New Work by Xavier Encinas
February 13th, 2009The talented Xavier sent me an email about a bunch of new work that he’s added to his website. Definitely give it a look.
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Barbican Identity Guidelines
February 12th, 2009I’ve been drooling over this Flickr set featuring a bunch of photos of the gorgeous Barbican Identity Guidelines book designed by North. Well done.
Update
Some posted a link to the downloadable PDF of the book. Thanks!
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Limited Edition Helvetica Moleskine
February 10th, 2009Category: Books, Design, International Typographic Style, Typography
Comments: 18
Folks, it doesn’t get any better than this. When I first saw this limited edition Helvetica Moleskine, I almost fell off my chair. Helvetica+Moleskine+Red+White+Cross=Perfection.
This notebook has instantly become my holy grail. I must have one and apparently there is also a black version. If anyone knows where I can get one please let me know! Thanks.
You can check out more photos here.
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10 Principles That Might Make Your Work Better or May Make It Worse
February 9th, 2009
Illustrations by Frank Chimero
I hate the word “tip.” It implies that there’s something that you don’t know. Some secret little gem that, when sprinkled on your work, your creative process, your diet, or your sex life will magically make it all better. They promise to make all of it effervescent, and float above everything, defying gravity above all those poor folks who didn’t happen to stumble upon Dumbo’s magic feather like you did.
Tips are easy. And shallow. Principles, though, now that’s something worth talking about. If tips are puddles, principles can be oceans. They can be deep enough to hold intrepid adventures, yet tame enough to provide a significant bounty to nourish a creative life. They can serve as a north star and a rallying point. More than anything, they can be an inspiration. Sailors will always sing about the sea.
Antonio asked me to map my own ocean and to document a few of my guiding principles. They may be of assistance to you. They may not. But then again, it’d be a shame if we were all working off the same map, looking for the same treasure.
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Das Erbe der Schweiz
February 5th, 2009Das Erbe der Schweiz (The heritage of Switzerland) is a sexy new poster by the super talented Xavier Encinas to celebrate the second anniversary of his blog Swiss Legacy. This poster honors the legendary designers that pioneered “International Typographic Style” which include: Ernst Keller, Theo Ballmer, Jan Tschichold, Herbert Matter, Max Bill, Emil Ruder, Josef Muller-Brockmann, Paul Rand, Max Huber, Otto Aicher, Armin Hofmann, Adrian Frutiger, Wim Crouwel and Karl Gerstner.
Offset Litho
PMS 877 C
148 gsm
Pacesetter Matte Text FSC Mixed
Printed in Canada by Hemlock
–
Edition of 100 only.
Each poster comes with a certificate of authenticity.
You can purchase it here for 50€.
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Helvetica Print Ad
February 5th, 2009Awesome print ad for Helvetica that was published in a 1966 issue of Print Design and Production. Here’s another one.
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Anyone Can Swiss
February 4th, 2009Category: Design, Grid Systems, International Typographic Style, Typography
Comments: 17
I find this site kind of insulting but at the same time very funny. Anyone Can Swiss, by Dirk+Weiss, is a satire on the Swiss style of design. Type in some text, select the between Helvetica Light, Ultra Light, Roman, Heavy and Bold, select a type size and hit the Swissfy button. What comes out (above) is your text in white, in Helvetica, on a black canvas.
It’s a great laugh and I definitely get the joke but I hope that people don’t think it’s this easy to design in the Swiss style. Far from it.
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Mercatdelgust Poster
February 3rd, 2009Swiss style inspired poster by Spain based firm Bisgràfic. They sent me an explanation of the info on the poster, but I think I deleted it by accident. Oops!
*UPDATE*
They re-sent me the explanation.
“It’s all written in catalan, but I’ll explain you. It is about a market. The Taste Market is a fair where you can find every kind of foodstuff that comes from the cultivation of the earth. In the poster there is a mixture between two elements: the earth and the food. The earth is green, like the nature, the grown fields, … and the food is orange. Both things are shown with the most elementary symbol: the round, symbolizing the plate, the earth, the food.”
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Introducing LegiStyles™
February 2nd, 2009As some of you already know, I use NetNewsWire for all my feed reading duties. It’s an amazing desktop applications that offers a ton of great features including synchronization. One of the great advantages of using NNW is that you can use custom CSS styles on your feeds.
There are a bunch of styles out there that are good but they all kind of look the same and most of them don’t focus on typography and readability. I’m trying to fill this void with what I like to call LegiStyles™, a series of custom NNW styles I’ve created that focus on design and typography. Best of all they’re free.
As of now I have 4 styles available but I plan to add more over time. If you don’t use NNW, I highly recommend it. If you do, head over to the site and download a style or two.
I’ve setup an RSS feed as a way to keep informed on news and updates. For all you Twitter users, follow LegiStyles for updates and also reply with any feedback using @legistyles.
Enjoy.
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Five Simple Steps
February 2nd, 2009Mark Boulton’s Five Simple Steps: A Practical Guide to Designing for the Web is finally available in PDF format for only £12.
A Practical Guide to Designing for the Web aims to teach you techniques for designing your website using the principles of graphic design. Featuring five sections, each covering a core aspect of graphic design: Getting Started, Research, Typography, Colour, and Layout. Learn solid graphic design theory that you can simply apply to your designs, making the difference from a good design to a great one.
I’m about to download it and check this baby out. Very exciting.
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Josef Müller-Brockmann Flickr Group
January 30th, 2009I’ve been meaning to set up a Brockmann Flickr group for some time now. I’m glad someone finally put one together. It’s still very new, only 10 members, but it will grow to be an excellent pool of Brockmann’s work. Please add if you have anything.
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Moa Moa
January 29th, 2009Superb work by Germany based designer Marko Puclin. Very clean and sophisticated work style which I love. I’m digging the huge images. I think everyone should do it up big.