A Paper Archive of Ideas

Michael Beirut recently published a post on Design Observer about his preferred method of taking notes and archiving his ideas – a standard-sized blank composition notebook. He started using them in 1982 and has filled 82 of them with notes, sketches and even drawings that his kids did. He calls them notebooks rather than sketchbooks because the books are likely to include more notes, lists and data as they are to include actual sketches. I'm fascinated by his notebooks, mostly because he found a system to document and archive his ideas over 20 years ago and he's stuck with it.



Despite the occasional book getting lost or misplaced, his system did not rely on computers or any kind of technology that required batteries, back-up systems or software upgrades. As much as I love technology, he makes a strong argument for paper-based idea archiving.

How do you keep your ideas?

Another Magazine Cancels My Subscription

According to the Kansas City Star and 63 other online news sources, another magazine has bitten the dust. This time it hits a little closer to home for P+P. The Hallmark Magazine announced yesterday that it would discontinue publication after just three years with the current issue on newsstands.

"Despite favorable consumer acceptance of the publication, we can not justify continued investment in the magazine at a time when we must focus our efforts and resources only on those projects that will lead to long-term profitable revenue growth for the company," Hall said.

Hallmark Magazine had doubled its rate base in two years and increased ad revenue by 30% in 2008. With the troubles in the publishing market over the last year and the overall state of the economy, the potential for decline for the publication definitely have been seen in the tea leaves.

The decision to close Hallmark Magazine affects 28 employees in the New York office and ten positions in Hallmark's Kansas City-based creative division, including several of P+P's friends.

This announcement follows a slew of other publications who have closed up operations including House & Garden, Domino, Craft, and Mary Englebreit's Home Companion to name a few. Check out Magazine Death Pool if you want to track the next glossy with its head on the chopping block.

Out with the New, Back in with the Old

A couple weeks ago, Kirsten posted about PepsiCo's redesign of the Tropicana brand. NY Times reported yesterday that, due to public demand, PepsiCo is discontinuing the new design in favor of its previous packaging featuring the orange with the straw stuck into it. Executives within the Tropicana organization were swayed to return to the original packaging when they discovered that consumers had a genuine emotional connection to the original look and felt that the new design looked "generic" and less distinctive.

Eye Candy: i.anton

Spotted on Flickr, the vintage, dreamy, almost-film-still-like images of i.anton. Prints of her images are available on imagekind.

Identify that Font!

Find a font you just love but don't know what it is? Got a client insisting you make their ad look just like "this?" There's a couple ways to tackle the problem, here's the one we use:

• On Flickr, upload a photo to the Typeface Identification group and see if anyone can recognize it.
• Try snapping a picture of the font in question with your iPhone and run it through WhatTheFont.
• Post a screenshot or photo on the Typophile Type ID board.
• Try using the website, IndentiFont. Linotype's Font Identifier is almost identical.

Hope you find what you're looking for!

Eye Candy: A Fied Guide to Stamps of the World

Gavin Potenza created his perfect world of mid-century styled postage stamps into a lovely print entitled, "A Field Guide to the Stamps of the World." Available at Tiny Showcase.

End of the Week Video Break

Check out this great stop motion video by Oren Lavie for your end of the week inspiration. Learn more about how it was made on Lavie's myspace page.

Book Covers Abound!

After Ana's post yesterday about your 30 favorite books covers, I poked around the net trying to find a couple of my favorites and ran across the Book Cover Archive. The site brims with amazing book covers from hundreds of great designers and let's anyone search by designer, title, author, typeface (totally geeky and rad) and tons more categories. The sites doesn't have every book cover so suggest some of your favorites and see if they make the cut.

p.s. – will try and post my favorite 30 book covers next week. thanks for the inspiration ana!

What can I do with Twitter?

I've come across a slew of articles expounding the advantages of using Twitter– for business, for blogging or for a host of other purposes.

I'm as entertained by reading and writing tweets as the next person but I'm not sure if I need yet another place to check for updates, posts and comments. I already read my work email, home email, Flickrmail, Facebook, IM and a handful of other community sites on a daily basis. Does Twitter replace or streamline any of this or negate one or more of the other sources?

Some articles for consideration:
Thinking about twitter feeding facebook status
Michael Surtees consider who say what to whom and where in the great debate, "Do I post this to Twitter or my Facebook status or both?"
Getting Things Done with Twitter
Use Twitter for financial, reminder, scheduling, health and more. It may be more useful than I thought.
Tweet Your Blog
Consider using Twitter to boost hits on your blog or website. Not a revolutionary concept but worthy of some consideration.
Tumblr lets users call in, queue posts, integrate Twitter
Ars Technica peruses the new additions to Tumblr, the already-abbreviated blogging tool.

