I stumbled across The Salvage Press the other day. Lovely work…
The Salvage Press is devoted to preserving, promoting and pursuing excellence in design, typography & letterpress printing. It is the name under which artist & designer Jamie Murphy produces his letterpress printed books and broadsides.
Take a look. Or follow them here and/or here.
Deborah from Point dropped me a line earlier, with details of the conference running in May. It's a stella line-up…
Between 2–3 May, the Point London conference explores the theme of 'Authenticity'. Point is a non-profit organisation of designers raising awareness of the power of great design to change business, education and society.
Through over thirty presentations, screenings, performances, workshops and events, conference delegates can interact with design heroes, thought leaders and innovators. The line-up of inspirational speakers includes, amongst others: Magnum photographer Bruce Gilden, Olympic Torch designers Barber Osgerby, Seymour Chwast of Push Pin Studios, Jonathan Barnbrook of 2013 Bowie album cover fame, Font Shop founder and typographer Erik Spiekermann, digital innovator Nicolas Roope of Poke, Blackpool Comedy Carpet designer Andy Altmann of Why Not Associates and BCC artist Gordon Young, Matt Webb of enabled product and service designers Berg, Adidas brand director Gary Aspden, public space designer Morag Myerscough plus exclusive screenings of filmed interviews with design icon Milton Glaser, Magnum photographer Elliot Erwitt, and the late graphic design master Alan Fletcher.
If you follow me on Twitter (What do you mean you don't?) then you may have noticed that every now and then I tweet links to old blog posts. It struck me a while back that there's loads of stuff buried in the archives that many might have either missed or forgotten. On a personal level I've really enjoyed re-visiting all the old stuff. Stuff of days gone by. From back in the day…etc, etc.
Some of the really early stuff, I think, warrants more than just a tweet. Way back then I only posted a few images. This pack of maps for example, from when Czechoslovakia was still a Central European Sovereign State was barely covered.
I picked it up in Prague when I was on my Stag Weekend. By day, we stalked secondhand bookshops; by night we got rat-arsed on Absinth and inexpensive Czech beers. Ah, if these maps could talk…
Easter Weekend and we found ourselves on a sightseeing bus in Glasgow. It's been a while since I've been to a city I haven't visited before and even though one or two people had rained on the parade we were about to embark on, by dissing Scotlands largest city, we soon came to realise they were wrong and Anne was right: Glasgow's ace!
Lots to see. From the bus, it was largely the large stuff we took it.
Published by the RIT Press Vignelli Transit Maps tells the rise and fall story of the celebrated New York subway map, from its preliminary sketches, through its publishing and on to its demise. Lavishly illustrated, the book is an appropriately dignified and detailed monument to a significant icon of graphic design history.
Catching up with the New Aestheticists and Mr Barnes kindly introduced me to Rainer Kohlberger's brilliant pxl app. There are other things that achieve similar effects, like Poly and Dmesh. With Poly you have to do some actual real work (although not much and it's fun); I'm going to try out Dmesh next. But pxl stands out because you can export your auto-processed artwork as a vectorised pdf file, which makes the results much more useful.
It's effortless, which reduces the perceived value of the outcomes, but the results are, as you can see, great.
My colleague Sam (Irwin) picked this up from The Shop With No Name months ago.
It's kind of weird and really interesting. Loads of the pages are foreshortened to create a many-tabbed thing. But the maps are the best bits. Simply printed and a bit clumbsy.
You don't want to know what we did at the weekend do you? It's probably only really interesting to us. You might want to switch over to the other channel; there's bound to be something better on.
It was lashing down on Saturday, so we drove down the peninsula to Portaferry; to the Northern Ireland Aquarium, Exploris. We hadn't been for a while and it's in a great location on the edge of Strangford Lough. The boys love the aquarium, although to be honest, it's looking a little tired. They could do a lot more with the place. But it's still a brilliant day out and the aquatic life forms are well cared for and fascinating.
The gurnards were my favourites. They're a dour fish and kind of loaf about the sea bed, sucking up the plankton or whatever it is they live on, but I like them. They look a lot like me. They're also very obliging and sat very still for me so I could snap some lo-fi portraits.
