Caldas da Rainha, Portugal

André Meca is a freelance designer and illustrator currently studying Graphic Design at ESAD.CR (where I lectured last year). His project ‘Make Something Cool Every Day’ is an online project to showcase his work… it caught my attention.

All images copyright André Meca.

—John Steinbeck (1902-1968)

(thanks to JuanMa Sepulveda for the quotable)

(original source unknown—passed on from my friend Gustavo Machado)

Banff National Park, Alberta

I’ve just returned from a week-long road trip to the splendid Canadian Rockies with Bettie Blue, my trusty Westie companion—more rest, reading, and reflection than climbing this year, but a splendid time of refreshing renewal nonetheless.

You can see more photos in a Facebook gallery, here.

(overheard)

Hiroshima, Japan

This is a day that weighs heavy on the hearts of pacifists and peacemakers every year… 66 years ago today, at 08:15 on Monday, 6 August, 1945 the first nuclear weapon ever deployed on human beings (a bomb named Little Boy) was dropped on Hiroshima by the crew of the American B-29 bomber Enola Gay. Several days later, at 11:02 on Wednesday, August 9, Nagasaki was the target of the world’s first plutonium bomb (named Fat Man) dropped by the U.S. B-29 Superfortress Bockscar, flown by the crew of 393rd Squadron.

In 2005, I was one of 24 designers invited to contribute posters to Lest We Forget: Canadian Designers on War, an initiative marking the 60th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (I’ve posted on that previously, here).

—Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968)

Udine, Italy

Chris Gilmour creates incredible life-sized sculptural structures using only cardboard and glue…

—Charlie Chaplin (1899-1977)

Beauvais, France

Gilles Eichenbaum, aka GARBAGE, make some fine lamps from discarded objects… enjoy more here.

(Thanks to my dear Brazilian friend Ruth Klotzel for the link).