AppleInsider Staff
After nearly three years in print, Apple appears to have halted sales of "Designed by Apple in California," a massive photo book that chronicles 20 years of the company's iconic consumer electronic designs.
While a dedicated "Designed by Apple in California" mini-site remains live on Apple's servers, links to purchase the book from Apple's online storefront are no longer active.
Conducting a search in the Apple Store app for iOS yields similar results. Entering the title's first few letters auto-fills the search text box with what appears to be a valid entry under the "Products" category, but executing the query yields only a list of Apple-designed accessories.
The apparent halt to sales arrives some two months after stock began to dwindle. A Reddit thread in late June noted large versions of the book were sold out with no estimated return date.
Considering time on market and demand, Apple potentially ceased production of the book earlier this year or in 2018.
An ode to Apple's industrial design team, "Designed by Apple in California" debuted in 2016 in two sizes — a $200 small version and a $300 large format copy — both of which contained 450 high-quality photographs of classic and contemporary devices. Going beyond simple hero shots, the hardbound book featured photos of products in various states of construction and, in some cases, deconstruction.
The work of Chief Design Officer Jony Ive, who presented the book in an accompanying Apple-produced video, is on display throughout. In fact, when Ive announced his coming departure in June, pundits commented that "Designed by Apple in California" was effectively a well-produced portfolio of his efforts at the company.
Charles Martin
Malcolm Owen
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
Wesley Hilliard
Andrew Orr
26 Comments
Excellent, collector’s edition scarcity has begun...Got the large, still in box.
I want this book. Somewhere inside my future collection.
Doing a run of these kinds of photo books is typical of design labels. Although it always felt a little artificial for Apple since the function of these books are to demonstrate the brands' design language by showing their radical and less known "thin end of the wedge" designs.
Apple's designs have predominantly been for the mass market, meaning there is little need to produce a book since the designs and design language are already well documented, known and celebrated.