Calyx Design

The seed was planted a few years ago, when my elderly grandmother pointed me towards a small bookshelf. “Take whatever you want”, she said, “I’m not planning on leaving anything behind when I go”.

I picked up two volumes of poetry, carefully annotated in her spidery hand. A history of the Mennonites. Then I noticed a slim book entitled, of all things, “How to play the Ukulele”. Grandma had a notoriously wry sense of humour, and was infmaous in our family for — and this was way before my time, so I’ve only seen photos — a raucous, knee-slappin’ ukulele-flailing, vaudeville comedy routine.

Whoa, Grandma!

I kissed my grandmother and tucked the books into my bag — and not long afterwards, she passed away.

What is it now, ten years later? Well, that ukulele seed has finally sprouted. I’ve just become the proud owner of an early-50’s vintage Bobby Henshaw ukulele. It’s a little beauty, ridiculously fun to play, a fabulous graphic design stress-reliever, but best of all — every time I pick it up, I remember Grandma..

My last day in Berlin for the year, so I decide to drop by a museum that don’t know thing one about, save for its intriguingly all-encompassing name: Museum der Dinge, the Museum of Things.
Well. Aren’t they all?
Ye-es, technically correct, but the categories that museums typically set for themselves are very, very narrow. Things […]

One of my private Berlin pleasures … a quick currywurst at Curry 36 on Mehringdamm, and then a stroll through the graveyard at Hallesches Tor.
The contrast between the non-stop noise and action of the Kreuzberg street and the instant blanket of verdant silence that prevails in the cemetery could not be more vivid. Mature […]

Berlin is plastered with graffiti. And I love it.
Despite a recent crackdown, a decades-long history of (ahem) ‘public self-expression’ can be be read on walls all over the city, from ’80s wild-style to left-wing squatter provocations to the artsy paste-ups of the newly bohemian-chic Prenzlauerberg and Friedrichshain.
Though some of it would have been better off […]

Spotted in a working-class neighborhood in a northern part of Berlin — the storefront of a ’50s-era architectural glass workshop, sheathed in gloriously ’50s style tiny glass mosaics.
The signage is even more beautiful … yeesh, need I write anything at all? Those colors, that texture, the Bauhaus-meets-the-Fifties vernacular letterforms … Just. So. Cool.

I spotted this sign on the side of a recently renovated building in Berlin’s hipster-cum-yuppie neighborhood “Mitte“. Every year more and more money pours into this area, and more of the gorgeous multi-story turn-of-the-century buildings here — fallen into terrible disrepair during the 60-odd years of Communist rule — are brought back to life.
Because […]

The “Dissolve-O-Matic” is the latest in the series of illustrations created for Havi Brooks’ self-work products, in the quirky style semi-officially dubbed “Steampunk meets Yellow Submarine”… »

Leaving for Berlin in a couple of days!
Even though I’ll be hanging out on the eastern side of the city (P-berg, X-berg, Friedrichshain, Mitte), after arduous days of cafe-sitting and strolling along the Spree I’ll be laying my head in the slightly more fancypants western neighborhood of Charlottenburg.
How fancypants? I dug up a couple of […]

No, no, no, not rhino leather — it’s a rhino on leather.
See, a CD package I created for Albino! features a badass rhino on the cover. A friend of the band was so taken by the illustration that he carved it into a leather guitar strap.
He’s pretty new in the world of leatherwork, […]

Entering competitions isn’t really my cup of tea strong-ass coffee, but I’ve just discovered the massive coolness that is Threadless.com. Whoa.
I knew I’d found a home for my recently-excavated Kung Fu Girl illustration the second I arrived. Some judicious editing, new color selection, and the girl is online with a brand new name: “Can I […]

The work of some smarty-pants at the Alberta Street Co-op — intended to quell the fears of the squeamish, or quash the hopes of vampires straying into the produce department?
Can’t say for sure, but it succeeded in inducing an involuntary chuckle from me.

Guerrilla artist/graphic designer Shepard Fairey is world famous (um, notorious) for papering the alleys, underpasses and abandoned storefronts of the world with starkly powerful images limned in black, white and red. I still remember the first “André the Giant Has a Posse” sticker I ever saw, somewhere in the San Francisco Mission District in 1989 […]

“Bring bad design to justice!” So command the Design Police.
It’s already old news that technology has placed the ability to commit design atrocities well within reach of the grubby hands of the masses, but as Sam Clemens remarked about folks who complain about the weather, “no one does anything about it“.
Until now.
The pen may […]

If you were a schoolkid in the ’70s who like to read, just seeing the words “Scholastic Book Club” will make your heart beat a little faster:
I remember in grade school how freaking fun it was to place an order for these inexpensive kids books, and that there may have been no greater thrill than […]

Gorgeous modernist signage for a cabinet maker’s shop in the Bergmannstrasse, Berlin, dating from (I believe) the late ’20s — early ’30s. The typography, the colors, the arched entryway and even the textures of the metal and painted surfaces … beautiful.
I can’t get enough of photographing signs, type, and even graffiti in Berlin … the […]

The fabulous commie sign over “Alex”, the famous train station in east Berlin more properly known as Bahnhof Alexanderplatz. It’s a beautiful sign, severely elegant — installed (I believe) during a retrofit in 1964.
This style of 3-D illuminated letterform is seen all over Germany’s capital city, a look that’s so appealingly tactile that I […]

I’m tempted to call it a miracle, but look — they’ve already put “Magic” right in the name.

Vector Magic is an online tool designed to convert bitmaps to vector files. The interface is simple and clean, the results are better than anything on the market (hello Adobe), and the cost? Thanks to the brainiacs down […]

Milk-out-the-nose funny!
‘Cause milk squirting out of your nose isn’t just funny… it hurts. This sharp little video spot is a graphic designer’s nightmare. In a vivid parody of those late-night Ronco television ads, an entire panoply of designer’s client-request horrors dances in front of your eyes.

“Make My Logo Bigger” cream is just the start… “White […]