Kapitzki’s studies started in Danzig and Hamburg and were completed at the Stuttgart Academy of Fine Arts 1948–52. In graphic design he was, however, self-taught. Starting an inquiry into theory and practice of design in mass communication, he became freelance in 1953. He was a real educator: running a department at the Ulm Hochschule für Gestaltung, becoming head of the Institute of Visual Communication at Frankfurt (1969), and a branch of the Institute of Environmental Design. Moving to Berlin in 1970, he was appointed as professor at the Hochschule der Künste, where he taught until 1990. He pioneered the development of functional design, pictograms and international standards for orientation systems. Kapitzki redesigned the Frankfurt Historical Museum in 1971. The German pavilion for the Montreal Expo 1967 was one of his many exhibition designs. He wrote several books about grids ‘underneath design’, and also worked for SWF television and did the visual identity for Schering AG.