The gurnards are lovable miseries but the highlight for all of us was the seals. They look after sick seals at Exploris which means it's pretty hit and miss what guests they have staying with them. In fact, I can't remember ever seeing seals in the pool. Right now though they've got three. And they were pretty friendly, giving us some top notch semi-aquatic mammal near-the-glass action. When they're taking it easy, further into the water, they're kind of ghostly.
Cotton thread is ever present in our home life. Largely because the International manufacturing hub of Karen's handmade empire is located in our dining room, with its centre of production pretty much overwhelming our dining table. A few minutes before dinner, almost everyday, the table has to be routinely cleared. And it's not uncommon to find small clumps of discarded threads here and there.
It struck me the other day that these spartan cotton nests are kind of beautiful.
In 2009 Massimo Vignelli generously released a free pdf document: The Vignelli Canon. If you dig around, you'll probably find it online somewhere. The Canon was a summary of what he considered to be essential knowledge that all designers should know, underpinning the idea that, "Creativity needs the support of knowledge to be able to perform at its best".
Vignelli is the quintessential designer's designer, championing a signature modernist approach that can feel a little soulless when practised without a deep understanding of the task at hand. But, of course, Vignelli is the master. Whether you're a dedicated modernist or not, The Canon is essential reading. A year after his electronic version, the print edition became available.
You're probably wondering how come it's taken me this long to get around to buying this amazing record of Lufthansa's design heritage? What can I say?
Laziness. Nothing more or less than bone idleness. Complete and utter, shameful, unadulterated, lackadaisical slacking.
If it wasn't for slothful, indolence I'd have snapped this up when it was first published. And delighted in its pages of tip top, world-class, über-stylish corporate identiness.
I am guilty as charged.
I was reading JohnsonBanks' Thought of the Week the other day. It was one of their Second Thoughtsies, Tina Roth Swiss to be precise. An interesting read, I'd have said the Bourbon biscuit was my all-time favourite. A couple of the questions had me self-analysing a little deeper. When did I first realise I wanted to be a designer? Tina was 7 or 8. Flippin' eck! I was in my twenties. The follow-up question was, "Did you experience anything early in your life that was a significant influence?".
That reminded me: I've been meaning to say something about The Goodies File for ages now. I think The Goodies File (circa 1974) was my earliest significant encounter with graphic design. I picked up a copy on ebay last year, for just a few quid. Seeing it again, I was not disappointed; it's a superbly crafted piece of work. Sometimes it's crafted to look crap, some of it displays cunning pastiche. Of course, much of it is just plain funny. A pre-Mac production, in those days the easiest way to mimic something hand rendered was to render it, by hand. Which means convincing authenticity. And because of that, the content is all the more engaging.
I now wonder if it was this that has made me so appreciative of convincing mimicry. It's a classic graphic design technique: you use the visual language of a profession or past time or something or other, to display empathy for a particular audience or to reflect a certain theme. I've done it plenty of times myself: a medical file for a GP's practice manager, a gold award envelope for a BAFTA member…betting slips, receipts, vitamin bottles. I love to see other people doing too. This is superb – so well crafted.
It feels less good, despite detailed crafting, when we see it online now doesn't it? Perhaps because it's more fake; the medium's different; it can't convince. We loved it for a while but now, en masse, we're turning our collective backs on feux. For a while at least. I guess that probably happened when we were only concerned with print too.
So when Michael gets around to asking me the questions (I know, it'll never happen), you know what I'll say.
Sometime during the mid-sixties the American trade paper Printers' Ink asked ad man Howard Luck Gossage for the ad he'd "never forget". He explained that it was a full page he'd seen around 1925, for a haberdashers. It had a massive woodtype headline that read "MONSTER SHIRT SALE", only they'd missed an "R" out.
It wasn't what they were expecting. It was, however, very Gossage.
A few weeks ago I was in Birmingham, having lunch with friend from the internet, copywriter Johnny Cullan. We talked about all sorts of stuff but came around to our shared hero Drayton Bird. A singularly uncool character in the marketing industry he was (is) a man totally focussed on getting results. I've learned a lot from Bird, although he doesn't know it. The line of chat lead Johnny on to introduce me to Howard Luck Gossage and, more specifically, Steve Harrison's book on the man that was published last year.
It's understating it to say that Gossage was an unconventional adman and to get his full measure you'd be much better off getting yourself a copy of Harrison's book than rely on any attempt I might make to talk him up.
