Direct Advertising

A series of lovely vintage ads, and some that aren't actually so vintage.











This ad is apparently from the 1980s which I think is pretty great of Dior. Now the internet told me it was from this year, but we all know that the internet has never told a lie.



This is from the early 90s and I am so in love with it. Bring back ads like this Lagerfeld!

cool breeze, tight squeeze, and NOW!

* Please note that I am terrified of aliens and they can
never be brought up in my presence.





Right now I totally have the creeps. Not because I watched 4 episodes of Lost today (although I'm sure that's affecting me subconsciously). I am completely at home, alone, with the creeps. I even looked at the Creature From the Black Lagoon and thought how scary it would be if that was walking down the hallway towards me. Ladies and Gentlemen, I have officially devolved into a 5 year old.

How Many Hours of Olympics Watching is Too Many Hours of Olympics Watching?

Okay, I realize that this is 50% a repeat post I already wrote for heartbeast/wolfgang , but I have Olympic fever bad. I have been seriously studying the branding of the Olympics, not just Vancouver 2010, but the individual countries and their choice typefaces, logos, colours, and uniforms. For example, the German speed skating team uniform has the huge letters GER in Gill Sans, an interesting choice, given that Gill Sans is the official/unofficial typeface of England. NBC created its own Vancouver 2010 logo it airs on screen with its broadcast, that has such a particular American feel. Serif letters, looking like 3-D steel, and powerful mountains in a crest.



Continuning with talk of Olympic logos, while I have hated on many aspects of the official Vancouver 2010 logo and oh-so-predictable iconography chosen, there is one aspect that I completely love. I love that Sasquatch is one of the mascots of the Olympics. Quatchi, as he is officially called, is the best mascot I can remember since that bird thing with the really long rainbow nose. Remember him? Was that from Barcelona? Regardless, I am pleased that the Canadian Olympic Committee (I made up that name) deemed Sasquatch an appropriate representative of Canada and then created the cutest mascot the Olympics will ever see.*

*I cannot guarantee that the Olympics will never produce a cuter mascot, but I challenge them to improve on Quatchi.



It should be noted that in my short quest to find a picture of Quatchi I somehow ended up on in the French area of some sort of Olympic site for children and made this picture. Im pretty sure I'm supposed to print it up and colour it in now. And by "made it" I mean I dragged Quatchi where I wanted him to be, and put in those mushrooms because they are the happiest mushrooms I have EVER seen.

For complete self-plagiarism I am including my comments from a few weeks ago on Olympic posters. The golden age of Olympic design really feel between Rome 1960 and Moscow 1980. These posters are amazing examples of clean lines and geometric imagery, really iconic. The Olympics should be saluted for their lengthy history of very simple and minimalist poster design. It's amazing how 1960 was the last use of serifs and more defined imagery, moving on instead to the incredible 1964 Tokyo poster. Each poster manages to capture the times and the identity of the city quite effortlessly and with such simplicity.

Take a Look, It's In a Book

I really love books. Both the act of reading and the physical objects themselves. In Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade when the Nazis are burning the books and the Nazi lady secretly cries because she also loves books, I feel her pain (and once cried myself — I was 10!)

Anyways, anyone who has seen any of my recent work knows that I am really into designing book covers these days. Last week I came across a really great blog dedicated to (generally) vintage book covers from around the world. http://ajourneyroundmyskull.blogspot.com/ After going through the incredibly vast collection for 10 minutes I actually had to take a break because, as I immediately described to someone, "my brain just exploded with design overload". It's been an intense search, but below are some of the best covers that I completely loved. I feel like these could act as some sort of Rorschach Test, and I really don't think I'm interpreting them accurately. I find them all strangely whimsical and cute.

Every time I look at this I think "Why hello giant grasshopper" in my head. weird.

I think this is the cutest image of death I have ever seen. I know he is bad ass and driving at deadly speeds in his muscle car but I find this image extremely cute. Love the little gun detail in the upper right corner.

This is just a really cool collage, and the typography works just as well and with the image. I guess this also could be seen as a bomb of wild west gay pride.

I didn't even notice the man with the axe (Casually going to chop down some of those trees? Nothing murderous going on here) until the 4th or 5th viewing of this cover. I also love the fox. Makes me think of those fox scarves that bite their own tail that I may or may not secretly want.