5-Card Swiss

File this under Why Didn’t I Think of This since I find the traditional design of playing cards oh-so-boring and very dated. Appealing both to the typophile and card player, Helveticards ($10) are a tastefully designed modern take on the playing card and are just too beautiful not to own. Too beautiful not to plan a modern poker party around!

Flight 101

South Africa’s Kulula airlines recently underwent a rebranding from their in-house creative team. Applying this 101 guide to the body of the airplane is so fresh and playful a design. Being a great lover of typography-driven graphic solutions, this definitely made me look. Now I finally know where the black box is. (Via: PSFK)

Eggs & Sausage

Wonderful typographic music video by Jackie Lay for the Tom Waits song Eggs and Sausage.

An Abundance of Type

It was love at first sight upon viewing these typographic mixed media artworks by Sarah Bridgland. See more of her visually exciting works here.

Playing with Your iPhone

The apps for the iPhone just get better and better, now I have another reason to be distracted from work today with the app Type Drawing. You write some copy, pick a font and a background and start drawing. At 99 cents, all the creative pleasure you could want for a few pennies! (Thanks Omar).

Charting Typography

A handy infographic, The Periodic Table of Typefaces. Thanks to Kellner Book Design for this one! (Click on photo to view at a larger size)

Summer Collection

Coca-Cola just unveiled a limited edition of their hot new summer look for their cans. My favorite is the logos as heat on the grill. Refreshing packaging design. 

When Worlds Collide

I love it when the worlds of architecture and graphic design collide and this stunning library in Alexandria is a great example of that kind of vision. Designed by Snøhetta, a Norwegian architectural firm that has been making quite a statement with their building projects. At the library in Alexandria, a huge cylinder with concrete plating is covered with typographical elements in non-western languages, mostly hieroglyphs. So beautiful.

Wrapped in Language

Just lovely, this calligraphic fabric work from artist Francesca Biasetton. See more at her Flikr and portfolio sites.

Soft Art for the Sofa

I’ve posted before about the fabulous pillows over at Bonjour Mon Coussin but somehow missed these beautiful typographic accent pillows when browsing the site. Love, love these.

Right On!

Beautifully executed animated short done in typography on the universal declaration of human rights. From the Human Rights Action Center, created by Seth Brau. 

CNN Gets it Right

Associated Press: The 129-year-old Hatch Show Print, one of the few commercial letterpress printers in the country that have survived decades of obscurity and are now enjoying a revival in the midst of a digital age. CNN hired the business - whose designers handcraft posters using wood or metal blocks in much the same way printers did for hundreds of years- to design and create nearly all of its promotional materials for its presidential election coverage. Belmont University will hand out Hatch Show Print posters to everyone who attends the upcoming presidential debate on the college campus.
This is the same shop that made Elvis Presley's posters, Hank Williams' and Bill Monroe's. It has created posters for Pearl Jam and the Beastie Boys. It supplied traveling circuses and vaudeville acts with the posters that advertised shows in the earlier part of the last century."We're huge fans of their work and their approach," said CNN's marketing director, Scot Safon. "Anyone who cares about design knows what they do and loves what they do."

Note: Visit the Hatch Show Print shop for some stunning vintage restrike posters. 

A Message of Peace, Freedom & Love

Love how the numeral 2 looks as if it's scratched (look carefully, it’s subtle) on the surface overlaying the copy on Comme des Garcons limited edition CdG#2 "Silver Words" … available for pre-order at Blackbird. "Words contain meanings like a bottle holds a perfume. Both convey messages that can be interpreted and experienced in an immense variety of different ways, each of them communicates an essence, a thought, a shared experience. Messages in bottles have always signified belief and a hope for the future. Using advanced serigraphic techniques, evolved from traditional printing methods, the original Comme des Garcons 2 pebble-shaped bottle has been lacquered in black to contain silver words of peace, freedom and love in several languages. The result is a deep, matt-black colour surface holding an infinate message of hope, stamped in silver words."

Scrabble, Anyone?

Top photo: 3d simulations of type-based installations by psalmplasma, commissioned by Odyssey Communication for Vodafone.

Bottom photo:  Pillows available from Steven Reed Design.

Mossy Message

Being a huge fan of gardening and anything typographical, I was delighted to discover illustrator Anna Garforth’s Mossenger project. She has used moss to create type/grafitti that grows on a wall with a verse from Eleanor Stevens. This installation is a part of YCN LIVE in London. I'd love to try this on the cinderblock wall down my driveway, but here in Southern California I'd probably have to do it in Astroturf. Beautiful work, check out her site. (Via SwissMiss)

Political Types

The outside facade of the CNN Grill in Denver, getting the message across to DNC attendees. Love how the building is used as a vessel for the typography.

Culture Club

Spent the day on a marathon tour of the new Broad Contemporary Art Museum at LACMA. My favorite installation was artist Barbara Kruger’s 3-story very graphic installation that covers three walls of a gigantic elevator shaft. The graphics are so huge, the impact is quite arresting. The guard would only let me take a photo from outside, but here's another shot of an exhibit she did back in 1991 at the Mary Boone Gallery. 

Magnificent Obsession

Brilliant concept and design by Issac Tobin; Illustrator: Lauren Nassef. This book is about the history of obsession, how apropos — hours spent pricking away at a heavy piece of card stock. 

A Closer Look

This image is from the cover of Funki Porcini’s album Fast Asleep. If you look closely you’ll see that the titling is all done in vintage audio gear, what a great concept! (Via iso50)

Seeing Things

Love, love this brilliant signage and direction system for the Eureka Tower Car Park in Melbourne. The distorted letters on the wall can be read perfectly and appear to be floating and transparent, when standing at just the right position. Makes parking your car there like a visit to an art museum installation. This project won several international design awards and is the brainchild of Axel Peemoeller. Very clever, very bold. (Via SwissMiss)