What could be worse?
There are bad signs, and then there are worse signs. In the journey of a designer of signing and related environmental graphics -- the core point of the design strategy is storytelling -- the story might be: this is the place; go here, do not go here, you are here,...
THE LEAVES OF A BOOK, THE TREES OF LEAVES
THE FOLIAGE OF THE ALPHABET AS THE DEEPER HEART OF WISDOM Perhaps universal history is the history of the diverse intonations of a few metaphors. - Jorge Luis Borges, “Pascal’s Sphere,” 1951 I've drawn a word a day on leaves, thinking: each word, as a work of time, is...
SAY YES
The journey of the answer. Anytime you have an answer, there was a question before. And any question is a quest -- it's a journey, from one place of comprehension, the grip of knowing, to the pathway to a step of insight. And in that in sight, you see in. I ponder the...
THE LIGHT BEHIND THE TREES
THE SOULFUL BRAND There is a proposition that a brand can have soul. That a brand, as a presence built by humans, can have a warmth of intention. Intention is the grasp, literally, to stretch out. What does the reach of a brand re-present? Any brand starts with an...
The Illustration of Ideas, the Letter form as a Magical Device
When you draw a letter, what happens? A drawing is a drawing out; draw a letter, the string of story unspools and it's something more. A letter is a map, an anciently originated succession of markings, a thought cartography, a seared, scarred, scratched, penned,...
The JOURNEY OF SPICE & PERFUME
THE LAYERING OF EXPERIENTIAL DESIGN PRINCIPLES OF THE TRANS-SENSATIONAL EXPERIENCE: LAYERING STORY, TASTE, TOUCH, SCENT AND THE HEARING OF THE WHOLE BEING. WORKING in Oregon, I met with a taste innovation strategist -- a woman who, along with my team, as well as a...
Mystical Brands
Brandspirit and the building of spiritual and mystical brands What is the shadow brand, and what is the brand of light? For a long time, it's been said -- "you can't use that word 'spiritual' around business people, it will scare them off. Use 'mystical' -- get outta...
The Weaving of the Alphabet
Designing the Alphabet of the Film, "The Matrix." The metaphors of threading, rain, flow and the loom of meaning in context Working with Warner Brothers, Joel Silver and the Wachowski siblings on "The Matrix" was a highlight in a string of theatrical advertising...
I COULD TOUCH YOU
WHEN I GET CLOSER, I KNOW MORE As I touch something, I can feel inside. Isn't it so, for you, that when you touch something, you know more? In a conversation, touching the person that you're communicating with, adds a series of punctuations and pauses that accentuate...
THE CONCEPT OF RECREATION
WHEN YOU GO BACK, TO A PLACE OF QUIET, IN THAT PAUSE, RE-CREATE. The journey of creativity is an ebb and flow of the fluency of finding the beauty that is right for you, that you could find, discovering -- and that you could make yourself, in your recreation. We start...