In another life, I was a wannabe luthier.

The intoxicating scent of Brazilian rosewood and Sitka spruce, the arcane and elegant tools and forms, the thrilling sensation of bringing an instrument to vibrating, singing life … ah well, turned out ’twas not to be.

I have built a couple of guitars, and fixed a whole bunch more, but the closest I ever came to becoming a Stradivarius of the six-string was spending an apprentice year in the terrific archtop-maker Tom Ribbecke’s workshop.

It was an amazing experience, and has deeply informed my life as a visual designer (more about that below), but why (you ask politely, as I continue what seems to be a random digression) am I bringing it up? Well, a good friend of mine happened upon the Mandolin Brothers in Staten Island, perhaps the finest purveyor of guitars in the country. He was knocked out by the joint, and — knowing I’d be interested — sent me a link.

Of course I knew about this place — Ribbecke had sold guitars through them, and so had most of the top-drawer luthiers I’d ever met. They seem to always have a spectacular inventory of handmade instruments, so I clicked straight through to the archtop section to see if I recognized anybody.

Well. Not only did I spot a few familiar names, but I ran across an instrument that I had actually worked on — and what an instrument!

Here’s the story:

J. R. Zeidler was one of the finest instrument makers I’ve ever met … a rough-edged Philly guy with visionary technical insights, exacting techniques, and an uncompromisingly personal aesthetic sense, he created some of the most uniquely stunning instruments that have ever graced this planet — and they sound as good as they look.

I got to meet the man only once, at the Healdsburg Guitar Festival. Zeidler came to an evening party at Ribbecke’s workshop. Whiskey was quaffed, war stories told, and I (the modest newbie) complimented him on his craft. He gave me advice about the importance of discovering your own style and sound, and then we argued about finishing techniques — “Hey Tom, your assistant is bustin’ my balls here!”

We shook hands. A great guy. Not much later J.R. got sick, and I never saw him again.

But I did get to participate in an incredible project inspired by both the man himself, and his (oh, the artisan life) lack of health insurance. That “project” is what I saw on the Mandolin Brothers website this morning.

The Zeidler Project:

Maybe I should just quote the “official” background.

“When fourteen of the world’s finest guitar makers decided to honor and support a colleague, they produced a unique and remarkable instrument — The Zeidler Project guitar. J. R. Zeidler was well known in the community of archtop makers. His instruments, and the man himself, were greatly respected by players and his peers.

When he was hospitalized with acute myelogenous leukemia, undergoing debilitating and expensive therapy, his fellow builders came together in support. They decided to make a collaborative guitar incorporating many of Zeidler’s touches and even using wood he chose.

The guitar will be sold to defray some of John’s medical expenses, and to help his family.”

The Zeidler Project was coordinated by the Canadian luthier, Linda Manzer. It was a spirited, bold project — never before had a group of so highly respected instrument makers attempted such collaboration.

Manzer said, “This was a chance for the archtop guitar building community to come together and focus all our skills on this one instrument to help our friend, John, and his family. These builders were just incredible to work with and we were all honored to be part of this truly unprecedented event. It was a very emotional and truly amazing experience. The end result is a guitar imbued with our collective spirit.”

The entire group, paying tribute to Zeidler’s style and preferences, worked out details of the design. The guitar traveled across the continent to the shop of every builder — each of them adding his or her own touch to it, then passing it to the next builder.

Ribbecke’s contribution involved the careful shaping of the gorgeously quilted maple back plate. My own was minimal, just helping to rough the thing out before Master Tom put his expert hands to work — but I felt honoured to play even the tiniest of roles in this historic project. Still do.

What the heck does any of this have to do with my current business?

Well … the success of a piece of visual work — just like a guitar — depends upon a careful accumulation of the smallest of details. Thus the importance of gently persuading every single element of a project to work together — in perfect harmony, as it were — can’t be exaggerated.

A millimeter too much or too little wood in the carved top plate of an archtop means the difference between an instrument that sings and a common plunker. Just so with a designed page or a drawing. A headline a few points too large, the wrong line weight, an ill-conceived colour choice …

Pay attention. Get it right.

