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Always the overachiever, Paula Scher actually looked up what 'play' meant in the dictionary. Play equals what we usually think of, kids playing, but it also means gambling, and if you're not gambling with your work, then you're not, as they say, in the game. But being 'serious' about something, says Scher, is very different from being solemn--when you're solemn, that means you're not playing anymore.
During what she calls her youthful arrogant years, she detested Helvetica (You remember her badmouthing Helvetica, don't you? Saying it was the typeface of Vietnam?). But her hatred pushed her into a very serious "brat"-like play with all the crazy Art Deco-like type you've come to know. And this resulted in some pretty serious work. But she didn't get serious about it again for about 14 years, when she worked on the Public Theater's identity. And suddenly this amazing, very serious, very playful work emerged that shook up everything in design. But what happened? "New York ate my identity," she says. Designers everywhere ripped her off, organizations copied the look. So she had to switch it up, and all her work since then has been solemn. Solid, but solemn.
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)"Be careful what you say at cocktail parties," says Joshua Klein from frog. In his case, he mused over a drink that someone should really teach all these crows flapping around here to do something useful. Someone else said that was a stupid idea, so that made Klein want to do it even more. Crows live everywhere that humans do for the most part, so there's a lot of them. And they're smart. Check out the video above, where crows drop shelled nuts onto the street where they're sure to get run over by a car in order to crack them. Brilliant! But what was notable to animal behavior scientists wasn't that they used car tires as nutcrackers, it was the fact that crows were actually learning from each other. This ability to learn cultural behavior is what makes crows exceptional. So Klein designed a vending machine that gave a crow a peanut when it inserted a coin into the machine. And guess what--the crows started to figure out that if they went out in the neighborhood and got more coins, they'd get more peanuts. So not only could crows be employed to pick up all the loose change on the streets, if you trained them to bring it to your house, you'd be rich. Amazing.
Then the lovely Eames Demetrios is onstage and it's a beautiful sight. He's standing before the famous Dot pattern designed by his famous grandparents, and he's also standing in front of their two red Plywood Elephants by Vitra, who are the stars of "A Gathering of Elephants" a delightful little film Demetrios made. From playing with plywood to making films, Charles and Ray never delegated the understanding to someone else so they wouldn't miss out on play. Plus--major bonus for Demetrios--"The great thing about having grandparents who made toys is that they always felt like it was important to be on the cutting edge of toy technology." When it the Super Ball came out, Charles said in an interview that it represented the greatest design of the year. And then Demetrios' brother promptly used one to break the third story window of their house. This didn't please Ray but it delighted Charles, in fact, the degree Charles valued the most was an honorary degree from clown college. Demetrios says that Charles and Ray would be very upset to see material objects used as status symbols in our current culture. The most valued things shouldn't be expensive things that are exclusive, rather they should be things anyone can do, like learning a language--something that proves the time and effort spent; devotion to a craft over the ownership of objects. He closed with a quote from a forthcoming book of Eames quotables: "At all times love and discipline have led to good times and a good life." The Eames stamps are out June 17, which is Charles' 101st birthday and the perfect day to send someone a real letter that shows both love and discipline.
>>Read all Serious Play 2008 posts
Design Within Reach has partnered with Domino Magazine to host tonights opening night party for BKLYN Designs:
Held from May 9-11 in DUMBO, Brooklyn, BKLYN Designs, now in its sixth year, is an annual show featuring Brooklyn-based designers and manufacturers of contemporary furniture, lighting, rugs and decorative accessories as well as panel discussions and speakers, design presentations, a walking tour, and other activities throughout the weekend.The opening party will be Friday May 9, from 8-10pm at the Brooklyn Heights DWR Studio at 76 Montague Street. Free issues of Domino will be available, and there will be food, cocktails and musical stylings by the Studio's resident DJ, Nathan Ursch. Design Within Reach and Domino will give away one pair of gunmetal grey Marais AC Chairs, as seen in the May issue of Domino.
For those who would prefer not to make the 12-minute walk from DUMBO to the Heights, Con Edison is sponsoring a shuttle bus leaving from BKLYN DESIGNS at St. Ann's Warehouse, 38 Water Street, at 8 pm for the party.
