Design Pattern is a vast and ever-evolving field, from web and graphic design to interior and industrial design. So, if you are looking for books that will help you to improve your Design Pattern concepts. Here are the top 20 Design Pattern books for individuals who are beginners and for individuals who are experts but want to explore more creative ideas in the Design Pattern field.
Top 20 Design Patterns Books of All Time
Design pattern books for beginners
- Head First Design Patterns
- Don’t Make Me Think
- The Non-Designer’s Design Book
- Thinking with Type
- Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture
1. Head First Design Patterns
This book keeps the readers hooked with its concepts and approaches. The book has an interactive and engaging teaching style, which is the main reason why readers recommend this book for beginners as well as for experts. Visuals and diagrams are engaging and help the reader grasp the understanding of patterns in design.
Author: Eric Freeman, Elisabeth Robson, Bert Bates, Kathy Sierra
2. Don’t Make Me Think
“Don’t Make Me Think” is a concise and accessible guide that is based on the principle which is: “web users should effortlessly understand and navigate the website without any strain.” A successful web design should make users feel they’re on autopilot, users get their results with minimum effort according to Krug.
Author: Steve Krug
3. The Non-Designer’s Design Book
“The Non-Designer’s Design Book” revolves around the concepts of fundamental principles of design, including proximity, alignment and contrast, and various other concepts with logic that are easy to understand. This book contains hands-on exercises to test and grasp a better understanding of the principles being discussed in the book So, the reader can apply what they’ve learned.
Author: Robin P. Williams
4. Thinking with Type
“Thinking with Type” is a book that is one of the best in typography and graphic design. It is helpful design websites and create PowerPoint presentations. This book provides a good and easy to understand introduction to typography. This book covers everything from basics of typography to more advanced topics in typography like layouts, hierarchy and many more interesting concepts.
Author: Ellen Lupton
5. Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture
“Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture” is the classic reference book in the field of software architecture and design. The book explains concepts of patterns, real-world relevance, code examples, timeless principles, and many more things about software architecture and design in detailed manner. It provides practical guidance, and a valuable and insightful catalog of patterns for building enterprise level applications.
Author: Martin Fowler
- Grid Systems in Graphic Design
- The Principles of Beautiful Web Design
- Universal Principles of Design
- Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter
- Design Elements: A Graphic Style Manual
6. Grid Systems in Graphic Design
“Grid Systems in Graphic Design” this book has a significant influence on the way how designers think about layout, composition, and use of the grids as the fundamental tool for creating better layouts. It has clear explanations, practical examples, and historical context that make this book resourceful for both newcomers and experienced designers.
Author: Josef Muller Brockmann
7. The Principles of Beautiful Web Design
This book provides insight and guidance on creating better visuals and designs for websites. The book is recommended for web designers, developers, and anyone interested in improving designs and visuals of the websites to make website more appealing. This book is a valuable resource for web designers looking to enhance their design skills and create visually stunning and user-friendly websites.
Author: Jason Beaird
8. Universal Principles of Design
“Universal Principles of Design” greatest strength is its ability to apply design principles to a wide range of design disciplines. It covers not only graphic design but also industrial design, architecture, user experience design, and more. Its clarity, visual examples, and comprehensive coverage of fundamental design concepts for designers across the field.
Author: William Lidwell, Kritina Holden, and Jill Butler
9. Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter
“Color and Light” is often recommended for artists, especially for those who are interested in traditional realist painting techniques. This book provides practical guidance guidelines and techniques for artist to understand, manipulate, and effectively use color and light in their work. The book contains beautiful and understandable illustrations created by the book writer.
Author: James Gurney
10. Design Elements: A Graphic Style Manual
“Design Elements” goes beyond just teaching design techniques, it also provides historical and cultural context for each design. This book serves as the source for inspiration for designers and students who want to deep dive in the field of design elements. It contains clear explanations, visual examples, practical exercises, and historical references making it a valuable book for designers.
Author: Timothy Samara
Design pattern books for Experts
- Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture
- The Design of Everyday Things
- Thinking, Fast and Slow
- Refactoring to Patterns
- Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software
11. Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture
“Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture” book has a significant impact in the field of software development and is consider one of the must read in the field of software architecture. It has architectural patterns and design principles that are crucial for building better and efficient software systems. It also explain best practices for each pattern, making it a valuable resource for software architects and developers.
Author: Martin Fowler
12. The Design of Everyday Things
“The Design of Everyday Things” this book is full of insights into design, and human psychology. This book made an impact in design industry because of the work and concepts author explained in the book. If you are an expert designer or the person interested in design and want to understand psychology behind everything this book is must read for you.
Author: Don Norman
13. Thinking, Fast and Slow
This book explains about two systems of thinking that impact human decision making and the factors that influence human judgment. To your surprise it is not a design book, it explains the working of the cognitive process and decision making, which is valuable and important for designers which will help them to make rational decisions and help them to understand the factors that influence human judgment.
Author: Daniel Kahneman
14. Refactoring to Patterns
Refactoring is the process of improving the design and structure of existing code while keeping its external behavior. Patterns are proven solutions to recurring problems. “Refactoring to Patterns” bridges these two concepts, and demonstrates how to refactor code using established design patterns. The book is an excellent choice for experts aiming to improve code quality.
Author: Joshua Kerievsky
15. Domain-Driven Design: Tackling Complexity in the Heart of Software
“Domain-Driven Design” is one of the important work done in the field of software architecture and design. It focuses on understanding and modeling complex domains which advances the field of the software development. If you are a software architect, developer, or someone interested in software design this book provides valuable concepts which will help you to become better at software development.
Author: Eric Evans
Some other important books on Design Pattern
- Python Design Patterns
- JavaScript Patterns
- Design Patterns for Embedded Systems in C: An Embedded Software Engineering Toolkit
- The Pragmatic Programmer: Your Journey to Mastery
- Design Patterns in Ruby
16. Python Design Patterns
This book Focuses on design patterns in Python, which is a perfect book for those who are wants to learn designing in Python.
Author: Chetan Giridhar
17. JavaScript Patterns
This book provides invaluable insights into design patterns in JavaScript. A valuable resource for web developers and for back-end developers.
Author: Stoyan Stefanov
This book offers valuable insights and design patterns tailored for embedded system development in C. This book is not recommended for newcomers because they might find this book challenging so, to read this book an individual must have prior knowledge of C and embedded systems.
Author: Bruce Powel Douglass
19. The Pragmatic Programmer: Your Journey to Mastery
“The Pragmatic Programmer” is not only based on design patterns but, this book offers a different perspective on software development, and also includes the uses of design patterns. If you are interested in software development and want to gain valuable insights this book is the right choice for you.
Author: Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas
20. Design Patterns in Ruby
This book contains an in-depth exploration of design patterns which is done using the Ruby programming language. This book is Recommended for Ruby enthusiasts.
Author: Russ Olsen
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