cupcake monster

I love cupcakes. I have been asking Andy to bake some for me, but the prospect of this actually happening is beyond grim. He sent me this cute stop-motion animation instead and I wanted to share. Had he actually baked me a cupcake, I would not want to share. It was created by Kirsten Lepore, it's long, but adorable.

Speaking of cupcakes reminded me of this brilliant, hand blown cupcake platter by Amanda Goss. The fact that she was 22 when she produced this idea is inspiring. I hope they are still for sale, it's going on my birthday list.

^D
sarah

addicted to polos

I am not addicted to polos, nor have I ever been moderately interested in their existence. I have, however, had this post on my mind for some time now.

I read most of Naomi Klein's No Logo last semester (a surprisingly interesting read considering the lack of images and abundance of facts and figures). She talks about brands like Nike, Tommy Hilfiger, and Polo in hip-hop culture.

"Tommy Hilfiger, even more than Nike or Adidas, has turned the harnessing of ghetto cool into a mass-marketing science. Hilfiger forged a formula that has since been imitated by Polo, Nautica, Munsingwear and several other clothing companies looking for a short cut to making it at the suburban mall with inner city attitude.

Like depoliticized, hyper-patriotic Benetton, Hilfiger ads are a tangle of Cape Cod multiculturalism: scrubbed black faces lounging with their wind-swept white brothers and sisters in that great country club in the sky, and always against the backdrop of a billowing American flag...

Tommy Hilfiger started off squarely as white-preppy wear in the tradition of Ralph Lauren and Lacoste. But the designer soon realized that his clothes also had a peculiar cache in the inner cities, where the hip-hop philosophy of "living large" saw poor and working-class kids acquiring status in the ghetto by adopting the gear and accoutrements of prohibitively costly leisure activities, such as skiing golfing, even boating. Perhaps to better position his brand within this urban fantasy, Hilfiger began to associate his clothes more consciously with these sports, shooting ads at yacht clubs, beaches, and other nautical locales. At the same time, the clothes themselves were redesigned to appeal more directly to the hip-hop aesthetic."

I love Young Jeezy, and it is only appropriate that I mention his track, "My President" today, as Barack Obama took the position just over 48 hours ago. It might seem trivial, but I was pretty stoked on making a connection between what Naomi Klein is saying here and what Nas [he wrote the lyrics] is asking when he says,

"I said I woke up this morning, headache this big,
pay all they damn bills, feed all these damn kids,
buy all these school shoes, buy all these school clothes,
for some strange reason, my son addicted to Polos."

Nas's son is addicted to Polo because Tommy Hilfiger paved the path for their company. Hilfiger was successful because he ignored moral boundaries.

Negative links like these, links that bring design to society in a negative way, have helped me to realize just how important it is for me to use my design for good.

^D
sarah

Obama for Mankind

The inauguration is so close, and I can barely contain myself. I wish my thoughts communicated better with my words so that I could explain the incredible feeling I get every time I consider the possibilities for our country's future. I'm elated. The same hop I found in my step on November 5th finds its way back each time I recall our new president-elect, each time I recall the millions of others who set aside bias, personal interests, and even politics in hope for a change.

I never had a chance to post these on Election night, so here are a few of the photos I took of the Obama parade. That night I felt excitement and relief, but I also found a great degree of comradery. It was as if the minor details that divided us each day no longer existed, we did this together and we would celebrate it together. Best night of my life to date.

{CLICK on these images to enlarge//You can find more pictures of that night on my Flickr page: http://flickr.com/photos/sarahkeane}

LittleBigPlanet!

{IMAGE: www.mediamolecule.com}

So, last month, I saw this commercial for a game titled LittleBigPlanet. The definition of cute, Sackboy (pictured) acts as the highly customizable mascot.

This month, I received my last issue of Print (bummer). I was confused when I realized that LittleBigPlanet was a feature story. But, the nature of the game could mean new and exciting things for designers. The game runs on Sony's newest console, Playstation 3. Sackboy is a platformer, and though the user is able to navigate pre-designed levels, they also have the ability to create their own. Your game controller acts almost as a keyboard, with Sackboy as your cursor.

"In the future," says Sven Travis [the founder and chair of the Communications Design and Technology department and Parsons The New School for Design] "all design work including print layout, print design--will be done on game consoles." {QUOTE: Print Magazine}

my design work

I'd like to start posting some of my own work for critique on here. I will be graduating in May and I want my portfolio to be in tip-top shape. I'll try to post more frequently about current events, design news, and my own stuff. I want this blog to be about design, but design is really about everything!