And I guess it’s even more than that. My obsession with the making and playing of guitars has as much to do with my business as any of my hundreds of other interests and passions.

When an artist is confronted by the daily task of making “something out of nothing”, every experience that has ever been poured into the ol’ brain-hopper is called upon to fill that blank page or screen.Every moment becomes an ingredient in the creative stew, a whole life’s worth of experience transmuted into a pattern of ink or pixels, just like that.

Anyway.

The truth is, I was just delighted to be reminded of the existence of this wonderful guitar — and my own tiny contribution.

And as I learned just this morning, it’s actually still for sale — scroll down to the bottom of this page. For a paltry hundred grand you can take it home, but please call me if you do — I’ve still never played the thing!

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”.

Though a professor of sociology, Grandma had a notoriously wry sense of humour. She was infamous in our family — and this was way before my time, but I’ve seen photographic evidence — for a raucous, knee-slappin’ ukulele-flailing, vaudeville comedy routine. Whoa, Grandma!

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

What is it now, half a dozen years later? That seed has finally sprouted, and with a little bit of extra inspiration, I’ve become the ever-so-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.

Well. Aren’t they all?

Ye-es, technically correct, but the categories that museums typically set for themselves are very, very narrow. Things called “art”, for example. Sometimes just paint-on-canvas sorts of things. Or carved-from-marble sorts of things. Or vacuum cleaners.

So, what to expect from this thing-room tucked away three stories above the hectic, graffitied streets of Berlin’s multi-kulti Kreuzberg neighborhood?

A well-lit, high-ceilinged room with beautiful wooden floors … and a whole lotta shelves.

This museum concerns itself with presenting a sort of mute cultural-historical narrative of Germany’s entire 20th century, from its beginning up to the present day.

The aforementioned shelves are stuffed with a stunningly diverse collection of manufactured objects. Not objets d’art, not objects ‘appropriated’ by an artist, but the kind of innocent every-day objects that you are surrounded with at this very moment.

Your computer. Your pencil. Your coffee cup. Each of these objects captures decisions made by an individual craftsman/designer, a moment in the history of human-created environment, and simultaneously expresses the essence of every “thing” designed and created before it. Ever.

That’s a lot of weight for a coffee cup to handle.

But this museum has the philosophical chops (and history of its own) to make it work.

The Museum der Dinge is the descendant and official archive of the Deutscher Werkbund, pr “German Work Federation”.

The Werkbund, an association of artists, architects, designers, and industrialists, was formed in 1907 with the express intent of overhauling the entire German landscape of mass-produced objects, “from sofa cushions to the building of cities”.

The fundamental plan was to rethink everything from an aesthetic viewpoint that took function, the essence of materials, and modern industrial manufacturing techniques as its muse.

You know the essential slogan of the Werkbund already: “Form follows function”. And yes, the world famous and extraordinarily influential Bauhaus design school in Weimar grew from these very roots in the early 1920s.

The tension between intelligent, form-follows-function design and the kitsch favoured by mass culture provides a formal structure for the museum.

It’s divided into two major sections. First, a long, high row of shelves runs along one wall, packed to bursting with items selected to reflect the manufactured world as it actually was — and you could easily spend half an hour just gazing at a single shelf! It’s a meticulously arranged riot, and the tastes, prejudices, and technological influences of the era burst from every piece.

This “world of objects” is arranged in chronological order, then further divided into subsets such as “body shapes,” “material/aluminum,” “post-War era,” and “East German household”.

The second section is composed of a series of free-standing cases running down the center of the long room. These are also arranged chronologically, but this time the objects represent opposing sides in a century-old argument.

Half of each case is filled with objects catering to contemporary popular taste, tending towards decoration and kitsch — to which the other side responds with elegantly clean-lined solutions from industrial and graphic designers sympathetic to the Werkbund‘s ideas and ambitions.

But the best part is that you don’t need to know a THING about design history to enjoy this exhibition; on a purely surface level it’s just the coolest, best-organized thrift store you have ever seen.

Conclusions aren’t necessarily drawn, and there’s no predetermined narrative. You can just let the colors, shapes, forms and textures wash over you … or let your brain go to work on the innumerable jarring, inspiring and thought-provoking juxtapositions.

it’s a wonderful experience.
 

