Salon.com > Mason Currey

Rebranding Brussels

Fri, 20 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Earlier 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).

Designer for the age of austerity

Mon, 25 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Unit Editions’s forthcoming monograph on Herb Lubalin already seems poised to be the design publishing event of the summer. Scheduled to begin shipping in August, Herb Lubalin: American Graphic Designer, 1918–81 is the first major work on Lubalin since 1985 — and it is indeed a major work, with 448 pages and including hundreds of examples of the pioneering designer's work, many never before seen, as well as a lengthy and revealing biographical essay by Adrian Shaughnessy (who co-edited the book with Tony Brook and Alexander Tochilovsky). Recently, Shaughnessy gave Imprint a preview of the limited-edition book, which can be pre-ordered from Unit, and took some time to answers our questions about Lubalin’s work, his sometimes prickly personality and the rampant misuse of his most famous typeface.

Art + design + storytelling

Wed, 20 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Here at Imprint, we’ve been lucky to have the inimitable Debbie Millman contributing a remarkable series of visual essays for the last two years. Millman, of course, is the president of Sterling Brands, the host of the online radio show Design Matters, and the chairwoman of the Masters Branding Program at the School of Visual Arts. She is also a witty, playful, and endlessly resourceful graphic artist, as we have seen in her illustrated essays — beguiling hybrids of design, art, and storytelling in which she has touched on everything from her first design job and turning 30 to her loathing of beer and her wishes for the New Year (2011 and 2012).