Salon.com > Design http://www.salon.com Fri, 04 Jan 2013 12:45:00 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 Highway of the future is seriously smart http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/highway_of_the_future_is_seriously_smart/ http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/highway_of_the_future_is_seriously_smart/#comments Thu, 03 Jan 2013 16:20:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13160695 The Dutch design lab Studio Roosegaarde invents weird things. And now, the brains behind clothing that becomes transparent while the wearer is getting, ahem, intimate and a room that contracts and expands based on how hard you dance in it would like to redesign Europe's entire system of highways and roads.

So they did.

According to Studio Roosegaarde the highways of the future are safer, cleaner and more environmentally sound. The lab has developed solar powered glow-in-the-dark roads that charge during the day to illuminate your evening drive, dynamic asphalt paint that transforms in response to road conditions like ice and sleet, and car lanes that double as electric car chargers by using magnetic fields under the asphalt.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2013/01/03/highway_of_the_future_is_seriously_smart/feed/ 4 Online privacy’s new iconography http://www.salon.com/2012/12/13/online_privacys_new_iconography/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/13/online_privacys_new_iconography/#comments Thu, 13 Dec 2012 22:52:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13124296 The online syndicate Disconnect has joined forces with Internet nonprofit Mozilla and a team of designers to demystify web privacy for the masses. Their weapon of choice? A visual rating system that pops up in your browser bar. Since reading the fine print on how your personal information gets used is time-consuming and confusing, which is why you don't do it. As a result, average web surfers (Hi!) has absolutely no idea what information sites are mining for, or how they use it. That's where the icons come in.

There are currently nine symbols representing different degrees of compliance with privacy standards. If a website sells your data to outside parties, it gets a dollar sign inside an orange circle with an upward pointed arrow. If it doesn't, it gets a plain old green circle around a dollar sign. Confused? You're not alone. The new set of icons is complicated, and that's pretty much by design. As Casey Oppenheim of Disconnect explains, Internet privacy is a hard concept to boil down to a visual language. "How do you convey data, intent, all these different things?"

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/13/online_privacys_new_iconography/feed/ 0 Artisanal water filtration is now a thing http://www.salon.com/2012/12/10/artisinal_water_filtration_is_now_a_thing/ http://www.salon.com/2012/12/10/artisinal_water_filtration_is_now_a_thing/#comments Mon, 10 Dec 2012 20:39:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=13120443 The U.S. has some of the safest drinking water on the planet. We also happen to spend a whole lot of money on bottled water and tap filtration systems. Now, two designers are hoping to dip into that market with an über minimalist new purifier they're calling Soma.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/12/10/artisinal_water_filtration_is_now_a_thing/feed/ 4 Campaign font war: Gotham vs. Mercury http://www.salon.com/2012/07/23/gotham_vs_mercury_the_presidential_campaign%e2%80%99s_real_issues_salpart/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/23/gotham_vs_mercury_the_presidential_campaign%e2%80%99s_real_issues_salpart/#comments Mon, 23 Jul 2012 15:03:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12962505 Remember how great the Obama campaign was four years ago? The slogans, the rising sun in the O, the typeface. The strong, confidant and bold letters, which seemed designed specifically for words like HOPE and OBAMA. Well, this year, Romney is trying to bite Obama’s typographic style.

The Weeklings

Campaign typography is crucial in positioning each candidate; the letterforms of a slogan carry as much of a message as the words themselves. It works on a subconscious level, connecting the words we’re reading now with emotions we’ve felt elsewhere at another time. It’s no accident that in 2008 the McCain campaign chose Optima, the same typeface that is used on The Vietnam Veterans Memorial (and a few war memorials since), a subtle reminder of McCain’s military record. Obama’s typeface, Gotham, was macho but less heroic; it was originally designed for GQ magazine. Now, the Romney campaign is using a typeface from another men’s magazine, taking Esquire’s Mercury Display and mixing it with Whitney, originally designed for The Whitney Museum. (Does this mean that Romney has some subtle leftish leanings pro the Arts and is aspiring to be like Jeremy Renner or, for that matter, Sarah Silverman, both of whom are on the cover of the August Esquire?)

