“Many of us didn’t fully know what that impact and influence looked like back then, and how it still carries forward,” Sykes told me. “But as we turned more pages and did more research and had more pre-interviews with experts, with curators, with museum owners, with founders of different types of companies, and with artists themselves, we learned more and more and more.” 

It’s through this extensive research process that Sykes and her team honed in on the creation of a two-part zine series entitled, “Legacy: A Modern Renaissance,” designed to shed light on diverse communities through the lens of Black excellence and achievement. These stories highlight the ways that passing wealth to the next generation is fueling community while celebrating the innovative period of Black art, music, poetry, and literature that launched in Harlem, New York, in the 1920s and ’30s. In partnership with U.S. Bank, the campaign is the first of its kind for The New York Times, paying homage to the lasting impact of the Harlem Renaissance and its 100th anniversary through the power of print.

T Brand Studio has commissioned work from Black writers, storytellers, artists, and designers for the two 12-page zines, highlighting the immense contributions of Black creatives to the arts and wider society. The zines feature work from typographer Tré Seals, poet Mahogany L. Browne, cultural critic and writer Michaela Angela Davis, collage artist Magdaline Davis, and photographer Ivan McClellan. The first zine, “Legacy: The Wealth Issue,” was released as a printed insert in The New York Times Sunday issue on August 18, with the second zine, “Legacy: The Culture Issue” set to be distributed with the December 29 print issue. Both zines are now available to view digitally through an innovative online hub unveiled by T Brand Studio last week. The online hub continues the theme and tradition of accessibility that the zine form is already emblematic of. 

To highlight this thoughtful and poignant campaign and continue to honor the lasting legacy of the Harlem Renaissance, I spoke in-depth with Sykes about the Legacy project, from development to distribution. Our conversation is below, lightly edited for clarity and length.  

Let’s rewind to the genesis of “Legacy: A Modern Renaissance” zine series. How did the idea first develop?

This time a year ago, U.S. Bank, who’s our partner for this program, came to us and said, “Hey, can you create a coffee table book?” They understood that The New York Times would be doing an editorial alignment with the 100th anniversary of the Harlem Renaissance. We said, “We could, but as a custom content studio, our lane really evolves around creating storytelling opportunities.” That’s when we started talking about maybe not a coffee table book, but what could be more realistic is a series of zines.

We wanted to bring the story forward. What does this idea of a Modern Renaissance look like? That’s when we came up with a “Legacy Fulfilled.” We wanted to spark this idea of a national dialog to really show and demonstrate that the Harlem Renaissance was this cultural phenomenon that continues today.

This is a first-of-its-kind program for T Brand Studio and U.S. Bank, where every single contributor on our platform and on this content is Black.

What was your T Brand Studio team hoping to accomplish with this project? 

This is a first-of-its-kind program for T Brand Studio and U.S. Bank, where every single contributor on our platform and on this content is Black. We wanted to remove barriers for Black creatives by not only giving them a platform to share new and untold stories but also to say to us, “These are the stories that I want to tell.” It’s a really huge deal.

The series leverages the talents of Black award-winning writers, poets, journalists, photographers, illustrators, and even a typographer, to specifically do a few things: We wanted to build awareness around the impact and influence of the Harlem Renaissance and grant access and opportunity to a new generation of Black cultural thinkers, which we’re really doing in our culture zine. We also wanted to shine a light on Black affluence because that was a specific, targeted area that U.S. Bank wanted us to speak to, and show people that wealth shows up in a myriad of ways. People are building wealth differently today. It’s not just the financial wealth, but it’s also the intellectual capital, and the historical value that brings to bear when we’re talking about inheritance.

We wanted to ask, across poetry and music and art and fashion and culture, What does the Black diaspora look like today, and how is the impact continuing globally? That’s where the zines come into play. 

People are building wealth differently today. It’s not just the financial wealth, but it’s also the intellectual capital, and the historical value that brings to bear when we’re talking about inheritance. 

Why did you decide on the zine form for this project?

The reason we chose zines is that during the Harlem Renaissance, zines were really designed (around 1918 through the 30s) to allow people without a voice to express themselves, to really communicate with others in the community, and lean into their artistry at the same time in a way that they hadn’t been allowed to do. So we said let’s use this idea of the zines as information for what we do today. 