I'll say this though: Gossage was also a man that wanted results; direct results. He came to feel that the mechanisms of his business would be much better employed for the greater good and during his life he showed how that should be done. He got some amazing results.
To summarise some of his most significant achievements, Gossage: saved the Grand Canyon from likely destruction; kick-started the Green Movement (i.e. Friends of the Earth); launched Marshall McLuhan onto an international stage; and inspired Tom Wolfe. John Steinbeck worked for him for heaven's sake! He used interactivity and "social media" practically forty years before the internet existed; and he pioneered the cybernetic technique of the information loop decades before the term "iteration" was adopted by the web community.
There I go, talking him up. But really, Gossage was that important.
Steve Harrison's perfectly titled book, Changing the world is the only fit work for a grown man, captures the radical energy of this lesser known pioneer in detail, with the personal memories of those that knew him best. OK, it's not as funny as my opening anecdote might suggest but nevertheless, it is an exciting story; about a man on a personal, world-changing adventure in advertising.
Issue three of GF Smith's Naturalis Works series, designed by StudioMakgill, is all about experitmentalist duo Based Upon:
Based Upon was founded by twin brothers, Ian and Richard Abell. They had long felt the instinctive desire to work together on something important, and when they chanced upon an undiscovered material, their destined collaboration presented itself. They heard about Liquid Metal, a substance that had been developed by an Australian company. It was being used and marketed as a skin to mimic metal, but Ian and Richard saw it through very different eyes. To them, its potential as a creative medium was fascinating.
I'm pretty sure it's the last in the series, which is a shame; each has been great in both design and content. GF Smith's website explains them all.
I've been meaning to do this for ages. Karen, my beautiful and extremely talented (and frugal) wife, every now and then, asks, "How come you can't make any money out of that bloody blog of yours?". "Can't make any money?", I say, "Can't make any money? I'll have you know I made a tidy $50…over…er…the last…well…hmmm, let me see…six? Yes, six months". That's about what I get for having that wee ad over there.
It's effortless but barely covers my Typepad fees. And goes no way to support my lavish lifestyle, my yacht, my villa in the Seychelles, Noah's Stradivariarse, Seth's herd of llamas or, indeed, Karen's near daily luxury spa treatments.
Then, of course, Ace Jet was never meant to be a money making venture. It's always been an outlet for the mishmash of cerebral fodder in my grey matter. It's all done for the love of the stuff. And although I've been approached occasionally by companies wanting to exploit its pixels for their own ruthlessly commercial end, I've resisted the temptation to dirty its pages with such vulgarity. Mainly because they're run-of-the-mill digital print companies claiming to offer the very finest printing ever. On the finest, shiniest paper in the world. At the cheapest price.
No, they can fuck right off. And in their place, I've just signed up to an Amazon Associates account which I'm filling with various tip top quality designery books I've plugged over the years. And will continue to do so, on the off chance that some lovely viewer is suitably inspired to purchase one from my aStore. If that ever happens, I'll get a meagre few quid kickback. Money that will help me feed my children and maybe even the dog we haven't got yet.
So, if you feel like a browse through stuff I've actually, genuinely read from actual front to real life back cover, you can find the secret entrance to my bookish Aladdin's cave of designery beauties on the left, at the top.
I'll only list books I'd recommend - although I have to say, I'd recommend alot. There are classics and there are some surprises. Lots of historical stuff like Corporate Diversity (superb!) and some practical things, like Jon Steel's Perfect Pitch (essential reading if you ask me).
So take a stroll, if you will, through its shelves. And if you do buy something, just think: not only will you be enriching your own life with knowledge that will probably help you win a D&AD Yellow Pencil but you will also be enriching my life – with money.
Ta.
It's a striking and slightly strange cover from the little heard of Grant Grimbly for the 1968 edition of Huxley's last novel. A couple of years later, Grimbly re-visited the cover. I can't help suspect the Sales and Marketing boys applied a little pressure to snazz it up a bit…Grimbly also did this one.
A little shorter than normal, the Fürst 2.0 clutch pencil is my scribbling implement of choice. I used to be a propelling kind of guy; the Rotring does take some beating. But the clutch pencil comes with something, a special pleasure, that the propeller doesn't have…A lead sharpener in the end. Really! You just unscrew the shiny (so shiny!) end — not forgetting to extend the lead a little first (got to do that first!) — then for the next two to three minutes you can whittle over; to your heart's content, as they say.
