Blog | Allen AKA at 12ozPROPHET

Really, really enjoying Allen AKA's blog at 12ozPROPHET, which I was led to today from a link on
PSFK sharing some observations of drip graffiti in fashion trends. At his blog, I found awesome Nikes galore, beautiful black & white nudes (that ever-so-slightly hover towards porn, without losing their artiness), snowboarding pics, hommage to a classic Italian deli, a paella cook-out in Barcelona, and documentation of Terry Richardson's campaign of Kermit for Surpreme. In other words, the life I wish I was living. Go there immediately and soak up the goodness.

The end.

Advertising | 1950s - 1970s Set

This fabulous set of 1950s - 1970s advertisements (posters, magazine ads, booklets, etc.) on Flickr is both fascinating and inspiring. Some of the ads are dated from a social perspective, but the design and much of the writing remains timeless and iconic.

Like this ad from Volkswagon ...



... I don't think its correct to use Native American stereotypes when selling cars anymore (thus the dated part of the ad) but overall the ad is striking and compelling. If I could write copy a fraction as 0s succinct, elegant, fluid and sharp as what's on this ad, I'd be a happy copywriter.

And this ad, from the Italian Art Directors' Club ...



... is not just visually a treat, but understandable to anyone, regardless of their mother tongue.

I think very often advertising creatives lose sight of the main task at hand -- communication. Deciding what needs to be said, and saying it -- through words, pictures or both -- as simply, singularly and memorably as possible.

These are old ads, but will you remember them? I will.

Blog | Ace Jet 170

I've really been enjoying design blog Ace Jet 170, especially for its devotion to found type and graphic images, all nicely collected in sets that showcase a the fine craftsmanship of these various disciplines, in all their slightly vintage glory. Such as this collection of stamps, shown above.

Blog | Ice Cream People

Yay, an entire blog dedicated to the arts and crafts of ice cream people. Like this yummy sculpture by Jenny Harada.

Site | FFFFOUND!

I must finally reference FFFFOUND!, which has become my must-visit site of the hour (practically). Users click images that they like, anywhere on the web, and you can see similar images in groupings. It's awesome!

Typography | Craig Oldham

This "nudist" typeface, with its "dirty bits" pixellated, made me instantly really happy. It's very simple, true, and even the kind of thing that makes you go, "Gee, that's kind of obvious, but really not so obvious than anyone ever did it before, so maybe that makes it just a little bit genius?" The rest of the work on Mr Oldham's site is equally as provocative in its simplicity, such as Adidas goal post tape.

Design/Advertising | Petronio Associates

Petronio Associates are a design, branding, and advertising shop out of France that do absolutely beautiful work for an array of high-end fashion clients such as Prada and Chloé. Originally I think I followed a link from a site featuring their current posters for Chloé featuring -- surprise -- Chloé Sevigny, which are really cool on their own. But then as I explored the rest of their site, I was impressed by their work that is so much loftier, artsy, and inspirational than most advertising dreg that clutters our lives. How wonderful would it be to create work that truly straddles the divide between art and commerce?

Graphics | Dreamers Ink Aesthetics™

Forget where I found this originally, but I've been loving the gorgeous visual motion graphics from Dreamers Ink Aesthetics™. Of course my eye is drawn (ha) to the wonderful use of colour and balance of classic and nouveau elements, but check out their awesome logos, too.

New Blogs

Two new blogs have captured my attention lately. The first blog, swissmiss, is from a Swiss designer based in NYC, who posts frequently on a range of graphic curiosities. The second is a friend-of-a-friend, someone I've heard nothing but praise and accolades from the mutual friend, but have never met. Her blog, Conversations on all Continents, is gorgeously written and inspiring -- plus it's nice to read something that gives you reason to stop and savour the language and think, rather than just being filled with fluff meant to be skimmed in a millisecond.

Design/Decor | Sleepyheads

I think these were discovered by a friend on Daily Candy. Either way, these quirky drawings (and pillows culled from them) honour the daydreamers amongst us with. Fun!

