Wednesday, July 6, 2011
Old English type body sizes
“Prior to 1737, little standardisation existed in the sizes of printing types and typefounders cast types to their own sizes and dimensions. In this year, the Parisian typefounder Pierre Simon Fournier introduced a new system that he derived from dividing two inches of the pre-metric French foot into one hundred and forty-four equal parts. Fournier gave the resulting unit a name – ‘points’ – and they measured 0.137 of the English inch, which is close to the present point system…”
Read the rest here. I love that the term Nonpareil is equivalent to 6 points.
Chop vs. Rubber Stamp
“Near the beautiful Temple of Heaven Park in Beijing, one might wander past this public sculpture resembling a enormous traditional Chinese chop. It looks as if a giant person just stamped her seal onto the sidewalk.
Original post here.
http://www.printeresting.org/2011/07/05/dispatches-from-china-really-big-chop
Chili Peppers and Scoville Units
 |
| Trinidad Scorpion Butch T |
“…The Ghost pepper Bhut Jolokia (“bhut” means ghost in Hindi) has fallen from the top. Earlier this year, Australian pepper grower Marcel de Wit unveiled a super pepper, called the Trinidad Scorpion Butch T, which tested hotter. Just two weeks ago came news reports that a Taiwanese farmer, Yeh Wu Shun, claimed his new cultivar is even hotter, scoring 1.5 million units on the Scoville scale of pepper hotness. (By comparison, a really hot jalapeno scores around 8,000 units.)”
Read the entire post here.
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
The Alamo was about Slavery
“In today’s excerpt from Delancey Place — as David Crockett entered into sparsely-populated Texas from Tennessee in 1836 hoping for riches from new land grants but unwittingly headed for martyrdom at the Alamo, white settlers there were chafing at the Mexican laws that prohibited slavery. While the causes of the Texas War for Independence were many, the principal cause was this prohibition of slavery. And of the ‘holy trinity’ of heroes at the Alamo — William Barrett Travis, James Bowie, and ‘Davy’ Crockett — both Travis and Bowie were land speculators and slave traders:
“Like many others making the same journey at the time, Crockett understood what he faced once he crossed the Red River into Texas and left the United States. He had to have been aware that, in the weeks before he departed, the animosity had increased between the government of Mexico and the American settlers, called Texians, in the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas, The white colonists were becoming increasingly tired of living under Mexican rule, and they headed for war with hopes of forming their own separate republic. Many of these Anglos were illegal immigrants and did not abide by Mexican law. All citizens were required to join the Catholic Church, accept the language and laws of the governing country, and, by the late 1820s, observe the ban on the enslavement of human beings…”
Read the rest here.
Suffragette Surveillance, 1912
via retronaut“In 1912, Scotland Yard detectives bought their first camera, to covertly photograph suffragettes. The pictures were compiled into ID sheets for officers on the ground.
When Evelyn Manesta, one of the Manchester suffragettes, refused to pose for a picture, a guard was brought in to restrain her in front of the camera. But when the photograph of Evelyn Manesta appeared, the arm had been removed. The photographer had acted on official instructions to doctor the photograph so that it would be less controversial...”Images © National Portrait Gallery, London. Read the BBC article here. More images from the BBC can be found here.
1910: Mademoiselle Fifi Crosses the English Channel
via BlackandWTF“In 1910, on the first airplane flight across the English Channel to carry a passenger, American aviator John Moisant flew from Paris to London accompanied by both his mechanic and his cat, named either Mademoiselle Fifi or Paree, depending on which newspaper you believe…”
Visit the link here.
Letterpress and Jack Daniels
via printeresting
Watch a video of Yee-Haw Industries making letterpress prints for their Tennessee pals Jack Daniels.
The video can be found here. I’m not a whiskey fan, but it is fascinating watching the carving of the plates, much like a stamp for a letterbox.
Monday, July 4, 2011
Earworm of the Day: Sinnerman by Nina Simone
 |
| Nina Simone |
I first heard this song in The Thomas Crowne Affair; you can watch the clip from the movie that used the song here. A search turned up this link on Nina Simone’s life — she was was an American singer, songwriter, pianist, arranger, and civil rights activist widely associated with jazz music. Here is a link to her official website.
Sinnerman (spelled as one word) is one of Nina Simone’s most famous songs and she recorded her definitive 10-minute-plus version on her 1965 album Pastel Blues. Simone learned the lyrics of this song in her childhood when it was used at revival meetings by her mother, a Methodist minister, to help people confess their sins. In the early days of her career during the early sixties, when she was heavily involved in the Greenwich Village scene, Simone often used the long piece to end her live performances. Listen to her 10-minute version here.
Find the lyrics to Sinnerman here, and more about the song’s history here.