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/23/gotham_vs_mercury_the_presidential_campaign%e2%80%99s_real_issues_salpart/feed/ 6 Rebranding Brussels http://www.salon.com/2012/07/20/rebranding_brussels/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/20/rebranding_brussels/#comments Fri, 20 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12960838 ImprintEarlier this year, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, or ICANN—the nonprofit organization that controls the Internet's domain-name system—announced that it was accepting applications for new domain-name extensions. For a mere $185,000 a pop, anyone could suggest alternatives to .org, .com, .biz, and the other URL standbys. Out of the 1,409 applications ICANN received, there were a few amusing ideas (.ketchup, .gripe, .wtf) and plenty of reasonable if slightly depressing commerce-oriented suggestions from corporations (.pfizer), brands (.calvinklein), e-business niches (.spreadbetting), and tourist-hungry cities and regions (.barcelona, .quebec).

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/20/rebranding_brussels/feed/ 6 Illustrator fights back against Marvel Comics http://www.salon.com/2012/07/19/illustrator_fights_back_against_marvel_comics/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/19/illustrator_fights_back_against_marvel_comics/#comments Thu, 19 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12960093 ImprintNever mind whether Captain America is more powerful than Iron Man or Dr. Strange. The real problem is that Marvel Comics editor and publisher Stan Lee is vastly more powerful than Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and many others who originally drew those superheroes for the company. And Lee presently enjoys 100 percent ownership of the Marvel Universe, in both the public's perception and the legal arena. And what do the artists own? Zilch, that's what!

And this makes Arlen Schumer pretty pissed off!

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/19/illustrator_fights_back_against_marvel_comics/feed/ 9 Jean-Emmanuel “Valnoir” Simoulin pushes the limits of art http://www.salon.com/2012/07/18/jean_emmanuel_valnoir_simoulin_pushes_the_limits_of_art/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/18/jean_emmanuel_valnoir_simoulin_pushes_the_limits_of_art/#comments Wed, 18 Jul 2012 03:51:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12959538 ImprintJean-Emmanuel "Valnoir" Simoulin, the founder of the Paris-based design firm Metastazis, has just upped the ante on shock and awe. He is known for making a gig poster using blood as ink (read more here and here) and now, he says in an email, "if you're into embroidery, I thought my last project may amuse you."

Those who are weak of stomach, please stop here. Or, if you're like me, and have an appointment with the dentist coming up in the next few hours, attend to that before (not after) reading this.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/18/jean_emmanuel_valnoir_simoulin_pushes_the_limits_of_art/feed/ 6 How designers compress ideas to their essence http://www.salon.com/2012/07/17/how_designers_compress_ideas_to_their_essence/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/17/how_designers_compress_ideas_to_their_essence/#comments Tue, 17 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12958618 ImprintI was surprised the other day to find settings in iTunes and the radio-streaming app Stitcher that allow users to play a podcast at up to two times the normal speed. I tested them and discovered that, yes, NPR hosts speak slowly. But do we really not have time to listen to a pause for breath, or a moment’s quiet contemplation of a thoughtful response?

Then again, reduction and compression can also be done in a thoughtful way; certainly, designers constantly rely on reduction to inform our work. Logos and app icons require extreme simplification of an idea. From a perfectly composed tweet to a book cover, there's an undeniable art to brevity. Even when a particular designer's work seems to favor complexity, it's often an aesthetic judgment; the designer is choosing to reveal a select part of the spectrum from simplicity to complexity. Some of the greatest "maximalists" of our time show great restraint of concept.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/17/how_designers_compress_ideas_to_their_essence/feed/ 1 Vernacular signage is a joy http://www.salon.com/2012/07/16/vernacular_signage_is_a_joy/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/16/vernacular_signage_is_a_joy/#comments Mon, 16 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12957674 [caption id="attachment_367731" align="alignnone" width="594" caption="“Big Fish Eats Little Fish”"][/caption]