Ars Technica calls BS on "There ain't no Magenta"

Ars Technica published an article today debunking the claims that magenta isn't a color. The rationale is that if we see it and our brains recognize as a distinctly unique color, then it exists. If you want a more scientific interpretation, feel free to read the full text and read the referring articles. See magenta, we do love you!

Oscar Nominated Shorts

[Clockwise from top: Oktapodi, Lavatory (Lovestory), La Masion en Petits Cubes, Presto and This Way Up.]

Tonight my husband and I checked out all the Oscar nominated short animated films at IFC Center in Manhattan. We watched all five nominated films along with four other acclaimed shorts. All the Oscar nominated films turned out to be captivating, smart and well-done. Some where funny like Oktapodi, Lavatory (Lovestory), This Way Up (small snippet here) or Presto by Pixar. While La Masion en Petits Cubes was soul-searching, introspective and bittersweet (small snippet here). I think La Masion en Petits Cubes should win while my husband voted for Presto. Another winner for us was Bill Plympton's Hot Dog which wasn't nominated, but we loved it anyways.

30 Books Worth Buying For the Covers Alone

Beth Carswell over at AbeBooks chose her favorite books based on the cover designs alone. Makes me think about all the books I bought (or didn't buy) because of the covers? What's you favorite book cover design?

First Pluto, Now Magenta!

It seems that all this time, I thought magenta was a color in the spectrum. Turns out, I'm wrong.

[Thanks to BoingBoing for demoting M. C, Y and K will miss her.]

When my worlds collide

Anyone who knows me outside of the design world knows that, besides my love of Vespas, MINIs and yarn, I collect Blythe dolls. So, when Target launched its new ad campaign for the Alexander McQueen line featuring Blythe (customized by Minklet, one of the best Blythe customizers in the US), I had to find it.

Will the doll generate interest in the clothing line or will the ad and marketing generate more interest in the dolls?



More images of the dolls from the ads and the assorted marketing materials are posted on Flickr.

Eye Candy: The Journal of Urban Typography

The Journal of Urban Typography is documenting urban, hand-crafted signs, words and typography created for utilitarian purposes. The photographic compositions are as interesting as the type itself.

Snooty designer chooses to NOT read Forbes. (That would be me.)

Forbes recently published an article about CrowdSpring, a web site venture that claims to "democratize design services." The subtitle was enough to keep me from reading the rest of the article:

CrowdSpring aims to slash the cost of graphic design work--and democratize a snooty business.

All I can say is that sometimes, you get what you pay for. So there.

Quotes on Design

Quotes on Design is a site to view and submit quotes on design. Simple inspiration.

Fun with the Pepsi Redesign

Apparently, we aren't the only ones who don't love the new Pepsi rebrand. All around the blogosphere people are posting fun little digs about the Pepsi logo. Here are a couple of our favorites.

Neatorama posted Lawrence Yang's hilarious logo tweaks and says that Yang plans to make stickers of them to slap up on advertisements around the city.




And Advertising Age posted another great logo customization.

Type Metrics, I Love Typography-style

In the past, we've told you how great I Love Typography is. They demonstrate their greatness in their post on the inconspicuous metrics of characters in a font. Its filled with the kind of information and visual details that a thousand design textbooks have neglected to address. While fonts look completely gridded and geometric, they stealthily break all their own rules in order to create the visual harmony we call readability. ILT gives the inside look at this subtle art.




This is the kind of detailed view of characters that make me appreciate and admire the master of type design even more. Go forth and marvel.

Eye Candy: Las Vegas Neon Sign Boneyard

This is a peek at some of the fabulous images of The Boneyard, the focal point of the Neon Museum in downtown Las Vegas taken by Greg Meadows.

The Designer's Review of Books

Prior to the creation of The Designer's Review of Books, there was no place to specifically find out if that $49 obscure design title was worth your hard-earned scratch. Thanks to the fine folks at The Designer's Review of Books, you can read detailed reviews of the books in your Amazon wishlist and either add them to your cart or remove them permanently.

The staff at The Designer's Review of Books will take your requests for a review as well as consider reviews you've written assuming they are thorough, well-written, proofread and to their liking. Hell, if you can do all that, you can write for us too.

Make your iPhone pretty

[From Typenuts]

I realize that each and every one of you is fully capable of making a gorgeous, engaging, well-typeset iphone wallpapers (And don't think I don't challenge you to do it too, but...). Sometimes, its nice to be inspired by someone else's work. Its cool. Its pretty. Its your favorite freakin' font. Whatever the reason, two web sites have popped up on our radar, both extolling the virtues of a well turned-out iPhone.

