Thursday, September 8, 2011

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Tuesday, September 6, 2011

Ampersand Cookie Cutter


via felt & wire
Alyson Kuhn writes on her blog, “I have always been fond of ampersands & have even gotten to write about them on occasion, including here. Today I’m pleased to introduce my new cookie cutter. Now I can have my ampersand & eat it, too!…”
The rest of her post, including Amper Sans Black and her thoughts on cheese & hampersandwiches, visit here.

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Saturday, September 3, 2011

Friday, September 2, 2011

Cover: Training in Commercial Art


via letterology
Just one of the old cover scans found here.
My 1982 degree from the Art Institute in Pittsburgh is in Visual Communication, and I am fairly certain that initially my resume from that time had me searching for jobs as a commercial artist. It was many years later that I took on the title of graphic designer.

Wednesday, August 31, 2011

Vegan Ipsum


Both Vegan Ipsum and Veggie Ipsum are simple placeholder text generators.

A bit of history of Lorem Ipsum found on the Straight Dope:
“... Lorem ipsum was part of a passage from Cicero, specifically De finibus bonorum et malorum, a treatise on the theory of ethics written in 45 BC. The original reads, “Neque porro quisquam est qui dolorem ipsum quia dolor sit amet, consectetur, adipisci velit . . .” (“There is no one who loves pain itself, who seeks after it and wants to have it, simply because it is pain …”).

McClintock recalled having seen lorem ipsum in a book of early metal type samples, which commonly used extracts from the classics. “What I find remarkable,” he told Before & After, “is that this text has been the industry’s standard dummy text ever since some printer in the 1500s took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book; it has survived not only four centuries of letter-by-letter resetting but even the leap into electronic typesetting, essentially unchanged...”



Lewis Hine: Photographer, Activist, Character


An expert linotyper in a
Southern publishing house.

via nytimes
Read this post by James Esztrin on the role of the photograph in affecting social change.

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Wayzgoose


via wikipedia
“A wayzgoose was at one time an entertainment given by a master printer to his workmen each year on or about St Bartholomew’s Day (24 August). It marked the traditional end of summer and the start of the season of working by candlelight. Later, the word came to refer to an annual outing and dinner for the staff of a printing works or the printers on a newspaper...”

I seem to forget about this holiday every year, but will try to get an early start for 2012.

Wayzgoose for Coventry printers at Stonebridge, c. 1907.

Images of the Day: Poe Valley Moss



With my camera nestled in some great moss behind the concession stand 
at Poe Valley State Park, I’m not sure which of these I like better.

Friday, August 26, 2011

Typographic Transit Maps


via a two winged fairy
“TRNSPRTNATION” is a series of typographic transit maps by Fadeout Design. The transit lines are made up of strings of text that list the stations of the transit system. Prints are available for sale on the website of Boston, Chicago, London, NYC, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.
Visit the site here.

Bookbinding: Everything you ever needed to know


via felt and wire
Craft Stew has more than 115 bookbinding projects, tips and tutorials that include stitching methods, glue methods, “unusual” methods, big books, little journals, and even how to bind a book by recycling an old book.
Visit Craft Stew here.

Thursday, August 25, 2011

Seneca Lodge Postcard




I love this hand-tinted image of the main building and surrounding cottages.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Erasable e-papers


via printeresting
“Geek.com profiles a new erasable e-paper, which costs about two bucks for a single A4 sheet, but is good for 260 uses.”
Read more here.