I’m easy. Okay, not easy like that—you people and your dirty minds. Vernacular signage makes me happy, and so do objects that have been accidentally anthropomorphized. Not long after seeing an upside-down mop in my driveway turn into a smiling woman with gray dreads, I stumbled upon Ner Beck’s small show up at the New York Public Library. It made me happy.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/16/vernacular_signage_is_a_joy/feed/ 1 Litho-mania http://www.salon.com/2012/07/11/litho_mania/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/11/litho_mania/#comments Wed, 11 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12954390 ImprintMy last post concerned the photoengraving industry of the pre-Depression period. This week it's pre-WWII lithography!

"Litho Media: A Demonstration of the Selling Power of Lithography," published in 1939 by Roger Stephens and edited by H. Homer Buckelmueller and Colin Campbell, is a 206-page, 12-by-15-inch slipcased bible produced to help publicize the successful and effective results of using the lithography process for marketing purposes. It doesn't pretend to be anything other than a "Toot Your Own Horn" compilation of uses (employing tipped-in examples of the produced work discussed), accompanied by testimonial letters from the various people responsible for utilizing the craft for their products. There are no technical descriptions or images that explain the process.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/11/litho_mania/feed/ 2 War swept under and over the rug http://www.salon.com/2012/07/04/war_swept_under_and_over_the_rug/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/04/war_swept_under_and_over_the_rug/#comments Wed, 04 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12950404 ImprintAs the U.S. prepares to draw down troops from Afghanistan this summer, what remains is a land of wounds left by Soviet, Taliban, and U.S. forces. Many scars are carved deep into the nation's psyche, and some are woven into their textiles. War Rugs: The Nightmare of Modernism (Skira), by Enrico Mascelloni, chronicles the history of a genre of beautiful yet disturbing objects, which I have found frequently at New York flea markets. Afghan war rugs are produced in different tribal workshops and refugee camps to either commemorate or celebrate the battles that have for so long ravaged the nation. This tension between modernism (represented by mechanized warfare) and craftsmanship is the underpinning for Mascelloni's overview.

[caption id="attachment_356201" align="aligncenter" width="492" caption="Photograph by John Hails. Used with permission www.ucalgary.ca/fyke_war_rugs"][/caption]

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/04/war_swept_under_and_over_the_rug/feed/ 1 Famous writers’ art and design http://www.salon.com/2012/07/03/famous_writers_art_and_design/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/03/famous_writers_art_and_design/#comments Tue, 03 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12949523 ImprintI attended the High School of Music and Art in Harlem, graduating in 1970. As one might expect, it was a place rich with talent. The program was split in two (as the name implies), and as I walked the halls, music would pour out from every corner. What I found interesting then was that many of the talents spilled over from one side to the other. I can’t speak to the visual art of the music students, as it was not so evident, but many of the art students were among the best singer-songwriters and rock musicians in the school. Indeed, our most famous classmate, Paul Stanley (née Stan Eisen) of Kiss, was an art student. I played in bands for fifteen years or so myself.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/03/famous_writers_art_and_design/feed/ 7 Graham Moore’s midcentury http://www.salon.com/2012/07/02/graham_moores_midcentury/ http://www.salon.com/2012/07/02/graham_moores_midcentury/#comments Mon, 02 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12948616 ImprintGraham Moore creates fine-art pieces that put you in a dancing mood, just by looking into them. In fact, many of them began as vintage LP record album covers, several decades pre-mp3. Then, under his knife, texts lose their legibility, images lose their identity, and those often dull cardboard sleeves are reconfigured into visual bop rhythms and beats that delight the eye.