Here is an identity system I designed for wee talk, a speech therapy center for children in Richmond, VA. Amy Carlton is the owner and worked with me through Laura Chessin at VCU. They were both amazing throughout the entire process, and very patient. Amy focuses on treating preschool-aged children with apraxia of speech (a condition in which the child intends to speak, but cannot translate conscious plans into motor plans. In other words, the child knows what they want to say, but cannot say it.) She really loves what she does and was enthusiastic about every design approach. I was incredibly luck to have such a great experience with my first real world project.

The logo and identity as seen here were inspired by the moment of clarification for the child. The moment when they are able to connect their thoughts with their actions and speak.

the logo (Typeface: Futura):

Brochure: Front and Back covers (Typefaces: Futura / Meta)
//Click photos for more detail.

Brochure: Inside Spread (Typefaces: Futura / Meta)


What do you think? Any suggestions?

howirichmond.com

Myself and a group of 6 other students started this website last semester in our design rebels class. A lot of revisions have been made since I left for break (I can't take credit for any of them, Mike Doughtery and Mark Luetke have been working really hard). It still needs a lot of work, design and content wise, so take a look and let me know what you think...design suggestions, content suggestions, anything. We have a meeting with BikeWalk VA in about an hour, we are trying to get the ball rolling an an alternative transportation alliance in Richmond.

places in the world where people do not dream

After browsing through bostom.com's first and somewhat depressing installment of "The year 2008 in Photographs," this book, written and illustrated by Dallas Clayton quickly lifted my spirits.

"There are places in the world
where people do not dream...
of rocket-powered unicorns,
and candy cane machines,
of magical watermelon boats,
and musical baboons..."

You can find the side-scrolling internet version (I believe in its entirety) here. You can pre-order a book to be shipped mid-January here!

Another image just because all of them are so totally awesome...

uh oh

Chrysler will shut down plants in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico for at least a month starting Friday. This is kind of crazy, you can read about it here at Reuters (my favorite news source).

Save the World For Real

I've been trying really hard lately to see the positive side of advertising. Manipulating minds isn't always evil. I stumbled upon this awesome ad for the Lebanese Red Cross, designed by Leo Burnet.

REK Bookcase

DeZeen recently displayed this UH-mazing bookcase by Rotterdam-based designer Reinier de Jong. The piece consists of five parts that can expand and contract as the user sees fit.

“REK is a bookcase that grows with your book collection. The more books, the bigger the bookcase,” explains de Jong.

Not only does this solve space problems for smaller apartments, but it eliminates the eyesore of a half-empty bookcase. Very clever.

Audimat

Found this beautiful font at smeltry.net. It's free, so download it!

I must have this bookcase/staircase. Almost anyone in immediate relation to me knows this by now. I figured that an item so essential to my happiness should be mentioned here.

I read about this brilliant idea on Apartment Therapy a little under a year ago. It resides in a London apartment, designed by Levitate Architects in response to a book storage problem.

I will color code my books as well.

I wish I lived in the shire

I HAD to post about this home in Wales. I've always wanted a hobbit hole home and I think this is as close as anyone's ever been to achieving the true essence of hobbit living.

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.

"It had a perfectly round door like a porthole, painted green, with a shiny yellow brass knob in the exact middle. The door opened on to a tube-shaped hall like a tunnel: a very comfortable tunnel without smoke, with panelled walls and floors tiled and carpeted, provided with polished chairs, and lots and lots of pegs for hats and coats--the hobbit was fond of visitors. The tunnel wound on and on, going fairly but not quite straight into the side of the hill--The Hill, as all the people for many miles round called it--and many little round doors opened out of it, first on one side and then on another. No going upstairs for the hobbit: bedrooms, bathrooms, cellars, pantries (lots of these), wardrobes (he had whole rooms devoted to clothes), kitchens, dining-rooms, all were on the same floor, and indeed on the same passage. The best rooms were all on the lefthand side (going in), for these were the only ones to have windows, deep-set round windows looking over his garden and meadows beyond, sloping down to the river."

-- The Hobbit, pp. 15-16.

An estimated 1000-1500 man hours, two men, and about 3000 pounds and the family was moved into this lovely home within 4 months of its initiation. The fridge is cooled through air from the underground foundation and water is generated from a nearby spring through gravity.

Go here to find images of the site before building, the process, and ideas behind its construction.

free font!

Here is a free typeface from Thatcher Ulrich. He has released it into the public domain, so go crazy! Send it to all of your friends! Merry Christmas Carissa!

solar powered christmas lights!

I spent all day Sunday stringing lights around the front porch and landscape. This job is generally left up to me each year, so I try to make things look fairly presentable. I'm not going to lie, they look pretty legit.

Personally, I'm a huge fan of colored lights. Colored lights, if handled correctly, say gingerbread house/winter wonderland. They can say, "We're fun and entertaining, but well-mannered." The well-mannered part is obviously dependent upon presentation.

Anyways, I found these today. They're charged by the sun and come on automatically when it gets dark! They even gather power when it's snowing or cloudy.