Design | Glueallfuk/Mapple, Elegalindus3, Jelsen Jargon, Liam Devowski

It's Monday again, and I thought I'd share some of my favourite design links today that I've been discovering throughout the past week. First up is Glueallfuk (or Mapple) who I stumbled upon while idly checking out myspace pages for various deejays/bands in NY. (Yes, exciting life.) I wrote to see if he has a website and he sent me to a collection of awesome images he's done. Not sure much more about him, but really cool nonetheless.


Next up is Elegalindus3, who I know (sort of) from ad school, and was reminded of when I excitedly showed my current art director links to the designer above. A lot of gorgeous advertising work, though I definitely enjoy the bold graphics for flyers and posters. The most up-to-date work can be found on his blog.

Another fellow ad school graduate is Jelsen Jargon, who has been doing a ton of very cool work for some big name clients, which pleases me to no end, since his stuff is definitely worth the big budgets and scope of these kinds of clients yet never loses sight of staying true to a real authenticity of great design. I'd upload a photo directly but was having trouble so you'll just have to head straight to his work to get a glimpse of the magic.


And last but definitely not least is Liam Devowski, who I discovered a while back on Urban Outfitter's blog and who has some really nice pieces of typography, art, and illustration up on his site. Looks like he's a recent graduate of Syracuse now living in San Francisco, so hopefully there will be lots of great stuff coming from this guy in the future.

Design | Commercial | Olympics

Reflecting a current trend in design (or so Jenne assures me), the efforts of the creative team at Meomi (pronounced Me-Oh-My, I suspect) have been chosen as the official mascots of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. A different direction than that mascots from the last Olympic Games in Turin, though very reminiscent of the Cheburashka character used by the Russians as team mascot during the Turin games.

Of course Cheburashka dates from a 1950's children's book, so it goes to show that what goes around comes around in design trends, and that we can't blame the Happy Tree Friends for everything.

Illustration | Yuka Yamaguchi

I've been following Yuka Yamaguchi's blog, Plastique Monkey, for a while now, which I discovered totally at random googling something like "barley mushroom risotto". Discovering her quirky watercolor and pencil sketches – not to mention the totally adorable photos of her newborn son – has been a real treat. So much so that I printed the above sketch and tacked it to one of the walls of my cube for some visual stimulii.

Design | Poetic Licence, Polyvore

There's a growing trend for these very interesting sites where you can move parts around and create your own design -- kind of like a dumbed down Photoshop/Illustrator. Poetic Licence is a UK-based shoe manufacturer whose site allows you to create your own ad for their shoes by giving you some logos, photos, words and other elements to play around with. Polyvore is a little more advanced and is an application (available both on its own site and on Facebook) where you can play around with creating your own outfits based on thousands of pre-loaded shots of clothes. The design comes in by creating your own personal dream outfits (or real outfits, I suppose) in a sleek and polished way that resembles the pages of a fashion magazine. Clearly there's major potential here for revenue if the clothes you represent pay money to be on the page; from a more personal standpoint, it affords hours of fun for any girl (or guy) who thrives on the creativity and self-expression that comes from putting clothes and design elements together -- even if they're out of your price range.

Art & Design | Doma

I'm kicking myself for missing the boat on posting the brilliant Orangina commercial and print work I was gushing over last week, so that will now be an incentive to get on it a little faster and update this blog the second I see something really cool. Like this amazing design work from Buenos Aires collective DOMA, a bunch of Argentines who started out doing street art and then morphed their talents into a lot of cool design and video work (a lot of the design work in the form of awesome toys).

Via PSFK

Advertising | Website | Orange

This site for Orange (the mobile provider in the UK) is one of THE. COOLEST. THINGS. I've seen in a long time. It just made me giddy with excitement for the cool stuff you can do on the internet and made me excited to work in advertising. In keeping with Orange's "good things should never end" strategy, it amplifies this idea in a gorgeous, fun, and shareable way. From a British agency called Poke London.

Via Adverblog.

Video | Justice | Dance

We've mentioned Justice here previously but I'd thought I'd throw myself back into unsticking brains again with their newest video which currently has me doing the d-a-n-c-e to my ipod on the train platforms knowing full well that other waiting passengers can't hear the music. Too bad for them. Anyway, check out this out. If you loved hypercolor t-shirts, wait'll you get a load of these.