And with your freshly sharpened point(s) you can return to your drawing board, with renewed vigour. A new and better world is just a few sketches away.
You can buy your own, world changing Fürst 2.0 over at Herb Lester. And while your there, check out the mighty 5.6mm beast.
Path buddy and all round gentleman Mr Steve Kirkendall bought Unit Edition's volume on graphic design ground-breaker Ken Garland recently. I'm delighted to say he agreed to write a guest blog entry on the book. I asked Steve to tell us a bit about himself first:
I work for Virgin Money as a print/web designer which is quite creative, when I'm not doing amends. I've worked in London, Chicago and I'm now back in Norwich where I'm from. I've worked as a cartoonist/illustrator, a magazine designer, freelance all rounder and a creative director for a small publishing house. When I'm not working I am trying to shoe-horn Javascript into my stubborn brain. Or running. I blog at www.kirkendall.co.uk, which I'm presently redesigning, so please forgive its pants-down demeanour.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
The film is about to start. The lights dim, the screen darkens. Out of the void you hear a voice, mature, quick, warm. It says:
"I've always thought it was terribly important to be able to say to someone: 'You don't need this – you can do without this symbol or you can do without this sign.' I think graphic design will only come of age when it can take on these sorts of questions, and sometimes answer them by saying, what you need here isn't graphic design it's whatever else. Or maybe nothing."
The words 'Ken Garland: Structure and Substance' appear on screen in Folio Medium Extended, range left and reversed out. They fade and the film begins.
Sadly, we'll have to wait for that particularly piece of heaven; this film doesn't exist. However, we do have the book. Ken Garland: Structure and Substance by Unit Editions is, unbelievably, the first ever monograph of one of our leading graphic designers. It may come as no surprise to learn that although only issued late last year, it's already on its second printing.
Part of the post-war generation of designers that included Alan Fletcher, Colin Forbes and Derek Birdsall, Garland is not as celebrated as his contemporaries. Maybe it's because he rarely entered his work for design awards and steered clear of any professional design body (although he helped to found D&AD, he left when he felt advertising started to dominate). Early in his career, his dissatisfaction during a meeting of the SIA (now the Chartered Society of Designers) led to the creation of his famous manifesto 'First Things First', where he called upon designers to use their skills to create 'lasting forms of communication' for 'worthwhile purposes'. With the applause that followed came the image of Garland as the design world's 'Mr Ethics' – something he always refuted. Though nobody doubts Garland's integrity.
Whether designing for Galt Toys, Paramount Pictures or the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, he never imposed his personal style or opinions onto his clients, preserving his own views for his books and many articles for the design press. A deep mistrust of homogenisation steered him away from corporate design (he famously turned down IBM) and stopped him from fully embracing the rigour of the Swiss, feeling that they prized form over content. Instead he felt the best way was to meld Swiss cool with American warmth – a philosophy described in his 1960 essay 'Structure and Substance' from which this book takes its title.
And what a book this is – whether, like me, you're a fan of Garland or are interested in the part he played in the birth of modern British graphic design, it will not disappoint. Everything is here – his design, logos, photography, lists of lectures, articles and books. Recommended, go buy!
P.S. Unit Editions are hosting Ken Garland: A graphic celebration at the St Bride Library in London on Tuesday 12 February. Unfortunately, it's sold out. However, Ken Garland will be signing copies of his book afterwards, you might want to pop along and see you if can get a cheeky autograph.
An accompanying pamphlet to that Tschichold text, this is as beautifully printed. An Older Typophile in the Nineties was printed using Linotype and Monotype Baskerville types on Mohawk Vellum paper. So it's everything you want from letterpress: a roughness to the sheet, nicely impressed letters, possibly once frowned upon but actually quite satisfying show through and hand tide string binding. It's lovely. You can get your own copy from the RIT Press.
I can't remember exactly who it was (quite possibly Johnny again) but a year (or two) ago I sparked up a short exchange about the sad demise of the pamphlet. It's a delightful format, the pamphlet. Kind of like a decent sized blog entry in print. A forerunner to the blog really, the pamphlet embodies a small work, inexpensively produced that would often have delivered a text of some importance; a new idea, a political statement or a religious concept.
