Work - Christopher Dresser

I was tasked to create a book spread for a craft person of my choice, I picked Christopher Dresser a great industrial designer. I am not overal pleased with my spread, there was alot more interesting work going on in my development pad, so next time I am going to go with heart not my head when creating the final piece. Also I am going to make changes to this piece, with shortening the title and putting it in a more classic typeface. The hierarchy in the stand first needs to stand out more with a heavier weight and put less leading into the captions.

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some pages (more to be uploaded)

Work - Birthday Cards

Dads Birthday Card.

Danielle Birthday Card.

When I came to create these cards I was feeling really unspired but I feel they came out okay. I like my dads one with the fish pattern in the background, when I got it printed it didnot come out as well as I want to. I like the whale card, which I created from a stamp I was using to make wrapping paper.

Travel - Longhoughton/Newcastle

This weekend I have been in Longhoughton (40mins north of Newcastle) which is by the town of Alnwick, visiting my girlfriends house. Its great as there are lots of RAF bits and bobs but also things like this phone box, looks really rusty due to the sea air.

This was in Newcastle which I thought was funny as arnt all Theatre's live performances? I have never been to a pre recorded stage performance, only a little picky.

We spotted this on a lamp post in Gateshead behind The Sage, I think it is a great idea. Light on demanding! Saving energy but also still providing a public service when needed. I hope to see this in other areas.

Inspiration - Nobrow

Nobrow is a really cool publication of illustration and graphic arts that showcases some great talent out in the world. Their aim is to renew focus on quality in print and to play as much as possible. Check them out

Inspiration - Baby Marx

I was just on the Walker Art Center website and found this, I think its really great. The project is created by an Mexican artist Pedro Reyes that looks at the potential for mass entertainment to operate as a radical educational tool. Walker Art Centre Website

New books - A Visual History of Typefaces and Graphic Styles

Here are two great books on typography, they document type from 1628 till 1938 combined. With a high quality printed pages and an online archive that you can access, these books are bargains! They are not just typography book but there are lots of symbols and beautiful illustrations. Here are some examples of pages inside (not the best pages, as there are so many).

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Volume 1

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Volume 2

Inspiration - Chinese Poster Net

Chinese Poster net is a really great resource, it archives state produced posters throughout the last century in China. Great fun just going through the site and viewing the attitudes and thoughts being communicate in the posters. Also I love the strong figures mixed in with the messages of production and technological growth. I really want to involve this kind of style and message into my own independent work.

Layout Project - Collage

For the first couple of days at university this year we were tasked to make eight compostions. These compostions all had a different set of rule but we were allowed to use any words, images/etc we wanted. I really enjoyed doing this, as collages bring the inner child out in everyone (and mine is always there anyway). I feel some of these compostions worked alot better than others, for example "loud and" is my favourite. Makes me think of the early photo collages from the Soviet Union.

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Travel - Newcastle

We went to newcastle the other day, here is my best bits of what we saw.

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At the Laing Art Gallery we saw Colin Booths: Institute of play which was just great fun! Loved how many wooden blocks there was that resembled a mini cityscape with simple geometric objects. The playfulness was just all around us, plus in the next there was a huge mat with tons of wooden blocks to let the visitors have a go themselves.

I adored this type, was so helpful and was really nicely positioned on the vast wall.
What a great comment from another visitor, could not say it better myself.

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Baltic, This was the second time I have been to see these two exhibitions at Baltic. Defiantly worth a visit before these two displays closes down.
Here is Maurizio Anzeri, who does great embroidery into portraits from the 1930's collected at markets. This is the favorite pieces of work we saw, as I like how the embroidery enhances the faces of the past.This work was done by Mariah Robertson who creates these amazing hybrds of photography, paintings and film. She creates these piece in the darkroom on huge rolls of photographic paper. The energy and passion and sometimes pure chaos on the rolls is just mind blowing, but my favorite part is the structures displayed within the pieces which I hope to use in my own design work.

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Side Gallery, is a lovely little gallery on the way to the Baltic Gallery. We went to see 'Fields Of Vision' which was a photographic exhibition about the north exploring industrial but also the abandoned and social cost of not being like the rich south east of the country.

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Well that was last weeks adventure from Carlisle but soon I am hoping to go to 'Design Event Festival' in newcastle in October.

Travel - Maltings Shrewsbury

The other weekend me and my family went to our towns locate industrial waste land. Here is the three oldest iron framed buildings in the world which used to be a Flax Mill but also became a Brewery thing. Was such a interesting place with some interesting spaces. They plan to spend around £50million to convert into a shopping, education space but there not really sure. My issue is this space was designed as a industrial site and all the spaces are designed with that in mind. So how easy will that be to convert into a nice livable and office workable space? Its a pitty that a new industry cannot take it over and convert back into the primary function of the building. However it does need saving as it part of the nations and regions history, plus it is a beautiful building.

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Inside the South Silo (built in the 1950's but due to be destroyed)
Pictures are pretty bad as only had my phone on me. (missed opportunity)
I just adored this space, would be a really interesting space to explore design with projections and sound in.

Gary's Birthday Card

With all my stuff at university, I had to came up this. I really like the playfulness of the type. I really enjoying collaging at the moment, going to do alot more collages in more details.

Wedding

I was asked by my sister and future husband to create a set of wedding invites and reply cards for there wedding. They want something modern and spirally, so I created this. I did not find it the most enjoyable project but I am very glad they like it. I will be uploading more images and better quality ones soon.

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Here are my favorite thumb nailing sheets I created.