Chattanooga, Tennessee

Typeface designers Robbie de Villiers and Jeremy Dooley have developed a custom typeface called Chatype that they are hoping will become the city’s typeface. They’ve successfully raised funds for this venture through Kickstarter…

The goal is to help the city and its businesses forge a distinct and cohesive identity through a custom typeface, sending a visual message to the world that Chattanooga—a rapidly growing city in the midst of a creative renaissance—is “more than just your average Southern town.”

(source)

Bangkok, Thailand

‘koh’ is a modular seating system designed for use in public areas such as lobbies, pools, spas, and courtyards. Capable of being customized in material and colour, and either movable or fixed, the sofas encourage dynamic interaction among visitors while offering organizations a flexible way to furnish various spaces. The word ‘koh’ in Thai means ‘island’… reflecting the way that the seating scheme appears as an archipelago when seen from above.

Conceived by Israeli designer Eyal Soodai (sooda-e studio), ‘koh’ is the winning design in the category of ‘hotel and hospitality’ for the TIFF 2012 Award, whose theme ‘inside outside’ celebrates designs in which aesthetics and the environment share an equal role. The competition included participation by 3025 designers from 87 different countries, and was organized by designboom in collaboration with the Thailand Department of Export Promotion (DEP), the Ministry of Commerce, Royal Thai Government, and TIFF — the Thailand International Furniture Fair.

Source: designboom

Edmonton, Alberta

I have always hated bus-wrap advertising (as well as bus-bench advertising for that matter)… I consider it to be a crass “mental invasion” and an exploitative, unwelcome form of visual pollution. For this reason alone, I’ll admit to a bit of schadenfreude at the inept “unveiling” of the Alberta Wildrose Party’s campaign bus earlier this week during a pre-election event, what with the “questionable placement” of party leader Danielle Smith’s photo on the side of the vehicle.

As might be imagined, the “far-right” Wildrose Party (who make the Conservatives seem like Liberals, according to some) has more than its share of detractors—this public relations faux pas went viral within hours, sending ripples of mirth across Canada. Below are a few other examples of bus-wrap fails from around the globe…

San Francisco, USA

My friend David Peters (no relation) is involved in orchestrating an open online call for posters to support Occupy: What’s Next? The invitation is to “reach out to the world with an idea for positive change.”

The submission deadline is 30 April 2012. Read more about the call for posters, jury process, guidelines, etc. here.

New York, USA

Henry Wolf was an Austrian-born American graphic designer, photographer and art director best known for his art direction of Esquire, Harper’s Bazaar, and Show magazines in the 1950s and ’60s—an influential contributor to that Mid-Century Modern era whose style has enjoyed such a resurgence in popularity of late. In particular, he is known for his bold yet simple use of expressive typography, surreal photography, and conceptual illustration.

Henry was born in 1925 in Vienna, Austria, from which he and his Jewish family fled the Nazis beginning in 1938, traveling through France and North Africa, before arriving to the United States in 1941. He worked with photographers Richard Avedon, Melvin Sokolsky, and Art Kane before launching his own photography studio in New York’s Upper East Side.

He became art director of Esquire in 1952; in 1958 he became the art director of Harper’s Bazaar (succeeding Alexey Brodovitch); and in 1961 he started a new magazine, Show, for A&P heir Huntington Hartford. In 1965 he moved over to the advertising world where he directed numerous high-profile campaigns. In 1971 he launched Henry Wolf Productions, a studio devoted to photography, film, and design. In later years he taught graphic design at Parsons School of Design in New York, as well as the School of Visual Arts, and Cooper Union.

Henry was honored with many awards, but more importantly, he was admired by colleagues, peers, and competitors alike. Read a biography written my Milton Glaser here and view collections of his works here.

(source)

There’s a stark, graphic beauty to be found in vintage matchbox labels… resulting from the bold design approach needed to accommodate a combination of coarse and absorbent substrates, low-resolution printing techniques, and a limited color palette (often muted, and often printed out of register). Shown above are a few samples of Eastern European designs from the 1950s and 1960s.

View hundreds more here.

(from ‘brain pickings’)

I enjoyed these “hyper-minimalist” posters that distill complex stories into clean graphic elements. See more here.

(Thanks to my Belgian philosopher friend Filip Spagnoli for the link).

New York City

My friend Luba Lukova’s exhibition Graphic Guts opens at La MaMa La Galleria (6 East 1st Street, between Bowery and 2nd Ave.) this Thursday, 16 February, from 6-8 pm.

Internationally renowned, Lukova is regarded as one of the most distinctive image makers working today. Poignant and unrelenting, her arresting images grab the viewer and don’t let go. In her third solo exhibition at La MaMa, she will present a new collection of social commentary and theater inspired art. Lukova’s work is included in the permanent collections of MoMA, New York; The Library of Congress, Bibliotheque Nationale de France, Paris; and the World Bank.

Image above: Delta Blues, 2012, silk-screen, ©Luba Lukova

Winnipeg, Manitoba

Many thanks to the event’s volunteer organizers and all the folks who have expressed interest in more information about the talk I gave at TEDxManitoba on Thursday. Solace House is the super-insulated passive-solar home I designed and built in the woods of eastern Manitoba in 1980, and that I’ve been living in (without a furnace) for the last three decades.

My talk is now on YouTube; you can watch it here.

You can also access most of the visual resources and notes from my talk in a Facebook album entitled ‘Solace House’ that I’ve set up here. (I’m on FB at www.facebook.com/welcome.change ).

(thanks to Richard Ray for the photograph)