My all-time typo-hero Tschichold wrote Clay in the Potter's Hand for the 1948 edition of The Penrose Annual. This reproduction of the text forms part of the Red Cat Typography Set and is available from the RIT Press. It's beautifully letterpressed on a Golding No.7 press using (presumably) Linotype set Garamond No.3 (Morris Fuller Benton's version of Claude's original) and hand set Garamont (the italic headings?). A wholely appropriate choice for a Tschichold text; he based the roman weight of his own most famous typeface design Sabon on Garamond's.
Richard Holt is a complete gent. He sent me these two lovelies. As a result, by mid-February, my penmanship will be improved ten-fold. I'll be scribing wistful and poetic correspondence like nobody's business.
Printing Processes is superbly illustrated and, as you'd expect from Ladybird circa 1970, explains with absolute clarity how it was done way back then…when letterpress and the likes of the Linotype/Monotype machines were still fresh in the memory.
Towards the end of last year a friend of mine, who was working on a web-based typography tool, asked me for tips on how to pair typefaces. I know how I approach the task but I started to wondering if there were well defined techniques to share. Digging through typography books (old and new) I couldn't find much on the subject. One or two writers basically say, "Just don't do it!", advising you to stick to one font family. After all, that's why it's been designed as a family (well, one of the reasons). Interesting, good advice, but the urge to contrast typefaces is still there. Are there any more encouraging answers?
And, perhaps, now more than ever an encouraging answer would be helpful. Not least because of the whole new generation of graphic designers (whether they call themselves that or not) whose work manifests itself in some digitally-based form but whose journey has not taken the "conventional" route. They haven't got to where they are via a lengthy stay at the university of typographical hard knocks. But the desire to learn is great.
What would/do I do? The first and most obvious approach, I think, is to look to type designers who have produced a range of typefaces and see if sympathetic pairs can be identified from within their body of work.
It's not uncommon for type designers to use similar letter structures across different typefaces. Some are plainly obvious, Spiekermann's Meta goes with his Meta Serif; Sumner Stone's self-titled Sans sits nicely with it's Serif sister and Informal brother.
More recently we've seen the term "Super Families" become more visible, describing sets of typefaces, some with incredibly extensive variations. Super Families hand us sympathetic font pairs on a plate and that's very helpful; not least for the fledgling typographic designer.
But what if you want to freestyle? Go off-typedesigner or off-superfamily in search of a pairing with greater contrast or all of your own making. How do you start?
I can think of two ways (there's probably more):
The easiest way is to cheat. You go looking for examples that work and you copy the same pairing. It's not stealing; it's not a terrible way to approach it really. Except that you're not going to learn much. It's a bit like the old, clichéd "Give a man a fish…" cliché.
A better way to approach the challenge is to get closer to the type; intimate in fact. Get under the skin of type design, analyse the characteristics of typefaces to discern what one (say, serif) face has in common with a different (say, sans) face. Learn about its historical and, even, its geographical contexts.
Enter, stage left, Stephen Coles' new book The Geometry of Type (or if you're Stateside, The Anatomy of Type). A timely publication, given the still fairly new but ferocious interest in typography from the designers and builders of the digital realm; Stephen's book, I think, couldn't have come at a better time. It presents just what those new to designing with type need to know.
The Geometry of Type leads you through the classification of typefaces, their historical background and reveals their distinguishing characteristics. Armed with a detailed grasp of this knowledge, the designer can see that, for example, a particular typeface that falls into the Humanist Serif category may well work well with another face that could be described as a Humanist Sans. Or how a Geometric Sans might work well with a Rational Serif (more traditionally known as a Modern). Of course, with any one single volume only a limited collection of typefaces can be included. Perhaps the most important lesson that the book teaches is to look closer at whatever typeface we're using. It teaches what to look for; where the critical details can be gleamed.
I think this is a book that could, and probably should, become a staple for a generation of typographic designers. From talking to a few people who are coming to typographic design with a digital background, our time feels not unlike that period when design studios were just installing Macs for the first time. When graphic designers were getting their hands on type which they'd previously relied on others to control (typesetters).
It's a little different but it's similar because there are designers using type with very little proper understanding of its intricacies. I was like that way back then and what I had to do was learn lots of stuff. I can wholeheartedly relate to the plight of these designers; that's just what I was like. And what I needed back then was a nudge here and there to set me on the right track. Stephen's book is one of those very helpful nudges.