Typenuts features free typographically-focussed iPhone & desktop wallpapers.

Huge Type is an an experiment using found type and your iphone camera. Take a picture of a glyph in the world, upload it to the HugeType Flickr Pool. Then access the HugeType site via the iphone and browse the glyphs. If you have enough type nerd friends with iphones, you can even spell out a word. You'll probably have to wait for an AIGA event or the HOW conference before you can spell "antidisestabishmentarianism". (If you do, please send us a picture!)


[Fun with HugeType]

Mood Boards Made Simple

Image Spark makes it a snap for anyone and everyone to create mood boards. You collect images from around the net and add them to your free profile arranging them by tags. Besides your own images, you can also grab images from other users in the Image Spark community and add them to your library. After gathering the images together, you can arrange the images on a page and export as a lovely mood board. Simple, easy and sleek.

Shepard Fairey's Legal Issues

[Image from NPR. Credit: Mannie Garcia/ Shepard Fairey]

Thanks to Michael Surtees over at Design Notes for pulling together a comprehensive list of news and information regarding the on-going legal battle between Shepard Fairey and the Associated Press for his use of an AP photo in creating his legendary poster of Barack Obama.

(Seems we're not the only ones who can't stop talking about Obama. Just teasing you, Michael!)

SVA: Study Design in Italy

School of Visual Arts is offering an opportunity of a lifetime for designers to spend two weeks in Italy. Spend a week in Venice and a week in Rome studying the typographic landscape in the country reknowned for its art.

The program is an opportunity to study a variety of artistic disciplines including architecture, fashion, literature, theater, and even cuisine. Collaborate with area design organizations and businesses to create projects and products for publication and production.

Interview and completed application are required for acceptance into the program. Applicants must be seniors in a design or art program or a design professional. For more information and application, visit the SVA site.

How to jack up communication

A cautionary tale of design-by-comittee.

History of the Internet

We surf, waste time and some of us design for it everyday, but do we really know the history of the internet? Watch the video above and find out everything you need to know.

16 Activities for Creatives

Frank Chimero created 16 Creative Prompts over 16 pages and then included his responses for an issue of the Italian Un Sedicesimo published through Corraini. For those who don't live in Italy, Frank is selling copies on his web site. It goes without saying, we're big fans and could use a good kick in our creative pants right about now.

Niemann Legos N.Y.

Today, I received 3 emails all pointing to the terrifically smart and New York centric Lego musings of illustrator Christoph Niemann and I couldn't resist posting it. Niemann took Legos and created familiar, ordinary sites that any New Yorker would recognize. Now, I'm hoping someone takes inspiration from Niemann and does one for Chicago. Maybe Coudal could tackle it?

Finally! Alexander Girard at House Industries

I got a little sneak peek at the Alexander Girard collection when Andy Cruz was at Hallmark giving a presentation. I was burning to tell-all but promised to keep my big trap shut until it was released.

So, now I can speak freely!

House Industries has tackled yet another exhaustive typographic retrospective. This time, they've taken on one of the most influential artists of mid-century design, Alexander Girard. He was a textile designer for the Herman Miller company through the 50s and 60s -- what many think of as the glory days of comtemporary design and created many of the images and patterns associated with the design of the time. House Industries dove into the archives of Vitra and Herman Miller to collect typographic and design elements to build their Girard collection.

Four fonts were created for the collection: Girard Script (based on Girard's signature), Girard Slab, Girard Sky (based on characters originally created for Braniff Airlines), and Girard Sansusie (a casual, playful face).


[Girard Sky]



[Girard Sansusie]


[Girard Slab]


[Girard Script]

As well as a series of functional objects including wooden blocks, solid maple nativity scene, handmade dolls, children's puzzle, and wooden memory set. There's also some great t-shirts featuring some of Girard's most recognizable images.



[Girard handmade doll, Rosy Casa. Designed exclusively for House Industries by Marilyn Neuhart.]

[House Industries Girard-inspired building logo tee]

Congrats on another unforgettable collection, House Industries!

Gallery Show: Forget Me-Not

For those in NYC, be sure to trek down to the gallery hanahou on Friday, February 6th and check out their latest show – Forget Me-Not. The show is not about your mother's embroidery, but instead it focuses on modern embroidery artists and how they interpret love. If heading to the opening on Friday, please rsvp. For those who miss the opening, don't fret. The show runs through February 27th and for those with a crafty streak, gallery hanahou holds a special hands-on Valentine's embroidery workshop on Saturday, February 7th.



[Clockwise from top left: Heidi Kenney, Diem Chau, Shannon Rankin, Orly Cogan.]