Find more great design events at the Core77 Calendar.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
John Maeda! John Maeda! hit the stage this morning wearing a super snazzy crumpled silver jacket (or maybe the iron didn't work in his hotel, but no matter: he wears it well). "I'm getting kinda tired of talking about simplicity, actually," he says, "So I'm going to do complexity." I feel a major Maeda crush coming on.
Maeda grew up working in his father's tofu factory and like all creatives, his parents told him not to be creative. Instead he majored in math at MIT, but he just so happened to start working when computers got visual. He became a self-professed "icon master" until he discovered Paul Rand. And realized how bad he was at design. So he went to design school. He started learning how to make his design work move and flail about on the screen and his design teachers told him to stop it. And it was right around then he noticed a now-famous quote from Rand: "A Yale student said, 'I came here to learn how to design, not to learn how to use a computer.' Design schools take heed."
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)Cyclecide Bike Rodeo is a group of bike-obsessed Bay Area makers who take their "traveling pedal-powered carnival that is fun for people of all ages" to events up and down the West Coast. Here we've got a few seconds of their cycle-driven carousel flinging some kids about at a frightening pace; see their website for videos of their other contraptions.
Posted by: core jr | Comments (0)
This morning is like the college humor portion of the conference, except for John Maeda, who was sandwiched in here but he deserved his own post. Late-add Douglas Campbell is nowhere on the schedule and hits the stage like a Sinatra impersonator doing the 3am shift at Circus Circus. Even after two days of magicians, jump ropers and jugglers, his jovial frat-guy demeanor is probably the most unsettling one coffee into the morning. What's a bit more disturbing is that he's wearing a tux. As one-half of Tuxedo Travels he and a friend traveled from Asia to London wearing only tuxedos. On April 1 (of course) they embarked on their epic journey to have fun, but they ended up donating money to organizations and doing goodwill deeds along the way to create a "trail of happiness" in their wake. Of course the trip also included plenty of rice wine binges, amnesia-inducing herbal baths and nudity, with the photos to prove it. Now Campbell wants to expand the flock, if you will, and he's calling on designers to help him design a broader audience participation experience. But he doesn't need any help with the tux, however: Apparently it's made from some superfabric that you can wash in the shower--while wearing it. Which doesn't make too much sense since Campbell seemed to be plenty comfortable with the tux off.
And now it's time for another Serious Play Surprise! It's the Mentos and Coke guys! After chatting about their sudden brush with fame--they even got contacted by the Bellagio fountain guys, sweet!--a kiddie pool comes out and they drop six Mentos into a Diet Coke liter for a small on-stage geyser. For you nerds out there, the reaction is not chemical, it's physical, and it's called 'nucleation.' In fact, it's not Mentos-specific, anything small with the same surface area will do the trick. Now the guys are headed back home to work on another experiment--using 46,000 pads of Post-It notes.
>>Read all Serious Play 2008 posts
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
Looking for something to do with Mom this weekend? Sign up for the Inhabitat Mothers Day Green Design Tour Sunday, May 11 at 2pm. Inhabitat's Jill and Abigail will lead you on a personal tour of Green products at Brooklyn Designs (opening this weekend!).
They're taking a limited number of participants. Email them at inhabitat at gmail.com to reserve your spot! And Mom's.
Posted by: elle* | Comments (0)
iLounge has launched a "Design the Next iPhone" competition. They're looking for originality, innovation and a bit o' humor:
We will be looking for six total winners for this contest - three grand prize winners will receive Apple's next-generation iPhone, courtesy of iLounge, and three runners up will receive $100 iTunes Gift Cards. Our plan is to pick two winners with "advanced" iPhone designs, another two for "simplified" iPhone designs, and two more for funny iPhone designs. The grand prize winners will be our three favorite overall entries. Use these design ideas to inspire your work and you'll have the best shot at winning a next-generation iPhone of your own.
Get crackin here!
If you've ever wanted to have a double-Dutch team at a party but worried that a bunch of people wearing ties and heels wouldn't jump, forget it. Design folk were pushing each other out of the way to hit the ropes at the Target party. And nothing goes better with jumping up and down repeatedly than a red apple-something-deadly served in red flashing martini glasses and a fry bar. A DIY fry bar, with chili, ketchup, cheese sauce, truffle mayo, chipotle mayo, blue cheese mayo (did I forget any of the mayos?). And candy, so much candy, I had a really hard time deciding what to stuff my pockets with so I stuffed them with red velvet cupcakes instead. We walked away with Crayola crayons, Cynthia Rowley jump ropes and "green" Target bags. Except they were red, of course. Do you see a theme?
