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The internet was down all afternoon Ggrrrrr!!%$#?>*>**!!! so I had to choose my next designer the old fashioned way - from a book!! A jump back in history this time. I looked through a few of my design books and settled on Jan Tschichold from my book "Graphic Design in Germany 1890-1945".
Jan Tschichold (1902 - 1974) did some really important work in both design and the education of design, publishing books such as 'Die neue Typographie' and 'The Form of the Book'. He was a practitioner of Modernist design and his books advocated methods such as the Van de Graaf canon (above), and the Golden Section, (both ways of dividing a page into visually pleasing proportions). A section of Jan Tschichold's historic 'The Form of the Book' can be found here, complete with diagrams.
His most well known work was with Penguin, where managed the redesign of over 500 books, mainly from the Pelican series, leaving behind the 'Penguin Composition Rules'. Ace Jet 170 has a great range of Pelican and Penguin books on display.
Images from wikipedia.org/wiki/Jan_Tschichold, and the book Graphic Design in Germany 1890-1945, University of California Press, 2000, Thames and Hudsonxxxx
I found this beautiful graphic design blog last night. It's really informative and has some gorgeous graphical found objects too: acejet170.typepad.com
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Derek Birdsall was born in 1934 and remembers as a child he was obsessed with stationery and writing-pads, particularly graph-paper he found at his grandfather's office. A school teacher noticed his beautiful handwriting and recommended him for a three year foundation course in lettering, which he began at age 15. Upon finishing there he began a scholarship course at Central School of Art and Design in London which launched a strong 50 year career, for which he's won a lifetime achievement award for book and magazine design. His most well known works are Penguin book covers and magazine design for historic magazines such as Nova. His signature style is simplicity and clever grid based design, which even today is executed on the standard graph paper he coveted as a child.
Images from the British Library, (www.bl.uk/learning (top), and www.dexigner.com (below).
Today I'll jump to the late 50's early 60's with the iconic design work of Saul Bass. Many of us know his movie posters such as - Anatomy of a Murder, Vertigo, West Side Story and The Man With The Golden Arm. He was born in New York and lived from 1920 - 1996. He spent most of his career working in Hollywood but also did well known logo work for companies such as AT&T. Influence from his graphic style can be seen today, for example the title sequence for the 2002 Speilberg film Catch Me If You Can. Above images from designmueseum.org and allposters.com
It's not a well publicised celebration, but Friday 27th April is World Graphic Design Day. The date was chosen because on this day in 1963, Icograda, the world body for graphic design was founded. There's a gallery on the Icograda website of current design from around the world which is worth checking out.
Leading up to next Friday I thought it would be fun to post images from famous designers. Most will be well known to graphics people, but artist and illustrator friends might find them interesting.
I'll start with FHK Henrion, who was one of the founding members of Icorada. He was a German born designer who studied in Paris and spent most of his career working in France and England. During the 1950's he was an art director at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London.
Images above: 1. Future Magazine (www.rennart.co.uk) 2. Fortune Magazine (www.fulltable.com) 3. Both images 3 & 4 are from www.lwl.org
After being so charmed by the Montessori School cook book (two posts down) I decided to pop my head in and see if they have playgroups for toddlers. Unfortunately they don't take kids until they're 3 years old. Lukas is only 5 months so a while to wait. At the front of the school they had a huge poster of Gandhi, with a nice little quote from him. Rather than creeping around the school taking photographs I did my own drawing of Gandhi and added the same quote.
Cute stuff for little kids. xxxx
After reading about the Chicken and Coca-Cola recipe (post below), I got a bit obsessed and searched for other Coke flavoured dishes. I found these and was quite inspired:
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COKE and KETCHUP SPARERIBS
2 to 3 lbs. country style spareribs (pork), fresh or frozen
1 cup ketchup
1 cup coke
Combine ketchup and cola. Place ribs in crock pot. Pour mixture over ribs. Cook 2 hours on high and at least 2 hours on low. May cook for several hours on low. Baste occasionally if desired. Serve with a side dish of cauliflower in cheese sauce.
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MICROWAVE COCA-COLA CAKE
Cooking time 11 minutes. Utensils, 11 x 7 inch glass dish, 4 cup and 2 cup glass measuring cups. 2 c. sugar 1 c. miniature marshmallows 1/2 c. Crisco 3/4 c. Coke 3 tbsp. cocoa 1/2 c. buttermilk 1 tsp. baking soda 2 eggs, beaten Mix flour and sugar together. Stir in marshmallows. Set aside. In a 2 cup glass measuring cup, put Crisco, Coke, and cocoa. Heat in microwave until Crisco melts, about 2 minutes. Pour over flour mixture. Stir in buttermilk, soda, and eggs. Pour into greased glass dish. Cook on high for 11 minutes. Turn dish every 3 minutes.
COCA-COLA FROSTING
6 tbsp. Margarine
3 tbsp. Cocoa
6 tbsp. Coke
2/3 box powdered sugar
1 c. (or more) broken pecans
Mix margarine, cocoa, and Coke in 4 cup glass measuring cup. Bring to a boil in microwave. Boil for 1 1/2 minutes. Pour cocoa mixture over powdered sugar; add pecans and mix well. Frost cake while hot. Decorate top with pecan halves.
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My grandmother would have loved these meals. I'm not joking but she drank only Coke, (she kept a case under her bed) and ate only meat and potatoes - no vegetables at all. The weirdest thing is that she outlived most of her healthy friends. Dinner party anyone? Above image from posterclassics.com
Look at this gorgeous star patterned dress by Biba from this spring's runway show (image from Style.com). They have the best logo, a beautiful website, and the most incredible history. The original Biba began in 1964 as a fashion boutique in Kensington, London and by the 70's grew to be a department store that was frequented by the likes of Freddy Mercury, Brigitte Bardot, Princess Anne, Twiggy, the Jaggers and David Bowie. It housed a tea room, the Rainbow Room where bands played and roof gardens, that according to the website, was home to 'a menagerie of birds, including ducks, doves, flamingos and penguins.' What a pity it closed in 1975 and why can't all retail be like Biba! These days it's fashion label that pays homage to it's heyday. Here's a couple of images from it's past:
While I'm having so much fun with patterns I thought I'd do another one and put in on a t-shirt template. I'm also getting obsessed with the colour yellow and purple. I might have to move on from there soon.