The zines pay homage to the powerful underground press that existed during the Renaissance that became known for delivering prolific poetry and prose, delivering local news, and giving people cultural information. We wanted to create today’s zines to run as an insert inside The New York Times. It runs in a Sunday newspaper for all of our 600,000 home delivery subscribers. Each zine specifically amplifies how the Harlem Renaissance continues to inspire some of our most powerful cultural moments in America. 

Also with these zines, so much of it has been about giving access to people, but it’s also giving space and making space for new voices, for poetry, for prose, for local news, for cultural information. They’re inspired by that tradition that gave birth to this idea of old voices and new voices. So that’s what these zines do; they not only give access and opportunity, but they give space to people whose voices hadn’t been heard and were traditionally not heard in a mainstream environment.

What are some of the stories told within the pages of these zines? 

One is about a Black family of ranchers, The Bradfords— a fourth-generation family of Black ranchers in Oklahoma. I got to go out there and see them, and talk about what it means to really grow the foundation from the roots. What does that mean for family? What does it mean for legacy? What does it mean for the future? In my mind, that was a really important story to tell, and I knew we could do it through Black farmers, who represent less than 1% of all farmers in America today. 

We also spoke with Julian James, who shared a story about inheritance and the idea that money can mean a myriad of things. He had a Movado watch that was passed down to him by his stepfather. He was a man who thought about not the clothes making the man, but the man making the clothes, and how important it was for you to carry yourself as you went out the door. So that was something that Julian took from him, and now he says that every time he wears this watch, he thinks of his stepfather and his legacy. 

We had Mahogany L. Brown, the current poet-in-residence for the Lincoln Center, write a custom poem for the wealth zine, and she said that everything about this project just felt like home to her. Her marching orders were simple: I said, “If Langston Hughes talked about this idea of a “dream deferred,” how do we bring it forward and speak to what a dream fulfilled looks like?” So she took us to Harlem. She took us to education. She took us to inheritance. She took us to all of the places and spaces that Black folks lived in during the Harlem Renaissance and said this is where and how we’re succeeding today. I thought it was a beautiful nod to the Harlem Renaissance, and it really hit on all of the cylinders as it related to this storytelling.

Can you walk me through some of the editorial design decisions that were made when bringing these zines to life? I know you worked with typographer Tré Seals, for example, to create a custom typeface for the project.  

This is a project that is rooted in the research of the Harlem Renaissance. Many of us didn’t fully know what that impact and influence looked like back then, and how it still carries forward, but as we turned more pages and did more research and had more pre-interviews with experts, curators, museum owners, with founders of different types of companies, and artists themselves, we learned more and more and more. 

In that research process we learned that the original zines during the Harlem Renaissance were designed to allow people without a voice to express themselves, to communicate with others in the community, and lean into artistry. We did a handmade approach to texture and color, and used layered compositions as an intentional nod to those artists who had bootstrapped. 

We used custom typography called VTC Sarah, created by Tré Seals, the founder, designer, and typographer at Vocal Type. VTC Sarah was inspired by his great-grandparents. They were entrepreneurs and business owners, and their names were Sarah and Henry Johnson, and they were pillars of their community. They had provided financing and resources to their neighbors when banks wouldn’t, and that really helped facilitate hundreds of purchases and land sales to the Black community. Our art director, Bri Moran, literally held up Tré’s great grandparents’ marriage certificate at one point and said, “This is what is inspiring, the typeface throughout our zines.” So in working with Tré at every iteration, he made sure that the typeface spoke to those words and the stories that we were telling. 

With the zine’s digital hub launching last week and the physical culture zine mailing out in December, can you shed a bit more light on what’s depicted in that issue in particular? 

We’re celebrating what culture looks like through a lot of different Black creatives. It’s an homage to the arts, literature, dance, and music industries created by Black artisans during the Harlem Renaissance. 

Who are some of the creatives featured in the culture zine? 