This art grew out of Moore's graphic design career. He worked at studios and ad agencies in London back in 1985. In 1991, he landed in Los Angeles, where he now freelances and earns awards such as Print's Certificate of Excellence. He also teaches at Art Center College of Design and other schools around town, where his students learn non-digital, handmade methods of operation.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/07/02/graham_moores_midcentury/feed/ 0 Comics masters http://www.salon.com/2012/06/12/comics_masters/ http://www.salon.com/2012/06/12/comics_masters/#comments Tue, 12 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12935127 ImprintNot very long ago, a dedicated comics library might have looked less like a rare books room and more like a semi-coherent junk store, containing a three-dimensional scrapbook of out-of-print books, half-completed reprint series, miscellaneous small press magazines, bound photocopies and endless clippings. But the rise of the graphic novel category over the past decade has yielded a rich vein of previously rare or inaccessible archival material in well-designed, library-ready formats: complete comic strip collections, surveys of mid-century comic book genres, art books dedicated to historical and contemporary artists, and other rare pleasures.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/06/12/comics_masters/feed/ 1 New dimensions of type http://www.salon.com/2012/06/11/new_dimensions_of_type/ http://www.salon.com/2012/06/11/new_dimensions_of_type/#comments Mon, 11 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12935107 ImprintThe French designer Jerome Corgier, one of this year’s New Visual Artists, is a master of crafting two- and three-dimensional landscapes from type. For his newest project, called Skeletype, he has created an alphabet (minus one letter — can you find it?) from slats of wood held together with glue. Each letter seems to suggest a story, or an emotion, and the architectural construction lends the alphabet a sense of complexity, charm, and, at times, magnificence. The letters could be remnants from the set of a Brothers Quay film, sea creatures, illustrations for a sci-fi novel, a model of utopian architecture, or the scene of a seance. The alphabet is below — along with Corgier's answers to a few questions about its creation.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/06/11/new_dimensions_of_type/feed/ 0 Designers take on Page 1 of “Great Expectations” http://www.salon.com/2012/06/09/first_words_designers_take_on_page_one_of_great_expectations/ http://www.salon.com/2012/06/09/first_words_designers_take_on_page_one_of_great_expectations/#comments Sat, 09 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12934155 “My father’s family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip.” Those lines may not be as recognizable as “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,” but they are nevertheless part of the literary canon, the classic opener to Charles Dickens' "Great Expectations." On the first page of the novel, our narrator, Pip, one of literature’s great rapscallion ragamuffins, is examining the carvings on the headstones of the parents he never met, trying to glean some sense of them.

Pip’s earnest attempt at what we might call "imaginative typographic genealogy" gave the folks at GraphicDesign& the idea for Page 1: Great Expectations, in which 70 international graphic designers have a go at designing the first page of this classic bildungsroman. Why solicit designers—and this book is chock-full of heavy hitters like Phil Baines, Robin Kinross, Ellen Lupton, and Erik Spiekermann—to apply their craft to a novel that already exists in countless editions? Because Pip’s search for knowledge begins with the shape of letterforms, making the book a fitting choice for a redesign. The new book has page after page of every design pose you can imagine—from the punched-up tabloid point size employed by Neil Donnelly to Barnbrook’s infographics take. So what do we really make of this book dedicated to the first page of another book?

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/06/09/first_words_designers_take_on_page_one_of_great_expectations/feed/ 2 7Up’s branding revolution http://www.salon.com/2012/05/07/7_ups_branding_revolution_salpart/ http://www.salon.com/2012/05/07/7_ups_branding_revolution_salpart/#comments Mon, 07 May 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12913846 ImprintI became interested in pop bottles (I grew up in the Chicago area where we all said "pop") and related stuff when I was about 12 years old. I had gone inside an old garage that was attached to a neighborhood house that was being torn down and inside was a cache of un-returned pop bottles that must have dated from the 1940-'50s period. I took one of each type home (about 20 of 'em) and yes, still have them to this day. I really got off on all the different labels and colors of glass and because I used to like to read old magazines I actually recognized most of the brands that were no longer around or had changed their design. I'll go into this more in a future post, but wanted to lay some sort of a foundation for this piece, which is exclusively on 7Up, with a special focus on their branding efforts of the 1950s.