The time-span covered by the collection runs right up to the present day, but the early half of the century attracted most of my attention — particularly the graphic design.

I was delighted to see that my hero Lucian Bernhard, ground-breaking developer of the sachplakat poster style and innovative type designer, is particularly well represented.

And because we’re in Berlin and talking about history, the subject of National Socialism is unavoidable … and here it is, expressed in a kind of embarrassing kitsch that apparently even made the monster on Voßstrasse squirm.

 
When I mentioned how much I’d enjoyed my couple of hours there, the first thing the smiling guy behind the counter said was “Great — would you mind mentioning it to other people?”

No one I know in Berlin seems to have heard of it, and worse, my explanations of its wonderfulness just haven’t seemed to penetrate: “Uh-huh, sounds interesting …” and then a change of subject.

I hope these photos are a little more effective.

If you’re in Berlin for a day or two, do yourself a favour. They’re open Friday – Monday from 12 -7pm, and it’ll cost you 4 € to get in. Guided tours are available if you’re lucky enough to speak German, but if not — no worries. These objects speak quite clearly on their own.

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 trees, marble crosses, gothic script … it’s a typical old northern European cemetery, I guess — established in 1735, in a spot just outside Berlin’s old city walls.

I just happen to like walking there more than most. Felix Mendelssohn is buried there, for one thing — I visited his grave today and softly whistled the theme to the Italian Symphony. The other thing I love is the number of grave markers from the early 1900s, many featuring the flowing visual elegance of the then au courant Jugendstil (think Art Nouveau).

The photos below show a couple of the loveliest pieces — at least, of those that are still in place. In recent years the cemetery has repeatedly been struck by art thieves, who’ve pried up, broken off, and carted away some of the most beautiful marble busts and medallions. *sigh*

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 left inside the spray can, a few pieces are amazing — and the atmosphere created by the chaotic visual density of it all is (to me, anyway) extremely inspiring. I honestly can’t imagine a Berlin without it.

I’ll toss up a few snapshots in the coming week or two, and to start it off, here are a couple of beautifully textured samples from somewhere in the vicinity of the Simon-Dach-Strasse.

And there’s more … check out the second installment.

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.

Because Berlin’s consciousness of its history is a bit on the hit-or-miss side, I’m ambivalent about this. Through ignorance or with deliberate intent, some of this renovation serves to erase the past, both the parts the city ought to be proud of and the more, well, “problematic” bits.

This sign for Holz Kohlen (Charcoal) is an example of the former; the owners of the building deliberately allowed this small patch of ancient paint to remain undisturbed while the remainder of the facade was completely updated. It’s a small gesture of appreciation and respect for those who lived here before.

Two-bit philosophizing aside, the real reason I snapped this shot was the rough charm of the ca. 1930s letterforms, and the contrast with the stunning texture of the wall. The sturdy weight of the verticals, the sprightly capital K, that jaunty little Z with just the suggestion of a crossbar … ain’t typography wonderful?

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.”

As I wrote about the first of these machines, they communicate a sort of alternate-reality functionality in a completely non-threatening way. This aligns beautifully with Havi’s brilliant copywriting and whimsically approachable brand, in both style and attitude.

This one is the metaphorical representation of a product designed to dissolve procrastination. You can almost hear the rattle and roar of this happy contraption at work … and if your curiousity is piqued by the rubber duckie, visit her other website.

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 random doorway snapshots to help tell that story …

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, but I think it turned out great.

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 Kick It?”

Here’s how it works:

People submit designs. Other people rate them. At the end of a week, the highest-rating designs win. Winning means the T-shirt gets printed, and the lucky designer gets a small pile of cash and a slightly larger pile of glory.

I am hoping, dear reader, not only to live this lovely scenario, but that you’ll get the chance to actually wear this T-shirt.

Please click the graphic below, and (if so moved), give me a FIVE!

UPDATE: Dang. She didn’t quite make the cut, but that won’t keep me from dragging out the silk screens one of these days. Thanks to everyone who helped out with a vote!

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 — and the invisible question mark that immediately popped out of my head.