We asked Emil Wilbekin, the former editor-in-chief of Vibe Magazine who now runs the platform Native Son, to take us back to having a parlor conversation. These were conversations that were happening in speakeasies and basements during the Harlem Renaissance, where people could really talk about the issues of the day. So we said, “What does that look like if we bring that 100 years forward?” Emil helped to not only moderate the conversation with other Black creatives from different fields, but he also was able to facilitate a Q&A at the Freehand Hotel in Manhattan. I loved this conversation. They talked about what the Harlem Renaissance means today, and the impact that the Harlem Renaissance is having on these particular creatives. 

We also talked to Naima J. Keith, an art curator and an educator at LACMA. She talked about paying tribute to the artisans that came before us, and this idea that because of those artisans in particular, now we can talk about skin tones. Now we can talk about Blackness and all of its authenticity, and how that comes to the table today in ways that it wasn’t before. 

Then there’s Shanari Freeman, who’s the executive chef of Cadence in Manhattan, and she talked about the idea of paying homage to the Harlem Renaissance through collaboration. She said that oftentimes we know what to do, but sometimes we don’t necessarily know how to do it, so let’s teach each other this idea of “each one, teach one.” 

Then we have Fredara M. Hadley, who’s an ethnomusicologist over at the Juilliard School. She talked about the idea of how dances from the Harlem Renaissance are being brought back today through troupes like THECouncil, a collective of five black women who are choreographers, producers, and directors who work with global brands and celebrities. 

What was the process like for developing the digital adaptation of the zine? What considerations went into that?

In addition to the print version of the culture issue, people across the globe will have access to a digital, flippable booklet of both zines, and those are going to be housed online, within a New York Times URL that encourages people to learn more about the resources and opportunities offered by U.S. Bank.

We had a long conversation early on about this idea of a digital hub, and I would always say, “Well, what would be the point of us creating something else if we already have our print zines?” And my team explained to me that it’s because not everybody has the same level of access, which is very important here. The one thing that we wanted to do with both of these zines is to give people opportunity and access, not only to the information but to the history. So that’s exactly what the hub is set out to do; now everyone—subscribers and non-subscribers of the New York Times—will be able to have access to it. 

It’s a great opportunity for us as a custom content studio to be able to take these zines and this content in its physical form and then allow it to live on digitally while also giving people this access. That was the lesson learned for us in our wealth zine— people were like, “This is amazing. How do we get it? How do I share it? How do I link to it?” But as opposed to thinking of it as a problem, we saw it as an opportunity in order for the zines to continue to live and give access to everyone.

The post T Brand Studio Celebrates the Centennial of the Harlem Renaissance with Zine Series & Digital Hub appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Here’s the thing about rebrands: they’re not just about slapping on a shiny new logo. A brand is an ecosystem of meaning, emotions, and experiences that lives far beyond the design. Jaguar hasn’t been top of mind for a while—except maybe when you see a vintage E-Type cruising by and think, “Wow, remember when Jaguars were cool?” A legacy brand being “forgettable” is way more dangerous than a controversial logo. Forgettable is death in today’s market. Controversy? That’s life support with a megaphone.

A New Roar: Why Standing Out Matters

The modern car market is crowded as hell. Luxury brands like Porsche and Tesla dominate mindshare, and electric upstarts are making disruption their personal brand. Jaguar was stuck in a lane of lukewarm association: luxury-ish, performance-ish, but ultimately not commanding enough ish to compete. They needed to do something radical to reclaim attention.

This rebrand plants a flag: Jaguar isn’t here to linger quietly in the background. Love the change or despise it, but the sheer volume of reaction shows one critical fact—Jaguar is back in the conversation. And for a brand that was fading into irrelevance, being talked about again is invaluable.

Here’s a hard truth marketers and brand owners often forget: most of the loudest voices online aren’t actual customers. They’re cost-sumers—people who cost you time, resources, and emotional energy without contributing a dime to your bottom line. These are the people loudly tearing apart Jaguar’s new look without ever intending to step foot in a dealership or open their wallets.

Forgettable is death in today’s market. Controversy? That’s life support with a megaphone.

Cost-sumers vs. Customers

Brands that chase approval from cost-sumers are doomed to dilute their identity and focus on the wrong metrics. The purpose of this rebrand isn’t to pacify Twitter branding enthusiasts; it’s to reignite interest in actual potential buyers. People in the market for a $100,000 electric luxury vehicle aren’t rage-posting about font kerning—they’re evaluating how this aligns with their lifestyle, aspirations, and future purchases.

