How would you improve life in NYC?
Doing good, as a contributor to community, in design -- could be "helping me, helping you." How would you improve life in NYC? How can you help? Anywhere? As a pro bono designer? There's nothing [as it seems to me, these days] as challenging as the balance between the...
Who is the Mayor of Mars?
Curiosity, where are you? Are you the Mayor of Mars? Yes -- to the Mayorship. But to the geo-synchronism of FourSquare, the point might be journey, story, relevance and place. I'm here. I'm there. I'm no where. Mars Curiosity at Gale Crater Became mayor! 1 hour ago...
The Deep Scent: Alcoholic Spirits, Perfume, and Distilled Essences
The perfume of booze: strategy, story, packaging Partnering in Paris, Tokyo and NYC with Pierre Dinand, we talked about -- and worked together on -- the idea of enchanted containment, ideating iconic containers of concretized, luxurious value as being a symbolic, even...
Jimmy Jane & Fluke Corporation
Cross promoting brand disparity in new conceptual alignment Frankly, knowing the leadership at Fluke Corporation, I can't imagine that they saw, or were offered a comment on the use of their video promoting vibration sensing for a grouping of exceptionally well...
Tom Ford, James Bond and Design
Theatrical design, costumery and captivation Who's the man? There's always been a supreme masculinity in the legacy of the mythic, Ian Fleming archetypal character and the theatrical playing power of James Bond - perhaps never better evidenced that in the persona of...
The power of graphically reorganizing and mapping information
Rethinking how ideas are shared The explanation of ideals, mapped in a navigation of content. "Where am I going, how will I get there -- being lost, I don't "get where I am" -- "having a map, with information, I have a map, a visualization of way, found." It might be...
Working with Steve Jobs
The design strategy of simplification A friend, Stuart Balcomb, a musician and composer in Venice, California, reminded me of something, to design -- and Steve Jobs. I worked as a consultant to Apple, at the behest of Steve Jobs in the late 70s, early 80s. I met him...
Hey, that’s designy!
The etymology of design, the signature of personality -- and your presence. The design of you is what you make of it. The design is you. Your story, your musculature, the tracery of your nerves and veins, how you draw, hold a drawing tool --what you see, mind-fully...
Idea Fire tornado
The metaphor of clouds Cloud-watching, the formation of ideas, cloudmind and the wind, the mist of crowds [Image above, the Palouse, Tim Girvin cloud watching -- photographed by Dawn A. Clark] Coming from a farming family, I'm a skywatcher. Also, as a sailor, I watch...
Heatherwick Studios
The rippling of Genius A friend writes from London -- a visit to the Victoria & Albert show on the design ingenuity of Thomas Heatherwick. It's not the first time that we've observed his shining light. Earlier, working in NYC, we'd noted his work on the curious...