Carin Goldberg, A woman album cover design pioneer

"Framing male designers as genius rockstars, alongside pervasive sexism and invisible labor, is often responsible for female designers' lack of visibility."

Carin was born in New York City in 1953. She studied at Cooper Union and was trained as a painter but was also scholar of designs and typefaces, particularly those of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  She had hoped to be a painter, but decided she did not want to be a starving artist. 

After graduating from Cooper Union, she worked up a series of logos for CBS, where she was hired as a junior designer in the corporate design department. She moved on to work for Columbia Records in 1979 along with fellow classmate Paula Scher. There she found inspiration in early 20th-century graphics and began to incorporate historical references into her work. In fact, she loved design history. She is quoted as saying "without a sense of design history, graphic designers are lost in space.”

In 1982, Goldberg started her own firm, Carin Goldberg Design. She continued to work for record label clients, but also sought out book design assignments. She designed hundreds of album covers, including Madonna's 1983 self-titled debut album. Her covers for classical music albums were distinguished by “an airy, open style that balanced ornament and white space." (Ellen Lupton)

Because of her reference and use of design history for inspiration, she was often considered controversial in the design industry.  Her work was stylish, innovative, and profoundly different in every design. 

In 1983, she started teaching graphic design at the School of Visual Arts, and remained teaching there for nearly four decades. Many of her designs have been exhibited at many different museums, including the Smithsonian Design Museum. 

Unfortunately, this deeply inspiring woman passed away at the age of 69 in 2023, but she continues to inspire designers today with her bold album cover designs.