Elsewares joins Design*Sponge, Clothes Pin, and Joi Lakes for a biz ladies meet up to discuss getting products into stores, production, distribution, legal issues, and more for independent designers.
February 20th at Design Within Reach Brooklyn Heights. 7-9pm
There’s a thorough run-down at Grace Bonney’s Design*Sponge.
Peter Hristoff, a faculty member of the School of Visual Arts, is leading the “Perceptions” exhibition for the Moon And Stars Project.
The exhibition includes original postcards from American artists illustrating their perceptions of Turkey and from Turkish artists illustrating their perceptions of the United States. Here’s the postcard I created for the show based on a psuedo-real exchange with a very real friend:
The exhibition will be displayed in various locations throughout the United States and Turkey.
Zachary Moldof will present a paper/hold a workshop at the International Symposium on the Arts in Society at New York Univeristy, February 23-25, 2007. As stated in the abstract, Zachary will “demonstrate how even the most meaning-laden of music can become referentless” thus minimizing our musical attempt to communicate into the science of sound.
Direct mail for magazine subscriptions has seemed to really pick up lately. All I can figure is that our address got on an extra list from somewhere, and boy are they rolling in.
All the design magazines and professional organizations must share lists in some ways, especially those from the same publishing house. We recieve regular solicitations for subscriptions and renewal offers from Metropolis, Dwell, I.D., Print, How, and Step Inside Design (thoughts on each in an upcomming post).
It’s also typical to recieve the standard business offers like those from Fast Company, Businessweek, Business 2.0, etc. I assume those come along with filing business forms with the state or from subscribing to even a single tangential publication. Membership in the World Futures Society has brought on another wave of mailings. This time, I’m pleasantly disturbed by how well metrics predict my interests. Offers for WSJ and The Economist begin to arrive; it’s a favorites newsstand pick-up of mine.
The strangest piece of all has got to be the one I recieved today from Mother Earth News. First, the title of the publication seems oddly outdated, as if coming from some other decade’s environmental movement. Looking at the publication’s site, I can’t help but feel some sort of tension. The spirit seems right, I want to like this magazine on principle, but in reality it’s all wrong. The site could just as well belong to a low-end outdoor recreation magazine, and the promoted content seems like a naturalist’s answer to Real Simple minus all of the design, beauty, and taste that make that publication so appealing.
Perhaps the worst part of all, for Mother Earth News and otherwise, is the amount of paper wasted in attempting to get me to subscribe. Respect my time, respect materials, and most of all, live by the premise of your publication. Please, stop sending offers, I’m busy reading Worldchanging, Plenty, and Treehugger.
Alissa Walker has been taking the busses…in LA! No, I’m not kidding and neither is she. Her experiment is profiled and she shares some tips on KCRW’s Design and Architecture (DNA).
The Design Encyclopedia, another project by Underconsideration/SpeakUp design blog pioneers, is a design wiki that’s grown to a healthy size in the last year and a half. Now they’re sponsoring the Fill in the blanks Initiative to challenge participants and award those making significant contribution to the archive over the coming 90 days.
It’s like a competitive design history sleep-in with an Amazon gift-certificate waiting at the end. Oh boy!
Recently posted on Speak Up: an interview with Stefan Sagmeister about his design for Worldchanging: A User’s Guide For The 21st Century. In our conversation, Stefan explains his thinking behind the design, his enthusiasm for the content, and looks back on “big books” as a wasteful invention of the 90s. Oh, and much more.
Opening February 8th at PS1, just down the streen from home, is Emergency Room. An artist who goes by the name Colonel, whom I know nothing about, has selected 30 other artists to complete installations each day that respond to news events from the previous 24 hours. Each day the installations are removed from the main space and moved to an archive area where they’ll remain on view until March 19th.
I can’t help but feel lucky to be nearby, as this is bound to be best experienced with repeat visits.
They key word here is “home.” Sadly, we’re in an apartment, but homeowner’s can take advantage of a stellar service offered by The Citizenre Corporation. They’re service, Renu, is a low-cost, long-term solar power solution. As they explain, homeowners don’t have to purchase the equipment, it’s owned and installed by Renu, when customers agree to purchase the power it generates are highly competitive rates. It sounds to me like a plan that’s destined to succeed, and I’m ecstatic to think that the entry point for home solar power is becoming more and more accessible.
I was tipped off to it by Worldchanging, and have been seeding it to friends and family since.
Now, I can only wish that a similar arrangement could be made for renters. Would it be possible for the building owner to invest in these and then bill tenants for the power? I’m not confident that’s allowed under the local law, but it seems reasonable. Let’s see how the landlord reacts….
Design Sponge has started a scholarship for design students. How wonderful is that? All I can think to say is, Alyssa Ettinger, you rock.
Check out the site for entry requirements.