Freight es Great

I stumbled upon a really beautiful typeface tonight. Freight, designed by Joshua Darden, is an extensive serif family containing 80 different variations, ranging from Display to Micro. Freight Micro was specifically designed for use below 9 point in print, which I found really fascinating. I love the angular features that are evident in Freight Big.

Recently, Joshua Darden re-worked the typeface for W Magazine. "When group design director Edward Leida noticed that numerous competitors were knocking off W's signature style, he began a soft redesign of the magazine, bringing the familiar aesthetic to a new (and less easily imitated) level of refinement. Realizing that the magazine was pushing the popular and traditional retail typeface Serifa beyond its capacity, he turned to typeface designer Joshua Darden for ideas." –joshuadarden.com

After numerous type studies for the publication, Joshua found that four new weights of Freight were born. The result: W Magazine has a typestyle unique to themselves, providing a fresh look that is all their own.

Freight Text Light

Freight Text Book

Freight Text Bold

Freight Big Italic

Slightly Altered

Vintage paint-by-number is in...maybe a little too in. Therefore, a number of artists spiced it up a little and enhanced original paint-by-number canvases with their own personal touch. The works are currently being shown at the Corey Helford Gallery in LA in the Charity By Numbers show. The paintings are being auctioned on eBay with all of the proceeds benefiting the Alliance of Children's Rights.

Joe Ledbetter

Audrey Kawasaki

Brandi Milne

Alex Pardee

Gary Baseman

Me-nom-en-a

Awesome video directed by Jonnie Ross, from the Portland, OR trio, Menomena. Currently, they're my second favorite band-o-the-week (first favorite being The Knife...oh so good). Anyway, the video is for their song, Cough Coughing...great bass line at the 2 minute mark. So, when Santa Trash comes to visit you, don't get mad at him...he's only trying to communa-macate.

Oh, and Menomena is coming to DC/Rock&Roll Hotel/March 31...I'll be there. Hmmm...Chapel Hill on April, 1st? I know someone there.

CMYK GUM

My sister knows how to shop for me...so, when she returned from her trip to Japan, she brought me a pack of gum. Totally awesome. Why does their gum have to be cuter than ours?

Unilever Love

While doing some late night grocery shopping, something small and blue caught my eye on the label of my Skippy peanut butter. It was the new Unilever logo, which is an array of floral-ish elements arranged together to form a blue letter "U". While looking closer, I could also see a dove, a fish and a bumble bee. I've seen many new, well-done logos taking this ornamental route, but this one has to be my favorite. The identity, designed by Wolff Olins, is made up of 25 different icons and adds a fresh and friendly mark. You can also check it out on the Ben and Jerry's and Lipton Iced Tea packaging.

The logo reminded me of Dutch type designer, Lucas de Groot, and his typestyle Nebulae. Each letter in the Nebulae family is intricately comprised of squiggles, dots and leaf-like elements. Lucas also designed the massively popular typestyle, Thesis.


letter "U" from NebulaeFour typestyle

Color Me Bad

To celebrate the release of their new book, Pictoplasma collaborated with numerous illustrators to create a walk-through coloring room experience. Galleries in the UK, Hong Kong, and Germany had more than 70 square meters covered with thousands of untouched black and white illustrations, scribbles and character madness. For the duration of the exhibition, visitors were invited to color in the characters, turning the space into an evolving coloring and activity room.

So don't be such a grown-up...buy the book and let's color.

Rockin' the Suburbs

Ahhhh, the land of subdivisons, cul-de-sacs, barbecues and above-ground pools. David Monsen, a design student at Gothenburg University in Sweden, created these picturesque slices based on Sunnydale, California. Sunnydale is, of course, the fictional suburban setting for the TV show, Buffy The Vampire Slayer. Limited cable in Sweden these days, eh? His design is to be diplayed at Hem 2006, the annual interiors display in Gothenburg. Congrats David...I'd rock it in my double-wide any day.