Design Think

I find bicycles so photogenic. Perhaps it’s because their form is so functional.

For my 21st birthday I got wheels; two wheels in the form of a bike. It was the perfect antidote to the stressful last term of university. Within minutes I could be riding along the seafront breathing in the sea air and soaking up the sun. To me this was freedom. I could get out of my usual square-mile roamings between uni, home and pubs, and get to the sea or countryside whenever I wanted. It gave my mind time to wander, and the rhythm of putting my feet to the peddles was comforting. It gave me that free feeling of gliding though the air. A wonderful way to travel and the epitome of ‘form follows function’.

I’ve recently returned from a two month long journey around Malaysia and Myanmar (Burma). Trying out a new camera (Canon 700D) and a 300 mm lens to capture some wildlife, I snapped my way around these two fascinating countries to add more photographs to my photoblog Wandering in Asia.

Malaysia was a friendly country where many different ethnicities, cultures and religions live for the most part quite harmoniously, and a real pleasure to travel in. There I fulfilled a childhood dream of walking in a rainforest, surrounded by trees, 100% humidity and the incredible sound of insects.

Myanmar was far more challenging to travel in (though still interesting) with their country being held back for seemingly fifty years by their government. You could tell that the people I spoke to were desperate for change, summed up by one acquaintance in this telling sentence, ‘Your country – 21st century; my country – still in the 20th century’.

I’ve just returned from a week in France, visiting Avignon, Marseille and Paris. Whilst also doing the usual tourist things, I managed to visit some less touristy areas to get the real essence of French life. I’ve enjoyed taking my cameras out, just two this trip, my Lumix and my Pentax K-1000, with some film I haven’t tried before – Fuji Velvia.

We visited the Père Lachaise graveyard in Paris, and apart from the obvious reasons to go there, I became quite drawn to the weathered letters, carved into the mossy stones. The tombs made me think of people’s attempts to cling on to being remembered, which will only last as long as their type does.

I keep finding reasons to look at my iPhone, finding myself stooped at the neck staring into the abyss of glass and LCD. Wondering if I have a song on there that’s just come into my head, or looking up a director of a film on the IMDB app. Even just writing down a note I mustn’t forget. I can’t stop. My smartphone, with all its connectivity and social stuff and internet and whatnots, is like fast food for my brain.

Recently I’ve been trying to use my phone better: less refreshing twitter and aimless wandering around Reddit, and more pedometer and task focuser. It can be a time sink if you let it, or if you carefully select your apps, it can actually help you.

As a child, I used to think and wonder about the following things.

I wondered why some ‘a’s in my school books had funny hats, whilst others were almost circular.

… and why some numbers seemed to jump up and down, whilst others stood strong like capitals.

My favourite part of homework was formatting the text in Word, choosing the font and indentations.

My many creations in MS Paint, preparation for using Photoshop later on.

I looked at newspapers and wondered why there were tiny little dots to make up the colours.

And my natural hoarder’s eye – I collected things like interesting pencils and packaging, without realising why.

Stefan Sagmeister

I love this quote. It’s often hard to separate design and style, sometimes they are synonymous. I know Sagmeister has since distanced himself from this quote, but I still think that style should come after the idea – or not at all.

Yevgeny Yermakov has created a site to help young designers starting out in the industry: 5 questions for 100 designers. I’ve been asked to bestow my tuppence too, which you can read here.

I run because my PE teacher told me I couldn’t. I run because I love seeing what my body can do.

I run because I don’t want to get fat. I run to escape my thoughts.

I run because I long for a time when women don’t get verbally abused for doing their daily exercise. I run to beat my personal best.

I run because it makes me strong in body and mind. I run for that euphoria afterwards.

I run to overcome the honkers, whistlers and shouters. I run to sweat away the stress.

I run because the rhythm of foot to ground, foot to ground, foot to ground is comforting. I run because somehow it chose me.

I run because it makes it easier to walk. I run because it’s difficult.

I am an oxymoron.

I have opposing sides to me which all seem able to exist simultaneously. The side that wants to be better than anyone else, work for the best company, be incredibly successful and then the side who wants an easy life, one that is relaxing and simple. There is nothing I like more than sitting in a peaceful place listening to the birds sing, and there is nothing I like more than a night dancing ’til sunrise. The part of me that wants to think more, analyse this, wonder about that, and then the other part who says ‘can’t I just be?’ The part that can’t resist a documentary about the evolution of mammals, and yet the other part who loves Take Me Out.

I’m not the only oxymoron though – none of us are clear-cut – we all have many sides of ‘us’ that need to be expressed.

Just over three years ago I wrote this.

I was full of excitement about the city and what was to come. And for a part it was really great, the photography and writing it inspired in me, and the culture it has exposed me to. And where else could you be part of an exhibition about lolcats?

I thought I’d enjoy the anonymity of the crowd, but in reality London is the loneliest place I’ve ever lived. And so I’m moving on.

I won’t miss the noise, crowds, pollution and incessant rush rush rush, but I will miss things like the beauty of interspersed old and new buildings, incidental happenings and discoveries, the peaceful canal backwaters and my beloved lunchtime spots.

I work in a very hectic, noisy part of London. You could call it up-and-coming, gentrified, or you could call it obnoxiously loud, and overwhelming.

And so I like to keep my lunch hours for myself; uninterrupted, undisturbed, and in as quiet a place as possible. While the main streets are busy as hell, there are some beautiful hidden places nearby where I can escape London.

The first is a place often deserted, particularly on overcast – yet still warm – days. Nomadic people often pass though, or linger, and it attracts those with a love of the slower pace in life. Nature is here, but a more urban kind of nature – one with feral pigeons and mallards, and sprawling brambles and climbers. I like it this way. It’s not perfect but it feels as if it’s mine.

