Bespoke Books and Calligraphic Font Design
Above, speaking of scripts, a Girvin stylistic expression: a broadly splayed opening capital, a hairline accentuation, a strike stroke from the opening character in its initiation, a bounced baseline and jumped x-height, an unexpected ligature, widely varied pen...
Brand Design and the Game of Chess
The study of moves on the board. I was talking to a client about chess strategy, the moves, the personality of the players—the tactical delicacy of the moves. Are there archetypes in the game? Yes, player archetypes. First off, the legacy of the game is roughly 1400...
Drawing Love | Mapping Brands
Workshopping allegories and brand soul I was thinking about the question of inquiry and exploration, the search—reaching in(to people)—listening to them, learning from them, and gathering their impressions and ideas. Search for it, listen to them, what does that look...
Designing Limited Editions—Journeys, Shopfronts, Galleries
Portfolios, collectible design processions and creating metaphorical gallery experiences. It’s an interesting contemplation to think about brand work, design, and value. Surely there is a lot of conversation about design as a value-inducement to brand propositions....
Brand Jewelry | Designing Brands for Jewelry
Could a brand be so beautiful that it should be made into jewelry? “Sure,” says Susy Korb, an earlier Creative Director at Tiffany&Co., she asked, “Could we create a font that could be used in our print, as well as for actual fabrication into precious metals?" In...
Death Comes Home | Creativity, Motherhood and Lila Lee Shaw Girvin
Everyone has a powerful connection to their mothers. My mother, Lila Lee Shaw Girvin died this past week. And it called into contemplation all of the things that one thinks about in death—of anyone near. You’re thinking, "they were here, now they’re gone. Forever.”...
Brands that are beautiful
The Quest for the Most Beautiful | Brands, Enterprises, Narratives and the People That Make Them. In our life journey, the threading of our work, as creatives—people that create— we listen, absorb, gather, interpret and make meaning. We work to import and deliver...
Writing Creative Brief Strategy for Brands
How Bright the Future? Could a Creative Brief be…Brief? Not really. Brevity isn’t the point, it’s the concision of the document. This is a talk that I was asked to offer at P&G, then later again at Mark Anthony Brands—the beverage group in Vancouver, BC., then...
Brands, what do you know, now?
The quest for where you were, and where you are now—and, as we’ve asked, “what do you know?” You might just never know. I’m walking out there, walking around remote pathways wild rivers, swaying bridges, down in ancient buildings and pathways. And while I’m down...
If you’re not here, do you k[no]w where?
Of course, as a brand person, a place-maker—as you are—we’re thinking: “if you’re not here, and not over there, then where are you? Do you know where you are? Or are you nowhere?” I’ve been talking A LOT about placemaking—and planning spaces, making places—since I’m...