Related: Ellen Lupton's article on Thinking With Type.
Super Families: At fontshop.com and fonts.com
I think it's kind of interesting that this was published at around the same time as that new Bowie album cover design appeared. They're clearly not really connected but they do have obvious things in common.
I'll be totally up front: I think they're both fantastic. Great, brave, strong ideas. Both feel radical in a time when it seems everything has been done. Not that blacking out text or regurgitating old artwork haven't been done before, of course they have. But when considered in context (and context is so important isn't it?) I do think both are challenging ideas. They are, it's undeniable. If they weren't, they wouldn't have triggered such discourse. Love them or hate them, in their contexts they're challenging - and in their contexts, challenging is good.
David Pearson's book cover is the antithesis of conventional book cover design and, perhaps, could only have been achieved with a book like this. Unless the cover is laughably unsuitable 1984 will sell. As it is, I have a suspicion that this cover will create new, invigorated interest and ultimately greater sales than if a more conventional approach had been taken. Why? Partly because of what I just said: 1984 will sell anyway but mostly because of the times we live in. Dare I believe that "good design" is recognised and embraced more than ever? Pearson's design has certainly caused a stir.
I remember my gut response to seeing the cover for the first time on Dan's blog. I immediately thought, "That would never have happened if it wasn't for the Great Ideas covers". Those series', in my humble opinion, shifted the perception of not only what you could get away with but how intelligent, considered, restrained design could actually sell books. Particularly at Penguin, I imagine those series' proved something. Perhaps a "something" that could only apply to re-issued older volumes but a new something nevertheless.
I can easily believe that this new cover may be an outcome of what was learned: innovate and people will buy. And Penguin deserve to be aplauded accordingly.
But what about Barnbrook's Bowie cover? The album's not even out yet but the debate is ferocious. Again: loved and hated, the big and simple question is: Is the design any good?
I think there's plently being said about it so I'm not going to spark another fight here. I don't think whether you love or hate the aethetics is really the point. What's important about it is that an artist like Bowie, at his age and position, opts for a design that shakes things up; that pisses people off. In one discussion I've been involved in we speculated over whether the re-hashing of an old album cover had been done before; Massive Attack was mentioned. But it's not just any old cover being re-hashed is it? It's an iconic album cover, provocatively bastardised. Vialated. Imagine doing that to Sgt Pepper or Revolver or Pet Sounds (OK, perhaps Heroes isn't quite up there with those but you get the idea).
Again, I feel that wouldn't have happened a few years ago. For some reason, and I'm not totally sure why, it feels like both the Bowie cover and the Orwell cover are products of our time. Is it a post-post-post-modern thing? I don't really know what that means. Is it because we live in a mashed-up digital world where "design" is embracing so many new things (3D printing, digital/print colaborations, craft/digital assimilations, lots of other stuff)?
I know I haven't got any real answers and this post is little more than my ramblings but I felt moved to put thoughts down because I think both covers are, if nothing else, provocative and it seems that it's been a while since we enjoyed such goading.
This post has to be accompanied by an apology to designer, author and lettering fanatic Simon Hawkesworth. Simon was kind enough to send me a copy of his book A Lancaster Alphabet: Letterforms from the Stones of the City in December but what with all that Christmas stuff and nonsense it's taken weeks to get around to uploading anything.
An elegant volume it celebrates the architectural and commenorative lettering of Simon's adopted city. Each letter of the alphabet is represented with its own spread showing where it was found and the social/design back-story to its location.
A Lancaster Alphabet is published by (and is available from) Simon's own Fast Foot Press.
If you didn't know, each year at around this time (well, in time for Christmas) Pentagram produce a small holiday book; something playful. Last year it was Today I'm Feeling Turquoise. This year it's a book of push out, metallic silver gift tags with special messages on the back. Special, heart-rending, touching (slightly twisted) messages of love and desire…and paperclips and ice scrapers.
Written by Naresh Ramchandani with the help of Tom Edmonds and Nick Molster, it's very simple and very funny. Click each image to read the texts.
Don't tell her but I nicked these straight off Alice's Tumblr…The new campaign from Ogilvy for Expedia makes great use of luggage tags. (Nicked those words too - basically, this is her post).