The soft drink that would be known as 7Up was created in 1929 by Charles Leiper Grigg in St.Louis as part of his "Howdy" line of sodas and was originally called "Bib-Label Lithiated (it contained the mood stabilizer lithium citrate until 1950) Lemon-Lime Soda." It was almost immediately re-labeled "7 (7 natural flavors) Up Lithiated Lemon-Lime," and then finally just "7Up".

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/05/07/7_ups_branding_revolution_salpart/feed/ 10 The genius pencil http://www.salon.com/2012/04/23/the_genius_pencil/ http://www.salon.com/2012/04/23/the_genius_pencil/#comments Mon, 23 Apr 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12881311 Imprint"I have found a new kind of pencil ― the best I have ever had. Of course it costs three times as much too but it is black and soft but doesn’t break off. I think I will always use these. They are called Blackwings and they really glide over the paper.” So said John Steinbeck, according to a Paris Review article (PDF) that pulled together quotations from the author over the course of his career. Steinbeck’s high praise for the Blackwing is just one notable voice in a choir of legendary figures.

In his autobiography, "Q," Quincy Jones explained how he composed “Suite to the Four Winds” by running all over Seattle, “working it out bit by bit on every piano I could find. That piece was the most valuable thing I owned. I carried it around with me every day, like money, scrawling on it, fixing it, changing it, carrying it under my sweater with a Blackwing No. 2 pencil in my pocket to make continual fixes.”

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/04/23/the_genius_pencil/feed/ 8 Black Dahlia beginnings http://www.salon.com/2012/04/20/black_dahlia_beginnings/ http://www.salon.com/2012/04/20/black_dahlia_beginnings/#comments Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12879901 ImprintWrapping up my interview with crime historian Joan Renner, we delve deeper into an unsolved murder mystery. Joan explores her theory that the victim’s Black Dahlia persona began when she was still alive. Read part one, with more details of the Dahlia investigation, here.

Our conversation picks up with Joan describing her passion for cosmetics ephemera from the 1920s and 1930s.

Joan Renner: About twenty years ago I began to collect vintage face powder compacts. The compacts nicely dovetailed with my interest in classic film, fashion, and the history of women. A few years after purchasing my first compact – a souvenir from the 1939 New York World’s Fair with that exquisite trylon and perisphere design – I was searching an online auction site and a few commercial face powder boxes popped up along with the compacts. I was struck by the beautiful graphics. In subsequent searches I found that there were boxes in a dizzying array of designs. I was hooked. My extensive collection of over 500 pieces includes commercial face powder boxes, hair net packages, bobby pin cards, and print ads circa 1900-1950.

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]]> http://www.salon.com/2012/04/20/black_dahlia_beginnings/feed/ 3 Pop culture’s Rosetta Stone http://www.salon.com/2012/04/19/pop_cultures_rosetta_stone/ http://www.salon.com/2012/04/19/pop_cultures_rosetta_stone/#comments Thu, 19 Apr 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.origin.railrode.net/?p=12881091 ImprintIn the wake of Chicago's "C2E2" 2012 ComicCon at McCormick Place, it seems fitting that I do a piece on an aspect of comic books that everyone even remotely acquainted with the realm knows well - the Johnson Smith & Co. of Detroit. You may not recognize the firm's name, but I'll bet you know some of its wares, its advertisements, and have seen its influence on pop culture and graphic design. This is a company that's been around since 1914 and after having had locations in Chicago, Racine, Wis., and Detroit, it continues to this day in Bradenton, Fla. Jean Shepard called the Johnson Smith Co. catalog "the Rosetta Stone of American Culture."

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