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
Remember this guy? After more of the rockin' 80s soundtrack (more Madonna, please!), we have Irene Au, director of user experience at Google (it seems somehow dirty and obvious to link to that). I know, you don't always think Google=design. But to her, fast=design, easy=design and profitable=design. Au shows a video from their usability labs where they studied behavior and eye movements of probably the worst Googler in the world (he was shopping for a flat-screen television and Googled "television"). Yet it proves a good point. In its success, Google's user experience has undergone a huge transformation. When they started, they were only used by tech-savvy Silicon Valley hipsters. Now 70% of their traffic is from outside the U.S and they've had to completely reconsider how they are used in places that aren't, like, American. Here's one especially striking comment from a clip she shows of cell phone user research. It's shot in India, where a woman opens a window in her house by rolling up a plastic tarp on her tent: "We can miss a meal a day, but we cannot miss a day on our mobile phones. It will affect all our work and our lives." So look forward to that option somehow incorporated into your new Google Phone.
Now we're entering Second Life. Well, not really, but it's a slideshow of images from the metaverse. Second Life founder Philip Rosedale loved stuff like Star Trek so much he built a roof hatch with a garage door in the ceiling of his room as a kid. He says the parallels of SL growth are so similar to the internet in the 90s that we should not be afraid of alternate universes, especially since, according to Rosedale, Second Life will someday be bigger then the web(!). Huh? Well, he says, because the web connects text to text, whereas a place like SL connects infinite imagery and descriptions and users' creations. But although he is standing in front of images of chesty women in swan costumes, Rosedale barely scratches the surface of the whole Second Life culture and all of the ahem, ethical issues therein (like, he just casually mentions that you can buy a baby in Second Life). Also? He is way too good-looking in real life to be the ultranerd he professes to be. He's like the Ryan Seacrest of gaming. He is probably the only person in SL whose avatar is actually less attractive.
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
Here's another in a long list of careers to sign up for at this conference: Stuart Brown is a play expert at the National Institute for Play. From the chaotic games of Medieval times to polar bears nuzzling the necks of huskies (instead of chomping on their jugulars), he actually studies play. Most notably, how its absence in childhood leads to violence in grown ups. So think about that the next time your kid is wailing because you told her it's time to put away the Polly Pockets. The reason for this is that play is not only essential for intelligence and developmental behavior, but it's also essential for trust. Brown says the case of the "wooden" Al Gore is a different example of a potentially play-deprived youth (but not in a violent way). This person probably didn't have a whole lot of play in his past--long days spent working, studying and trying to be like dad--but once he got to play around with his slide show....well, you saw the change. So take a cue from Al and think back to your most creative, joyful moment in your past. Start building ideals from that notion into how you live your life now. It should be just as much a part of your life as sleep and dreams.
As principal of Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Elizabeth Diller's architecture is all about play--and they sure do like playing with water. Their Blur Building in Switzerland screwed around with weather systems by turning a buildings walls into mist from the lake it sat in. Another art project created a frozen lake made from branded waters from around the world. At the Biennale in Venice this year they're actually going to use water from the canals to make the best espresso in the city (really, you must tell us how that goes). Diller also is working on the High Line, that abandoned elevated railway through Manhattan. Playing with the definition of a public space resulted in their ideas being so vibrantly embraced that starchitects wanted to build near it, celebs like Ed Norton wanted to get involved, and David Bowie had a benefit concert for it...that was actually nowhere near the High Line. And isn't that kind of the measure of success for your entire life? When David Bowie supports you, you can retire, right?
Posted by: Alissa Walker | Comments (0)
Smart / Models is a one-day event scheduled for Saturday May 17 at the Times Center in NYC. The conference will feature presentations by five design firms describing their five different business models. According to the web site, the day will cover 'the overlap between smart design and business smarts." Sounds like you'd be smart to register while there are still tickets left!
Cool poster design by Sam Potts!
Posted by: StuCon | Comments (0)