This is why brands need to adopt selective hearing. The real measure of success is whether Jaguar can now attract modern luxury buyers who might have otherwise dismissed them.

The Real Critics: Branding People

It’s worth noting that much of the backlash is coming from branding professionals. Why? Because Jaguar broke an unspoken rule: don’t mess with the playbook. Many in the design and branding community love to shout “disruption” but cling to convention when it actually happens. The same people who roasted Gap for their logo swap or ridiculed Tropicana for reimagining their packaging are likely leading the Jaguar backlash.

What these critics miss is that sometimes different works. Gap abandoned their logo refresh in fear, but Tropicana recovered from initial backlash to remain one of the most recognizable OJ brands globally. Change takes time to settle, and public opinion is often a knee-jerk reaction driven by nostalgia and resistance. Jaguar’s job isn’t to win over designers; it’s to sell a vision of luxury, performance, and exclusivity.

Rebrands Are More Than Logos

Let’s zoom out: a logo is not a brand. The rebrand isn’t just about Jaguar’s new emblem or typeface; it’s a shift in how the company positions itself for the future. It signals a focus on modern luxury, electrification, and a younger, affluent demographic who care about sustainability and aesthetics over tradition.

Will it work? That depends on whether Jaguar follows through. Rebranding isn’t magic—it’s a promise. If the cars, customer experience, and marketing campaigns fail to deliver, the critics will be right. But if Jaguar uses this rebrand as a foundation for meaningful change, they’ll prove that the haters are just noise.

Stop Freaking Out. Start Watching.

To everyone freaking out about the rebrand: chill. This isn’t the end of Jaguar; it’s the start of something new. Whether that something is a roaring comeback or a quiet whimper will take time to see. But at least Jaguar is taking a chance, and for a brand that was teetering on the edge of irrelevance, that’s a hell of a lot better than standing still.

Critics might say this is the death of the brand, but I see it differently. It’s the rebirth of a brand willing to take a stand, turn heads, and claw its way back into the conversation. And that, my friends, is exactly what Jaguar needed to do.

Saul Colt is an award-winning and somewhat notorious real-world and online marketing leader and the founder of The Idea Integration Company, a 29-person creative shop staffed with alumni from Facebook, Wall Street Journal, Mad Magazine, Disney, and The Simpsons, specializing in marketing, advertising, word of mouth, and experiences for his clients that exceed expectations. Saul has been transforming the world of experiential marketing and community building for over two decades and has no plans to stop any time soon.

This was originally posted on Saul Colt’s LinkedIn newsletter, Saul’s Ideas.af.

Images: “Copy Nothing” ad © Jaguar.

The post You Are All Wrong About the Jaguar Rebrand appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Design creativity blooms in spaces where curiosity meets intention, where ideas are nurtured into forms that resonate and inspire. It’s a process marked by exploration, experimentation, and the willingness to challenge conventions to uncover new perspectives. In this fertile ground, creativity is more than a spark—it’s a cultivated journey, drawing from diverse influences and blending intuition with technique.

Celebrating our 45th year, the 2025 PRINT Awards honors design in every shape and form. And, as our industry continues to evolve and our practitioners continue to explore new mediums and methods to advance their creativity, the PRINT Awards have found new ways to recognize outstanding work.

2024 PRINT Awards First Place Winner in Self-Promotions. The Office of Ordinary Things and D&K Printing. D&K Printing also printed the beautiful 2024 PRINT Awards certificates.

Categories for 2025

The 2025 PRINT Awards offer 28 categories for entries, ranging from Illustration to Motion Design & Video. In recent years, we added In-House, Design for Social Impact, and Packaging and expanded our branding categories. We also expanded the awards to offer students a chance to enter work in each category instead of only one student category. And, this year, our jury will also consider entries in Social Media + Content Design, Title Sequence Design, and Graphic Novels.

Learn more about the 2025 PRINT Awards categories.

2024 PRINT Awards Third Place Winner in Packaging, CF Napa Brand Design; Second Place Winner in Logo Design, Onfire. Design.