If I want to people watch, I wander to another place just a few minutes away. I come here at times when I don’t mind the low background noise of a bustling city. Although it’s right in one of the noisiest parts, its shape and arrangement manages to dampen the urban sounds. I watch couples wandering past, workers chatting on their phones and kids letting off steam. It has an air of nostalgia and anonymity.

When I long to be surrounded by nature, I visit my third hideout. I didn’t think it was possible to escape the smells of the city ’til I came here. It’s incredibly beautiful, wild and alive. A reminder that the city is home to more than just people. In a bizarre twist of fate I’ve ended up frequenting a place that my dad helped build back in the eighties. It has to last for another quarter-century at least.

The latest lunchtime spot I’ve found is the most beautiful. It’s near-enough guaranteed to be almost deserted every time I visit, but it’s not just that. This place is ethereal, it’s hard to describe, it’s almost like I’ve dreamt it. It reminds me of an abandoned and lush overgrown courtyard in a computer game, or a vivid scene in a Shirley Hughes illustration from my childhood. It’s the place that is hardest to leave, and I don’t think many people know of it at all.

On 19 December 2012, Chris Hadfield was catapulted into the sky to live on the ISS.

Over the next five months @Cmdr_Hadfield excellently explained various phenomenon to us and answered our questions in between his work. I was lucky enough to follow him on twitter just a few days before he went ‘up’ there, and it wasn’t long before his twitter feed began to outshine the rest.

As I transition the Space Station computers, I notice our Houston CAPCOM's name is ... Hal ! The irony, as life imitates art.

[View on twitter]

Astronauts often grace my twitter timeline, but none had explained and described life in space as well as Chis Hadfield. He just seemed to understand what gravity-bound earthlings wanted to know about. Our little curiosities, like, what happens when you cry in micro-gravity, or how do you get your haircut?

Spacewalking has been the most memorable. It is magic to be between the Earth & the Universe, alone, holding on with one hand.

[View on twitter]

With help from his son, Evan Hadfield, he shared photos of views that few of us will ever see. (Collected here by Guy Moorhouse.) The ISS is on Greenwich Mean Time, and so every night just as I was going to bed, tonight’s finale would appear on my twitter feed and give me a new, grounding, perspective.

Almost time to leave Station. Hard to express all of my emotions, but mostly gratitude. I came here on behalf of so many people - thank you.

[View on twitter]

All in all Chris Hadfield has made exceptional use of social media. Let’s hope that @AstroKarenN and @astro_luca continue the job after he falls to Earth.

In case you missed it, here are some of the highlights:

Just about the best advice I have ever heard.

What happens when you squeeze a soaking wet towel in space.

This Reddit AMA.

12:00

In my hideout away from London in N1, I can hear birdsong and smell the sweet burnt coal from the boats. City noises evaporate and nature resounds.

High-pitched whistles and tweets from the birds push away the heights of crowded buildings, and the clouds are visible once more.

All I dream of is here, in amongst the concrete mass, yet so far removed. Urban sprawl conquered by nature’s sprawl. Lapping water carrying cares downstream.

And in the summer here, it is heaven. Only clouded by the thought of a full turn of the clock.

It’s all been a bit quiet on here lately. For a very good reason – all my thoughts have been taken up with a book design project I’ve been working on. It’s a book about the history of a school in Dorking, Surrey, and I am designing and typesetting the whole thing. It’s a lot of work as a side project, but extremely enjoyable. My typographic knowledge and confidence have improved and it’s great to have full autonomy on the design. I owe a mountain of typographic debt to The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst for helping me sort out niggling typographic details like how to typeset old British money (italicised virgule and a figure dash) and is it OK to justify text (absolutely). I am also designing the front cover, which strangely seems more challenging than typesetting 200+ pages.

Some brief design details as it’s not yet finished: I’ve used an asymmetrical grid to give lots of breathing space between the images and text, and allows the captions to sit outside of the main text area. I chose Minion and Gill (which was produced by a foundry just down the road from the school) whose characters match the nature of the book’s content.

I definitely want to do more of this.

Our creativity is incredibly affected by the environment we work in.

Natural light, or lack of it, has the most immediate impact on us. Working under fluorescent bulbs flickering out sickly yellow light is the antithesis of a creative atmosphere where ideas flow freely from mind to mind. Colours are distorted and eyes are strained in the absence of natural light.

Next, the room itself. Small rooms, with low ceilings and dark colours immediately bring an unpleasant feeling to mind, and yet many buildings are designed in such a way that these spaces have to exist. We feel fenced in and trapped, unlike in a larger space with high ceilings and whitewashed walls.

Thirdly: air quality. Lack of air soon encourages the eyes to droop and breathing to slow, resulting in less oxygen to the brain and less resistance to distractions. Air conditioners are the enemy of fresh air, and are often used unnecessarily, when an open window will work far better.

A room that is not silent, but filled with low-level sounds of discussion, sketching and scribbling, and others engrossed in their work is desirable. A deathly silence can be as oppressive as intolerable noise.

Working on the ground floor emphasises the feeling of existing as a tiny being between huge towering buildings. Yet a view stretching over the bustling city below can uplift your outlook. Interestingly, davidthedesigner has never worked on the ground floor, perhaps contributing to a successful and happy career.

I have been lucky enough to take part in Lolcat: Teh Exhibishun, an exhibition endeavouring to display beautiful images of LOLCats, instead of the crudely put together pictures seen on the internet. Jenny Theolin did an incredible job of organising and curating the whole thing, and the exhibition has even been featured in a lovely little video on the BBC website.