by Tim Girvin | Concepts | Feb 18, 2014
INTENTIONALLY BLANK? I found this in a hospital room. And I was thinking, “what is it for, really?” This room is intentionally supposed to be blank? Empty? An interesting discovery for a patient. Welcome? You’re here, but you’re not supposed to...
by Tim Girvin | Concepts, Storytelling | Feb 13, 2014
WHAT THAT COMES DOWN TO, IS WHAT TYPE, ARE YOU? When I interview people, prospective employees, client and team interviews, I watch for handwriting. How does a person sign their name, how do they take notes, how do they hold a pen? Everything tells a story. In...
by Tim Girvin | Concepts, Cool People, Designers | Feb 6, 2014
I want to trust you, but should I? Do you trust me? Do I trust myself, my instincts — what’s true? Pondering trust and inspiration, I was thinking about Rei Kawakubo, foundress of Comme des Garçons, a hands-on woman entrepreneur, designer and innovator...
by Tim Girvin | Concepts, Places, Scent | Feb 4, 2014
THE BRAND AND FRAGRANCE STORYTELLING STRATEGIES OF COMME DES GARÇONS “There is no plan.” Rei Kawakubo As a blogger on design, and on perfume, and architecture, I’m always looking for threads, entanglements and weaving between lines of thinking action...
by Tim Girvin | Artists, Concepts, Cool People, Designers | Jan 30, 2014
The Stroke of The Hand, Like Touch, Says It Real. Best From The heart. Touch me. Touch you. Hello & Good bye from me. When it’s time to say goodbye, it is, truly — “parting is such sweet sorrow.” And, the expression of sorrow isn’t...
by Tim Girvin | Concepts, Places | Jan 27, 2014
Designing strategies for Movement, People Journeying Into, and Coming From, a Place I was walking a corridor, and it was like a dream — blood red, bathed in blood, a journeying into brilliant light. Except that it wasn’t a dream, but rather a walk in an...
by Tim Girvin | Concepts, Places, Storytelling | Jan 21, 2014
Don’t go here. Walking an old and beautiful island road, I found this turn off, along with a metal cut-out signing warning: “No.” Why not? What “no” out there?” Of course, I went out there. I can recall a time when I saw a Charles...
by Tim Girvin | Concepts, Places | Jan 14, 2014
A Sense of Place, Design and Experience When I was studying with Reed College’s rockstar+poet+calligrapher Lloyd Reynolds, I spent time with him at his home in Portland, talking, exploring and pouring over his enormous library. We’d write out broadsides,...
by Tim Girvin | Concepts, Places, Storytelling | Jan 9, 2014
The Layers of Intention and Storytelling in the Context of Message and Community As students of environmental design and signing, we’re endlessly studying typography and messaging, signing and fabrication — and, in the end — placement and meaning....
by Tim Girvin | Brands, Concepts, Storytelling | Jan 7, 2014
It would be better if it was true In the soul-searching of positioning and the right angle of brand, to story, cult and culture and truth in the telling, the woven fabric of brand experience and the personality of that narrative will be far better if the foundations...