Secret Still

I read a lot. Like to the point where the people around me know not to take me into a bookstore, because I will spend too much without blinking an eye, and then there’s the inevitable cold truth stage where I feel sick for having spent that much. Then I’m reading and everything is ok…until I finish all those books. I am the reading equivalent of the fat guy with indigestion and diabetes. All that is just to say that I’m as qualified as the next guy to say “this is a good looking book.” Well, in the case of Studio8 Design’s Wonders of the Solar System, I can say that “this is a good looking book.” Well organized, perfect design, great information architecture, and full of cool information. If you don’t think that our solar system is cool, then you came to the wrong place. The wrong place being this solar system. I was gonna make a “go back to the Horsehead Nebula” joke, but you know what? I’m not gonna bother. Space is fucking rad, including the Horsehead Nebula. This book just proves that it can be even better when presented with some beautiful design to back it up. Studio8 Design, that is a good looking book, and I’ll be sure to buy it if I can ever convince my friends to let go into a bookstore again.

Studio8 Design

I’ve been sort of doodling type in the margins of notes and things at meetings recently. I’ve always held pretty firmly that if I’m in a meeting, I should be paying attention, and it’s rude to doodle. Opinion changed. If I’m gonna sit through meetings where I’m needed for about 5 minutes of the total hour, then I’m going to be using that time to make some pretty/interesting/gross/blasphemous. Possibly all of those at the same time. Not possible? A flower with an E8 sequence in the middle shitting on a baby Jesus. That’s just off the top of my head. But none of what I’ve casually been doodling is close to being as wonderful as the work of Dana Tanamachi. Of course, she isn’t doodling, she’s making fully-formed, kick your teeth out through your eyes works of awesome. But she is making them in chalk, a very impermanent medium. All it would take was one drunken Kiefer Sutherland to bump-slide his way past that wall, and whammo, all fucked up. It’s like sculpting with soap bubbles. “But Brad,” you’re saying, “couldn’t she just seal it with something?” “Readers,” I reply, “go fuck yourselves; I don’t have to take that kinda crap from you.” Here’s to hoping that someday my shitty doodles even resemble Tanamachi’s work. Should take me another five or six straight years of meetings.

Dana Tanamachi

You had me at Flaming Lips poster, Doublenaut. Someday, when I have a room that is my own (study/library/office), I will probably cover one whole wall in Flaming Lips posters. No band has influenced my life more, and no band ever has cooler posters. Maybe Ween. Kind of a tie, really. But Doublenaut’s arsenal isn’t limited to a Flaming Lips poster; these two aren’t a one trick pony. Their portfolio is stacked with example after example of their graphic superiority in the form of show posters, logos, apparel, and anything else you can think of. I looked through everything and could find no fault, but I knew they were great from the start. They designed a Flaming Lips poster; that’s all I need to know.

Doubelnaut

Austin, Austin, Austin, I hear and see so many good things about you. Someday I will actually visit you, and tour your many breweries, design studios, art galleries, and music venues. Not during SXSW, because that’s a big crowd, and nobody wants to see me have one of my crowd freakouts. But I bet you’re a pretty nice place the other 51 weeks of the year. And dammit if you don’t seem to have one of the best design communities in the US. I picture it as some kind of club where everyone sits around in comfy leather chairs by a fire, drinking Lonestar and talking about color theory. Some of you might even be smoking pipes. Renee Fernandez is there. That image above — Trading Post — I just can’t stop staring at it. That is a graphical win if ever I’ve seen one. Fernandez’s work is full of graphical wins. Yet another reason to visit Austin. Maybe next Spring.

Renee Fernandez

Design studio The Luxury of Protest caught me right good wallop upside the jaw this morning with their data visualizations. If you know me, and about 4 of my 6 readers do, then you’ll know that I do love me some good data visualization. It’s like porn, but the type of porn you only watch occasionally when you’re by yourself and you’re sure there’s no one around to judge you. Infographics are my secret design porn shame. And The Luxury of Protest is producing some sexy work. I just want to hold up those data visualizations and think all day about the actual impact of their data, as well as the visual hierarchy derived for the design to convey that data. Woo, it’s gettin’ hot in here.

The Luxury of Protest

His name is Glen Birchall, and he’s a London based graphic designer. And his website designs are the tits. I love me a fresh grid in the morning.

Glen Birchall

You know all that cool shit you see on the internet, and you think, “What a great idea! And it’s so simple! I must be mentally retarded to not think up stuff like that!” Brock Davis made that shit. 9 out of 10 images in your internet cool file are his. Seriously, it’s like scrolling through a fountain of inspiration over there. OMGZol Brock Davis FTFWz!

p.s. I’ve mentioned him before (over here), in case you were questioning my foresight in the cool department.

Brock Davis

I tend to shy away from cliches for the most part. Usually because they don’t contain a lot of swearing, and swears are a large part of my mystique. Powerhouse is not a word I use regularly, this may in fact be the first time, but powerhouse indeed is Jeffrey Docherty. Design, illustration, type — the man can do it all, and better than you probably can in your dreams. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was better looking than me. Some people are just better. If we can learn to deal with that, then we can probably end world hunger and reality television all at the same time. Lead us there, Jeffrey.

Jeffrey Docherty

It’s hard to be taken seriously as a writer/bringer of things pretty when I don’t really want to be serious. I want to talk about naps and blowjobs, and how I need both in that order. And you know what, internet? I will talk about it. And if you don’t like it you can report me to HR for sexual harassment (pronounced in the pretentiously British way). Maybe I feel like writing the word boner several times like a Tourette sufferer celebrating. Boner boner boner boner boner. And I’ll do it as often as I want. Just like Urban Influence does whatever they want when they’re designing. Ah, see, I brought it back around; made it all make sense. I am the Samuel Langhorne Clemens of the art/design blog world. Which is about the same as being the J.R.R. Tolkien of the dogfood bag copy writing world. “Low in the sky was the great, fiery sun as the free-range chicken rode forth from the small, organic farm, across the misty mountains to combine itself with the finest of golden wheats and hardiest of brown rices.” That’s enough post-modernism for today. Click the link, take the ride.

Urban Influence

Gonna throw some design at you today, because Fridays and rain mix to bum me out. Nothing picks me back up like some quality design work, especially when I’ve got my own projects to work on. No, I’m kidding; I don’t actually have emotions, but I was trying to be relatable. Isn’t this how people talk? Blah blah my dog, blah blah total bummer, blah pants.  You don’t pay me to talk though, you pay me to find things to look at, so look at Veronica Stark’s work. It falls into the ever-growing pile of work that I’m labeling “considered.” That’s my new verbiage, coming soon to your area code, and it means that the designer actually took the time to think about what they were designing for. You’d be surprised how often that doesn’t happen, or maybe how often the considering has no subtlety. Veronica’s work is considered, beautiful, and as subtle as a ninja’s ghost. Blah blah Obama-care.

Veronica Stark