A few weeks back I saw a tweet featuring a pic of the octothorpe or hash symbol, from Shady Characters: The Secret Life of Punctuation, Symbols and Other Typographic Marks by Keith Houston. It looked exquisite and I couldn't resist grabbing a copy of the book. It's a fun book, chocked full of history and geeky knowledge - a perfect gift for the graphic designer in your life. But it's the book design that really shines. The designer (Judith Stagnitto Abbate) has done a beautiful job. It's full of elegant details and the two colours (the classic typographer black & red) are balanced perfectly throughout. Overall it has a very classical feel but with the occasional fun little twist like close cropping a mark or bleeding it off the edge of the page. You can tell she had a lot of fun with this, wonderful job.
Seriously geekish purchase: Reissue of the Nasa Graphic Standards Manual
This is a graphic design and 80's child, double hitter. Nasa was so cool growing up (even in the UK). I think it was mostly due to the Space Shuttle with a little help from Moonraker. This reissue of the Nasa Graphic Standards Manual (Danne & Blackburn) from 1974, marks the identity change from 'meatball' to 'worm'. It's bound as a book and wrapped in a 'space aged' reflective foil envelope. The original was presented in a ring binder with hole punched pages, and it's those pages that have been scanned (including the holes) and used in the book. The reissue design team (Jesse Reed and Hamish Smyth) have reproduced all the fold out pages to create an accurate and loving (but bookshelvable) version.
For me the Nasa identity is something that screams space! Much more than Star Wars or Star Trek ever did because Nasa was (is) real, making the impossible possible and the bringing the unimaginable that bit closer. The style of the 'worm' mark firmly places it historically in the 70's/80's but somehow remains a timeless expression of space age design. I love the collapsed leading and condensed tracking on the full name National Aeronautics and Space Administration. As you'd expect the manual covers logo use, typography and colour as well as grids and layouts. But the really cool parts are the vehicle decal examples - it's not often that you get to show an example of your logo on a satellite and a Space Shuttle.
This is the first reissued standards manual I've picked up, but there's quite a trend for them at the moment. I think this is partly because they are beautiful objects that reflect the discipline and skills of pre digital graphic design, and partly because it's way more acceptable to be this geeky these days.
Grab a copy from the website https://standardsmanual.com/
For more standards and guidelines take a look at the marvellous United Editions imprint from Tony Brook and Adrian Shaughnessy https://uniteditions.com/
Wild Forever by Gary Taxali
I've been toying with getting a Gary Taxali print for a long time, no idea what held me back. Anyway I finally grabbed Wild Forever for Katrina for Christmas as it fits her perfectly.
The illustration was originally commissioned by The New York Times' for a tribute to the great Maurice Sendak, upon his death in 2012. It's a fantastic print, large (19.3″ x 24″), richly coloured and will look stunning on the wall (alas we will need to find a new home with enough walls first).
Up until now the only other Taxali piece we had was a very small postcard and catalogue from his 300 show (I posted the card and cover back in 2010). I think what I love the most about his work is the layering and texture. All the rubber stamp, overprinting and notation really hits the spot for me, especially when combined with the commercial colours and cartooning.
Here's a little more from the 300 catalogue:
Check out his work here: http://www.garytaxali.com/
The ever so Fine Art of Abuse - NSFW
Firstly, this will offend a lot of people out there, especially those that are sensitive to items with more colourful language. If you regularly use the phrase 'potty mouth' I suggest you leave this page immediately.
I've backed a few Kickstarter books, and this has to be my favourite so far. Mostly because I can't imagine a publisher ever have the balls to put this out. The most surprising thing about this fabulous book full of Mr Bingo's spectacularly foul mouthed (yet somehow poignant) postcards is the production quality. It's gorgeous!! From the cloth bound with a foil embossed cover of an octopus giving you the V sign, through to the card bookmark, dedication and 'Hall of Twats' section for the backers. Also had best postage label, pretty sure it set off a few flags coming through international post to the US. On top of that it's a hefty tome, a good inch and half thick - best postcard book ever. Added bonus for the Kickstarter campaign was the 'dedication' and this print:
Some of the 'crap postcards' and Mr Bingo vitriol are sublime and some of the insults are truly horrifying (see Fat Jimmy Saville below). Why does this exist? Why did people pay for these insults? I'm not sure, but I'm so pleased they did. But as for Mr Bingo's rationale here's how he introduces the project:
I love post and I'm worried that people don't get enough 'fun' post these days.
Especially postcards.
So I had an idea. It's very simple.
You send me fifty quid (plus postage) and I'll send you a vintage postcard with a
drawing and an offensive message on it. (that's why it's called 'Hate mail').
So you get an original signed drawing, the postman get's a laugh and the world
get's a little bit happier.
I was in a quandary about posting images from the book as the individuals who 'requested' or at least received a piece of Mr Bingo's hate mail have their names and addresses shown on all the postcards. Of course any postcard publicly displays the name and address of the recipient and I think they knew what they were getting in to.
In the images below I've chosen to blur/edit/crop out as much of the personal information as possible, so at least I'm not publishing their names and addresses on the web.
Hate Mail: The Definitive Collection by Mr Bingo is brilliant. It's foul mouth, irreverent and puerile, and a fantastic addition to my library. It will sit proudly on my bookshelf next to A Decade in the Shit House by Modern Toss.
Grab a copy from Mr Bingo: http://www.mr-bingo.org.uk/
Beautiful but Beastly Verse
Picked up a copy of the beautifully illustrated Beastly Verse by JooHee Yoon. It's a lovely collection of rhymes and poems about animals by various authors. Each has one of Yoon's wonderful, layered and rich illustrations supporting it. Incredibly rich and sumptuous colour.