Shepard is one of contradictory characters who makes graffiti art because he has to, because it’s turned into a nice living, but also to change the world. He fell in love with Obama at first word, and contacted the campaign: Could he please give the candidate the André the Giant treatment?

(Shepard: “He didn’t want the Farakhan endorsement, maybe he didn’t want the Shepard Fairey endorsement either …”)

Silence from Obama … then a quiet yes.

Fairey papered Philly, then put a short run of the posters up on his website for sale: $40 apiece, using the profits to buy (somewhat ironically) legal street advertising space. A copy autographed by Obama is now hanging on Fairey’s wall, they’re now selling on eBay for $1500 and up, and the story has hit the national media like the proverbial hurricane.

Any graphic designer making the front pages gets a smile from me.

Attaboy, Shepard.

“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 be mightier than the sword, but even more potent is the bright red sticker! Scatter that justice around for the piddling price of a color printout.

The five pages of labels are frighteningly on-target … “unnecessary use of a Photoshop effect” popped right out at me, but there’s a category here for just about every offense against design, from abjurations to consult a designer to one of my own hobby-horses, “the inch glyph is NOT a speech mark”.

This is just the latest example of an irritable minority trying to maintain order in the printed public sphere, I suppose. Lynne Truss, grammar-fascist author of “Eats, Shoots and Leaves; The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation” has long advocated carrying a Sharpie around for the correction of publicly misplaced apostrophes — and she is far from alone.

Can excess in the pursuit of good design be called a vice? Take matters into your own hands — red-sticker vigilante justice is the kind I can finally get behind.

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 when those books arrived in the classroom and were distributed.

Like, just electric.

That’s from an incredible Flickr page hosting a fat batch of cover scans, golden-hued elementary school nostalgia of the highest order.

Poring over the newsprint catalog at the kitchen table, carefully penciling in the form in the back, piling my quarters and pennies together and figuring out how many of these cheap-and-cheerful little books I could afford … what a joy! These scanned covers are sort of Proustian madeleines in paperback, and the pulse-quickening thrill is as real today as it was in 1976.

Whether or not “Remembrance of Things Past” was on the catalog’s list, I couldn’t say. — still have to read that one.

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 whole city is alive with hieroglyphs, and I can’t wait to return this summer for more.

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 just can’t resist ‘em. I’ll be in Berlin again this summer, snapping up a storm.

The station’s name is perhaps most familiar as the title of the early 30s novel by Alfred Döblin, Berlin Alexanderplatz — the novel inspired a pair of films, but today’s post-war, post-wall Alex bears little resemblance to the densely active nighborhood that was.
]]> http://calyxdesign.com/2008/01/29/alexanderplatz/feed/ 0 http://calyxdesign.com/2007/11/16/vector-magic-the-holy-grail-of-vectorizers/ http://calyxdesign.com/2007/11/16/vector-magic-the-holy-grail-of-vectorizers/#comments Fri, 16 Nov 2007 20:40:56 +0000 richard http://calyxdesign.com/wordpress/2007/11/16/vector-magic-the-holy-grail-of-vectorizers/ 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 at Stanford who developed the thing, not a dime.

Since I’m constantly juggling the hats of both graphic designer and illustrator, this is something I’ve been hoping for for years; something to release the pixelized ink that I scrawl on paper, my sketches, photographs into the infinitely scalable world of vector art … something that works and costs less than a new laptop!

It works like this: upload your bitmap file, and the Flash-based wizard guides you through a series of simple questions about the nature of the file. You can edit online, make a variety of tweaks and changes, and when you’re satisfied, download as .EPS, SVG, or PNG… or email the results to whomever you like.

A-freaking-mazing.

But why take my word for it? Try it.

‘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 Space Eliminator”, “Starburst Dust”, and ooooh so much more, for just three easy payments of $29.99 a month!

The spot, created by Agency Fusion programming services, appeals to graphic designers by jabbing them right where it hurts the most — that vulnerable spot right between the ego and the intellect. You know the one — precisely where you feel the twinge when that ingrate client of yours inflicts yet another aesthetically-challenged atrocity on your perfectly balanced design.

Ouch.

I’m not endorsing AF, but only because I haven’t used them… yet.