In 2003, Chicago-based design firm Coudal Partners launched Field-Tested Books, a charming project that collects reviews of books which were influenced by the reading locale.

This year’s edition, the third in the series features 143 reviews from more than 90 contributors including yours truly. I’m super-jazzed to be in such good company.

As a rockin’ thanks, Coudal sent over a print from the limited edition celebrating the series, designed by John Solimine of Spike Press. She’s a beaut.

Fresh on the heels of the whole project’s launch, Coudal began offering the book reviews in, you guessed it, book form today. Pick up a copy for only $17. I look forward to getting my hands on one. You can pick up the lovely poster too.

Kemosabe: Loyalty, Friend House

Zachary Granger Moldof and Anna Kerlin are working on a journal. According to Zach, the first issue:

...is going to be unbound, and it will come in a plastic bag. It’s going to be ideas, drawings, design, writing, and objects from our friends.

The project gets exciting before the first issue is published. To support the publication costs, Zach and Anna are selling “subscriptions” to out of print issues of National Geographic dating back to the 1930’s.

• they’ll send a questionaire to the subscriber
• the subscriber will fill it out and return it

• Zach and Anna will go through a massive collection and select issues based on the relevance of the content to the survey response

  Subscriptions are $40 for a year or $20 for a half-year. To subscribe, contact natgeoreissues (at) gmail.com.

  

On Friday May 23rd, AIGA/NY hosted Fresh Dialogue 24, IN/VISIBLE: Graphic Data Revealed, a 3-way conversation between Steve Duenes, Fernanda Viégas and Andrew Kuo around discuss the visual ethics of information graphics. The conversation was be moderated by John Maeda.

Prior to the event I had the opportunity to talk with the participants about their relationship to information design on DESIGNY.

For more information about the evening, see the event site.

On Saturday May 17th, AIGA/NY hosted SMART/MODELS, a one-day conference about various business models for creative businesses.

Prior to the event I had the opportunity to interview some of the participants over at DESIGNY:

Drive Your Design Business: An Interview With Emily Ruth Cohen. Emily talks about the common problems facing small-to-medium sized businesses and offers some guidance to the light at the end of the tunnel.

Stop Making Things Hard on Yourself: An Interview with Jason Fried of 37 Signals. Jason discusses optimizing business for happiness, working 4 days a week and getting by giving – all principles that have come to underline

Teams That Fit: An Interview with Athletics James Ellis and Matt Owens of Brooklyn-based design collective Athletics discuss the scalability and flexibility of their modular business model.