Got a couple of nice emails from Jordan Stark from Product Etcetera and thought I would show some more people his work. For sure check out the Westside Love and his new book for B Monroe. Nice work!
I like design. I also like History. Thus, I found this article about The Evolution of National Flags quite interesting. For example, they start with a nice lesson on the American flag:
“Did you know that the current US flag was designed by a high school student for a class project? (He got a B, though his teacher changed it to an A after Congress accepted it as the national flag!).”
Also seeing the changes of the Afghan flag is pretty wild. The flags really do tell a lot about that country’s history of stability and change.
It’s finally here… Grain Edit’s first anniversary! Their archive of impeccable posts on design should be enough to make you head over there, but if not, they are giving away a lot of booty to celebrate.
Remember Lamborghini? You know, the 80′s sports car sensation with its insane yellow and fire red colors. Anyways, did you know they are now a profitable company that sells over 2000 cars a year? Previously they used to only sell around 200-300 cars a year! Well, they have now taken a strange journey into creating a sedan, if you can call it that. Read more…
When we (Cina & Young) started YouWorkForThem 6 years ago, we soon realized our time for client work was very thin. Over the years we have cut back, putting almost all of our focus and time into this little child of ours. But sometimes, we make time to help friends, fellow peers or big buckaroo clients with some design insight. This year, we helped out our peers David and Zoe from a very interesting company called Commonwealth. They are based out of Brooklyn, New York and do very interesting work for an array of clients using various mediums. You might call them Architects if you had to call them anything, but they are not creating architecture in the traditional sense. Read more…
Everyone needs help overcoming their mental blocks, that’s why there’s Oblique Strategies…
Oblique Strategies, was initially conceived by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt in 1975. It is a tool that consists of self-imposed dilemmas to help creative people push through mental blocks.
Take a look at Gregory Taylor’s website, which is completely devoted to Oblique Strategies, and includes the complete text from editions 1-4 of the card decks published by Eno, and Schmidt.
We finally got back our latest project, Sentence. It’s an illustrated loosely around a poem by Grant Leuning and was worked on between the two YWFT Studio’s. We created the publication so that it can be viewed/displayed two different ways. You can read it like a magazine, from left to right or you can unfold it for larger spreads. It was created around a grid, so the pages somewhat relate to each other, even when out of context.
It’s true. Surfstation is back. It’s interesting to have witnessed the history of design portals on the internet. It seemed like yesterday when K10k, Surfstation, and Design is Kinky ruled the design news planet. I am sure I already forgot about a couple. Check it out though, looks nice.
We just got in MoMA’s new book, Modern Swedish Design.
At first glance, it doesn’t stand out from other books on Modern Design, but this book definitely deserves another chance. The rarely translated writings of the founding texts that initiated modern design in Sweden, make it a necessary addition to any designer’s collection. This book shouldn’t be overlooked!
Did you know we have a recommendation section on our site? No? Well, now you do. And we’ve made it even easier by creating this informative and collectible PDF poster available for download. If you like, you can print it out, hang it up, and show that you know your essentials.
(Links in PDF are active, so they will bring you to each book in the store.)
YWFT Zine 01 is a PDF zine that serves as an example of what is possible using the wonderful array of stock images, vectors, and newest typefaces available in our collection. Each image is tagged with the stock sets and typefaces used so that you, our beloved customer, can be directed easily to the appropriate product(s). Download Zine
You have a variety of work, and have had continuing engagements with several clients… do any projects stand out as favorites? We’ve been doing regular illustrations for The New York Times (mainly the Book Review, but other sections as well). These projects often illustrate an essay or article with a more abstract intellectual theme or relate to the impact of culture on language. Since there usually hasn’t been an immediate visual reference to start with it’s a fun challenge to figure out a visual accompaniment to an abstract idea. Unlike our usual projects, the time lines of these illustrations, which range from 24 hours to a couple days, force us to conceptualize and execute them very rapidly. We’ve also continued to design for the Johns Hopkins Film Festival for the past six years; it always challenges us to think of new ways to approach a poster subject that’s so well-worn. We’d also love to do more book design and publication design in the future; it’s a medium we enjoy working in.
Tell us about the traveling experimental typography show you curated, Alphabet. Alphabet: An Exhibition of Hand-Drawn Lettering and Experimental Typography is a show that we curated in 2005 for Artscape, a large arts festival in Baltimore. We sent out an open call for experimental and inventive interpretations of the letters A-Z and selected the 60 best alphabets from the hundreds of submissions we received. The show features artists and designers from around the world— including work from renowned designers like Ed Fella, the calligrapher Jean Larcher, and House Industries’ Ken Barber to exceptional alphabets from students and artists such as Andrew Jeffrey Wright, C.W. Roelle, and Luke Ramsey. In spite of the fact that the show was based on an open call, the level of work submitted was overall very high quality, and the resulting exhibition reflects that. There’s also a nice range of approaches ranging from elegant conceptual work to the surreal and illustrative. Since the show closed in Baltimore, Alphabet has been traveling to galleries and institutions around the U.S. (currently in Minneapolis). Check out the Alphabet website for more information.
What does your band, Double Dagger, have to do with graphic design? When we began the band a few years ago, we planned Double Dagger as a graphic design punk concept band. Design and art references made their way into a lot of the lyrics, as parallels and metaphors for the usual stuff punk bands yell about. As the band has grown and evolved, the design stuff has faded from the content, but there’s still a good bit of Internet-age, post modern stress throughout which we’re sure most designers and others can identify with. Double Dagger has also provided us a chance to design and screenprint a lot of posters, packaging, and shirts, so it’s also a chance to express ourselves visually and be our own client. We’re also really loud.
What’s next for Post Typography? Bruce: I’m going to the Dominican Republic. Woo! Nolen: I’m gonna get my car fixed and shave more regularly. We’re also making Post Typography more “legit”, working to get some larger jobs. We’ve done a lot of work across many media, but we’re excited whenever we get to do something new that forces us to think in a different way or explore new media. For example we did some film titles last year as well as our first completely Flash-based website, and we hope to continue to explore new media and ideas in the future.
Who are some other individuals or studios that you feel are doing interesting things with design? We’re generally too busy working to pay too much attention to what other people are doing. It seems like with the recent explosion of design blogs and trend-spotting blogs, one could spend all of one’s time just reading about design. We prefer to spend our time working on our own projects. That said, it seems that in general there are a lot of young smaller studios or individuals who are doing really smart and beautiful work that blurs the line a bit between design and art.
About Post Typography
Originally conceived and founded in 2001 as an avant garde anti-design movement by Nolen Strals and Bruce Willen, Post Typography specializes in graphic design, conceptual typography, and custom lettering/illustration with additional forays into art, apparel, music, curatorial work, design theory, and vandalism. Their work has received numerous fancy design awards and has appeared in such publications as Ellen Lupton’s Thinking With Type and D.I.Y.: Design It Yourself, The Art of Modern Rock, STEP Magazine, Metropolis magazine, and Taschen’s upcoming compendium, Graphic Design Now. Post Typography has appeared in multiple design and art exhibitions, and their posters are collected by high school punk rockers and prominent designers, whom they consider equally important. Strals and Willen currently teach classes in design and typography at the Maryland Institute College of Art, and have lectured at the Cooper Union, Society of Publication Designers, and Pennsylvania College of Art and Design among others.