The Ampersand, part 2½ of 2
via shady characters“Although the ampersand’s creator (if it can be said to have one at all) is not recorded, there exists a popular misconception that the symbol’s name is taken from ‘Amper’s and’, after a supposed originator. Mentions of this derivation come from sources as diverse as an 1883 book on Personal and Family Names written by one H. A. Long, and more recently the collaborative, internet-based Urban Dictionary which suggests that the symbol was both invented by and named for a 17th century typesetter called Manfred Johann Amper. Unfortunately, both claims are undermined by a lack of corroborating evidence, and even more telling, ‘Manfred Johann Amper’ appears to never have existed.
The real origin of the word ‘ampersand’ likely owes more to Latin than to French, although it is a far more recent creation than the character which bears its name. During the 19th century, the ampersand was routinely taught as the twenty-seventh letter of the alphabet, and in common with those other letters which formed words by themselves — ‘A’ and ‘I’, for example — it was prefixed by the Latin per se, or ‘by itself’. Schoolchildren would recite “X, Y, Z, and per se and”, while particularly bored pupils would not so much recite as slur the final syllables to yield any one of a dazzling variety of words. This entry from Farmer & Henley’s 1905 Dictionary of Slang and Colloquial Engish recorded some of them for posterity:
Ampersand. 1. The posteriors. 2. The sign &; ampersand. Variants: And-pussy-and; Ann Passy Ann; anpasty; andpassy; anparse; apersie (a.v.); per-se; ampassy; am-passy-ana; ampene-and; ampus-and; am pussy and; ampazad; amsiam; ampus-end; apperse-and; empersiand; amperzed; and zumzy-zan...”
Read the rest here.
Image of the Day: Life is a Bowl of Perry's
More on the company can be found here.
Sunday, July 3, 2011
Klotz Type Experiment
spotted by my sonCombine wooden blocks and perspective and what you’ll get is a fascinating Block Type Experiment by Marc Bottler.
See it here.
Linotype Machines
spotted vis a friend on TunnelBug's photostream “These ghostly linotype machines stand guard on the 7th floor of this early 20th century gothic masterpiece in St Louis, MO. Linotypes made the plate for printing presses by embossing red hot plates of iron. I couldn't help but imagine red hot plates of iron passing the halls of this grand skyscraper…”
Visit TunnelBug's photostream here.
Restoring an 1870s Tintype
via topdog imaging and boingboing“Bob Rosinsky from Top Dog Imaging walks through the extraordinary process of restoring a badly damaged 1870s tintype using modern, high-tech techniques, such as a polarized strobe and ultra-high-rez camera. He hints at even more advanced techniques employing X-rays, UV and infra-red light…”
Read the rest here.
Saturday, July 2, 2011
Hamilton Wood Type and Target announce a new Hamilton inspired Fall clothing line
via kartemquinfilmsTarget has just announced their Fall line inspired by designs and prints from Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum. Visit the link below to watch a video from Target that features a behind-the-scenes look at the design, and a quick glimpse of the clothing. Also, you can find a link to an article in The Atlantic, where you can find a bit more about how this all came to be. And finally, watch a video interview from earlier this year with the Moran Brothers on how Typeface has made a positive impact on Hamilton.
All the links and more can be found here.
Friday, July 1, 2011
Image of the Day: Time Among the Ampersands
 |
| For some reason, this clock makes me think of the Wizard of Oz. Perhaps it is the shape of Tik-Tok... |
Phipps Conservatory 1910
via shorpyPittsburgh circa 1910. Phipps Conservatory, Schenley Park. Detroit Publishing glass negative.
View full size here. I have loved going to Phipps Conservatory since my college days in the early 80s.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Color Communication: When You Say X, Your Designer Hears This
via colourlovers
 |
| Image from Hearing Color: Neil Harbisson, Cyborg |
Read the rest here.
Odd Color Names Offer a Primer in Marketing
via nytimes“If you heard the words “Tempest,’ ‘Turbulence’ and ‘Tornado Watch,’ you might head for the basement — fast. Paint manufacturers want you to head for the living room. In a redoubled effort to capture consumers’ attention in this sputtering economic recovery, some paint companies are hoping to distinguish their brands with names that tell a story, summon a memory or evoke an emotion — even a dark one — as long as they result in a sale. What they do not do is reveal the color…”
Alessandro Novelli’s The Alphabet
via felt and wire“In just over a minute, Alessandro Novelli captures his (and our) love for typography and animation in The Alphabet, a spelling video inspired by children’s hornbooks..”
Read the rest, and watch the video, here. P.S. Can you spot the typo?