Just before Christmas, Nat in the studio, got a really nice package from the Italian paper manufacturer Fedrigoni. We all looked on enviously. But not one to let these things lie, I promptly contacted the company and they kindly sent me my own copy. Part calendar, part Woodstock paper range school exercise book style promo, the pack was design by The One Off. And it comes with a pencil and some string; it's lovely.
Always feel rather privilaged to receive Pentagram Papers. They're often odd in their subject matter, always surprising, usually delightful; the latest is all of those things.
Cowboys and poetry aren't particularly familiar bed-fellows round these here parts but in the right circles, there is a long heritage of high plains wordsmithery. Designed by Austin-based partner DJ Stout, with Stu Taylor, Paper 42: Cowboy Poetry features stunning photography Jay B Sauceda and the lyrical ramblings of whole posse of veteran ranch herders.
You can read more about the book and the launch party here.
Sad, perhaps not surprised, to here of Gerry Anderson's death yesterday. But genuinely sad. Anderson's work played such an enormous part of my childhood and, for that matter, the early years of my own children; they have been massive Thunderbirds and Stingray fans but also enjoyed most of his major TV series'. Hard to measure a man's true creative greatness but Anderson is surely up there with the greatest of science fiction and action adventure film makers. He out-reached many of them with his ingenuity and uniqueness.
Much has been said over the years about the various shows he created. Now he's dead it's got to be time to take another look. Beautiful and meticulous work. So clever, so original. So very, very well designed.
And to illustrate that last point, take a look through Fred's incredible Flickr set.
I don't know what these things are called. You know, the distance matrix so you know how far it is between cities. The unsung hero of the road map.
Penguin Scores…new to my Flickr Sets.
The unquestionable truths of Dr J.
Yep, a "weather station with an indoor cloud function". Of course. Using data from Sweden's Met Office it brings the outdoors, inside. From those clever people that brought us the iPad powering rocking chair.
Cool modernist typography; fresh, clean colours; this sheet reminds me of Vignelli.
Maps courtesy of the marvellous Johnny Cullen.
This is a lovely sheet. Two colours. Quite roughly drafted with that red haphazardly overprinted; it looks like someone's just drawn over the black linework.
Maps courtesy of the marvellous Johnny Cullen.
Conoco sheets are a bit cranky, the font is a bit dodgy and the blue plate feels a little heavily printed. But what's most disconcerting, perhaps quite peculiar to the US (I don't know), is how straight and gridly the road systems are.
Those ace people over at Herb Lester are now selling luggage tags. Printed onto what looks like Tyvek®, they're lightweight but robust. They're also lovely…and don't cost much.
The perfect accompaniment to…er…something else, this Christmas.
Johnny (Euston, do you copy) Cullen knows I like a good map. Disparities in colour scheme, typography, level of detail, branding and other trappings are fascinating. There seems to be no end of variation. Johnny very generously sent me a box full of maps from the US he found in a charity shop. There's loads of them; what you see here is but a small sample.
It was such a generous thing to do and there are so many different designs that I thought they deserved their own series. Hence that…ehum…"special" heading.
I feel incredibly privileged to have received Monotype's One of a kind box set. Beautifully designed by SEA, the box contains twelve bi-folded booklets; each focusing on an aspect of Monotype's work: its Britishness and its Internationalness; essential workhorse fonts, lesser known gems, type on screen and web fonts; the company's heritage, publishing sympathies, American support and most famous fans.
Each booklet presents fonts appropriate to its theme accompanied by a text from someone of note: Creative Review's Patrick Burgoyne, Pentagram's Abbott Miller, Eye's Simon Esterson, Andy Payne from Interbrand, Rankin and SEA's own Bryan Edmondson; who I have say a special thank to for very kindly organising the dispatch.
It's an impressive piece and a fitting tribute to Monotype; its rich heritage and its dedication to the future of typography.
Last week I finished my stint guest blogging for Herb Lester. It was fun. I wrote a set of entries on peculiar corners of Belfast (and a little beyond). The last post was about the shop over the road from our studio. If you want to head down there, it's opposite Portview on the Lower Newtownards Road.
Me and the boys went down to the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum last weekend. So, of course, we slipped into the print shop. It could be so much more than it is. Right now, it's an exhibit; just that. What it really needs is a massive injection of enthusiasm then who knows what it could become.