Penguin Covers
Joe Kral has a nice Flickr set of vintage Penguin covers. (via Neverhappened)
David Rainbird
Posted on Wednesday, 11th of October 2006 Permalink
Book
This is Miroslav Sasek
A holiday in Paris in 1958 inspired Prague born Miroslav Sasek to create childrens travel guides to the big cities. I recently bought ‘This is New York’ whilst over there and quickly bought ‘This is London’ on my return, can’t believe I’ve not run into them before, beautifully illustrated, charmingly written, I am now in search of the whole ‘This is..’ set.
Dave Brown
Posted on Thursday, 17th of August 2006 Permalink
Burning Man
When I first read that Neil Boorman was planning to burn all the branded goods in his life I wondered why? I mean, it’s all a bit five years ago – in 2001 John Freyer sold his whole life on eBay and Michael Landy destroyed all of his possessions in Oxford Street.
Whilst Freyer and Landy were both preoccupied with possessions, Boorman’s focus is his addiction to brands. The subject of his investigation is not really consumerism – it’s himself. He’s trying to burn his addiction (he’s also publishing a book about it in 2007).
The choice of burning Nike Cortez sneakers as an image to kick off the project is interesting – it’s the classic model that the Heaven’s Gate cult were wearing when they killed themselves in 1997 waiting for the Hale-Bopp comet to take them away. We should be relieved that Boorman is only destroying his possessions and not himself.
I’m also relieved to read on his blog that he starts therapy next week, although if the book is to include this research it might be delayed – getting a therapist to commit to a publisher’s deadline will prove harder than burning all of those things!
David Rainbird
Posted on Thursday, 1st of June 2006 Permalink
What’s on Kurt Cobain’s iPod?
Andrea Heller & Paul Harper commissioned a clairvoyant to contact 10 dead rock stars to find out their current musical tastes. I think the clairvoyant – Steve, must be very professional because his name isn’t theatrical like “The Great Steve”. Anyway, the resulting booklet is Death Disco. It’s published by the wonderful Nieves – Swiss, independent and chock full of great artists’ books and zines.
David Rainbird
Posted on Wednesday, 24th of May 2006 Permalink
Let’s Move to LA (Silverlake in particular)
There’s a general rule of thumb about architects (okay two rules of thumb—two hands, two thumbs). Architects are rarely women, and even more rarely successful before 50. The exception to the rule is Barbara Bestor (she’s 39 and doesn’t look like an architect). There are none of those Corbu style-heavy black glasses going on. So, she wears skinny jeans high heels and is all about modernism—but doing it with interesting materials. Plywood for one. Or cardboard. Both used to great effect in her building for Grand Royal and stores for XL. And now she has a gorgeous book out—Bohemian Modern Living in Silverlake, which is great not just for the cool houses (Eli Bonerz’s Neutra one for one and Barbara’s own iconic shack in the hills), but also for its cover and illustrations. The cover has that heavily textured feel that makes you think of math textbooks in the 7th grade (or if you’re British your second year of secondary school) – and the illustrations are all by the legendary Geoff Mcfetridge. And you can buy it all on Amazon.
Jennifer Kabat
Posted on Tuesday, 9th of May 2006 Permalink
Hard Backs with a Soft Center
Last year when the lovely Tsia Carson was looking for ideas for her forthcoming Supernaturale book on craft gone cool, David had this idea of turning old forlorn books into boxes. (What can you say, he only reads a novel a year). Well it didn’t quite work, but a library in Portland Maine is trying the same thing, turning unloved tomes into a lending library of art. Called Long Overdue, it includes the Candy Dish (the closest to David’s idea) where you check out a book that’s had a bowl drilled into it, filled with sweets. You can eat them, eat them all even, but then you must return the book with your favorite treats tucked into its pages. Oh and the book insists that the only people who can snack on its contents are those who’ve checked it out. So don’t go eating in the aisles of the Portland Public Library. Rather more literally one artist, Susan Winn turned Walt Whitman’s epic (and awesome) poem Leaves of Grass literally into that, a tiny volume whose pages have been turned into individual little blades of paper as grass. And if you’re in the US you can take out the books on interlibrary loan.
The project’s a bit like Lawrence Bradby and Anna Townley’s eloquent collaboration “Shelf Life” in the Norwich Millennium Library in Norfolk. Designed like a treasure hunt, they had special bookmarks to guide you to their selected works. The couple altered some 65 books—including having butterflies fly from certain volumes when you opened them. Then you got to keep the butterflies… (via the New York Times)
Jennifer Kabat
Posted on Tuesday, 25th of April 2006 Permalink
Indeed indeed
I’ve wanted to post this since buying a friend the book for Christmas. Now David’s broken the taboo I think it’s safe to share…
L.A. based designer, Bodhi Oser, had no big idea other than he thought it might be funny to print out different sized ‘FUCK’ stickers and take photos of the signs he defaced. He was right. And by offering free templates and selling sticker packs on the website he has garnered enough photos for a book and the acclaim of fuckers everwhere. Link.
Gary Butcher
Posted on Tuesday, 7th of March 2006 Permalink
Indeed
If you like swearing and craft and hey, who doesn’t? then you will have already bookmarked Julie Jackson’s Subversive Cross Stitch. You can now bookmark her real book, Subversive Cross Stitch, filled with all your favourites. Also if you buy the pattern above before April 30 then Jackson will donate fifty percent of the profit to The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. A f***ing good cause.
David Rainbird
Posted on Tuesday, 7th of March 2006 Permalink
1 New Message
If you’ve stumbled across any framed texts in public places around London lately, Jeremy Kunze is probably the culprit. They are literally framed texts, because graphic designer Jeremy has been collecting text messages, then framing and leaving them in spaces that relate to the original message, for example a text conversation about a tennis match is hung on the net.
He’s also collaborated with his partner Jane to create Jane & Jeremy – a website of their creative projects. The thrift-chic clothes, arty photographs and handmade books are all available to buy. My favourite is the collection of kisses from films – like the end bit of Cinema Paradisio in book form.
David Rainbird
Posted on Friday, 17th of February 2006 Permalink
Valentine Postcards
An artist is helping lovers (and would be ones) ease their consciences by confessing their deepest secrets on postcards. Frank Warren asked strangers to write down their secrets anonymously and send then into him, so far he has received 20,000 and posted the best on PostSecret. He has also published a book of the messages, which include everything from childhood trauma to funny experiences.
Vikesh Bhatt
Posted on Tuesday, 14th of February 2006 Permalink