Business Cards of the Day
Four cards I discovered on a recent trip. Freeze Frame Reality has used a nice spot gloss varnish. The Art Out of the Box card reminded me so much of the local equivalent to it [Artbox Studios] and I just had to laugh at the similarity. The next card, well, is self-explanitory: I buy. ’nuff said. Dog Gone Walking is my favorite in this series of finds [both sides of this card are shown, along with a close-up]. Clean design, nice muted color choices, sophisticated typography along with a touch of humor on a topic that can make me go on a rant.Click on the images for a larger view.
Heavenly Typography
 |
| From Urania’s Mirror: Monoceros, Canis Minor and Atelier Typographique, 1825 |
“Some people see faint outlines of unicorns in the heavenly constellations and others see dogs, or the canis minor. Yet Mr. Jehoshaphat Aspin looked up and saw a celestial type studio in the stars with a unicorn (monoceros) jumping over it…”
Read the rest here.
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
The Art of Sleeping in a Box
pointed out by a fairy“Start from simple sleeping on your back…or on your side…”
Read the rest here. Makes me smile.
Paige Bradley’s Expansion
via notcotPaige Bradley’s artist statement on her sculpture Expansion, “From the moment we are born, the world tends to have a container already built for us to fit inside: A social security number, a gender, a race, a profession or an I.Q. I ponder if we are more defined by the container we are in, rather than what we are inside. Would we recognize ourselves if we could expand beyond our bodies? Would we still be able to exist if we were authentically ‘un-contained’?”
More images of Expansion can be found here.
Don’t Fear the Internet
via imprint“…Jessica Hische and Russ Maschmeyer have started a wonderful little site explaining to beginners what production for the web is all about. Young designers, take heed: this is not optional information. It’s rare that a web shop would be willing to hire a designer who has no idea how HTML/CSS and JavaScript work together. Friendly and easy to understand, these guides are a good place to start.”
Be sure to visit here.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Typeface Software
 |
| This is my face as interpreted by the software. |
“The design of typefaces is founded upon principles from the days of metal type, when creating individual fonts was a laborious process and constrained by physical requirements. Most digital type design follows those same conventions, but technology gives us opportunities to make type design more spontaneous and personal. The Typeface software translates facial dimensions into generative type design.”
Learn more about it here, and download the software to generate your own typeface.
The Ampersand, part 2 of 2
“From its ignoble beginnings a century after Tiro’s scholarly et, the ampersand assumed its now-familiar ‘&’ form with remarkable speed even as the Tironian et stayed rigidly immutable. The symbol’s visual development is perhaps best documented in a formidable piece of typographical detective work carried out by one Jan Tschichold, a graphic designer born in Leipzig in 1902…”
Read the rest here.
Image to the Right: Collected ampersands in Jan Tschichold’s The Ampersand: its origin and development (1957). Notable here are (1) Pompeiian graffiti; (8) an insular majuscule ampersand from the 7th century Book of Kells, and (13) an 8th century Merovigian ampersand, already recognisable as the modern ampersand form.
Paper Peaucellier Linkage
via robives.com Newsletter“Invented by Monsier Peaucellier in 1864, the Peaucellier linkage is a simple mechanism created to convert rotary motion into straight line motion. Now, almost 150 years later, you can download and make your own working paper model. A fascinating paper model to download and make.”
Find out more here.
Monday, June 27, 2011
Vintage Office & Art Supplies
via letterology
See more examples here; and even more, including pocketwatches and locks, can be found at at Vintage Collective's Flickr site.
DART St. Louis
via designobserver“…Last April, as a part of STL Design Week, the St. Louis creative community was invited to FK Photo, a well-known commercial photography studio. Inside their sleek 12,000 square foot rehabbed warehouse in the city's midsection, more than 250 designers, art directors, photographers and illustrators took turns throwing real darts at a large projected map of the city. The intersection where the dart landed became their destination. The dart-thrower had a month to find his or her assigned corner of the city and return with a photograph that made that spot come to vivid life.
Each dart throw brought a donation of $5, with the proceeds going to Rebuild Together St. Louis, a local affiliate of the national not-for-profit dedicated to revitalizing local neighborhoods. The Throw Party raised over $2,500 for the organization. A month later, the community came together again for the Presentation Party, where all of the photographs were revealed to the public... ”
Read the rest here, and learn more about DART St. Louis here.
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Images of the Day: My Other Car is a Broom
I just discovered today that the broom rack for our car that we’ve been using for years can also be used for transporting mountain bikes as well. Life is good!
I’ve known about My Other Car is a Broom for quite some time, and love most of the products at Northern Sun; but I especially love this one.
Sybil Ludington’s Heroic Ride
via delancey place“In today's excerpt - with all deference to a former governor from Alaska, not only was the purpose of Paul Revere’s ride to warn the revolutionaries of an impending British attack, there was another heroic ride of warning twice as long as Revere’s. The rider was sixteen year old Sybil Ludington…”
Read the rest here. More on Sybil can be found here.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)