Citizen Design Award

Each year, the PRINT Awards highlight a free-to-enter Citizen Design Award to celebrate design work focused on one annually chosen social issue. With societies facing global challenges like climate change, economic instability, and technological shifts, our Citizen Design Award this year will honor work that speaks to social justice.

Social Justice ensures that all people are entitled to human rights and societal respect regardless of race, gender, religion, health, and economic status. Discrimination in the form of economic and educational inequities, combined with enduring legacies of oppression continue to impact many communities, creating toxic cycles of privilege and disadvantage.

Design can profoundly influence social justice through graphic tools that amplify awareness and drive change. Design can make complex issues more accessible, spark debate, inform audiences, and motivate positive engagement. This year’s PRINT Citizen Design category recognizes and celebrates the most impactful work that fosters empathy and action. From social awareness campaigns to apps, community-centered design projects, infographics, posters, social media graphics, and interactive experiences, Citizen Design will honor work that strives to make our world more compassionate and just.

2024 PRINT Awards First Place Winner in Design for Social Impact, Clinton Carlson and Team.

Our 2025 Jury

With a global jury representing a wide range of disciplines, each entry will continue to be judged on four key criteria: Craft, Longevity, Innovation, and Originality. Top winners will be featured on PRINTmag.com and receive trophies, certificates, and social media promotion. We’ll be adding jury members in the next few weeks. In the meantime, we welcome a few here!

A few of the 2025 Jury Members: Marisa Sanchez-Dunning, Bennett Peji, Jennifer Rittner, Eleazar Ruiz, Lara McCormick, Mike Perry, and Miller McCormick. More jurors are to be announced soon!

The 2025 PRINT Awards Presenting Sponsor

The team at PepsiCo Design + Innovation believes that good design is a meaningful experience. A functional product. A rich story. A beautiful object. Design can be fun, convenient, precious, or fearless, but good design is always an act of respect, empathy, and love.

That’s why PepsiCo Design + Innovation has joined PRINT this year as our Presenting Sponsor—to recognize, honor and, above all, to celebrate the joy of design in all its forms. That’s why PepsiCo Design and Innovation has joined PRINT this year as our Presenting Sponsor—to recognize, honor, and, above all, celebrate the joy of design in all its forms!

Dates and Deadlines

As in years past, we’ve broken the deadline schedule for the awards into four simple tiers—Early Bird, Regular, Late, and Final Call. The earlier you enter, the more you save because it helps us plan judging schedules and other tasks in advance. Enter now for the best price! (And it’s worth noting that to enable students to enter, the pricing is consistent across the board no matter when they submit their work.)

Join us as we recognize the talent that colors our world and celebrate the beauty of fresh ideas, bold solutions, and impactful storytelling. From emerging talents to seasoned visionaries, each submission is a testament to the boundless growth of design.

Submit your work today, and let’s cultivate the next generation of creative vision!

The post Announcing The 2025 PRINT Awards Call For Entries appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Age: 24
From: Jakarta, Indonesia
Living in: Los Angeles, CA
Currently working at Thinking Room
Studied at: ArtCenter College of Design

The PRINT community has spoken! Among a stellar class of New Visual Artists this year, we asked our audience to vote on the designer they felt should be named the 2024 Community Choice Winner, a significant recognition that highlights the artist’s ability to connect with an audience on a personal level.

This year, that well-deserved honor goes to Danu Ardhata!

Ardhata Sans, type-design student initiative project.

Atheneum, type-design student initiative project.

The Art of Biomimicry, A narrative-driven, typographic poster series.

Ardhata’s work is driven by a balance between idealism and the practicalities of contemporary branding, to create transformative brands that influence consumer behavior and set new standards.

His focus is on exploring the essence of humanity in brand identity. Ardhata feels that in the same way, humans adapt and evolve, brands must remain dynamic, responding to their environment. This adaptability is central to his philosophy, alongside a commitment to continuous learning and openness to new perspectives.

Looking ahead, Ardhata envisions a future of boundless possibilities, emphasizing the importance of crafting narratives that resonate deeply with the human spirit and forging meaningful connections. His ultimate goal is to shape brands that leave a lasting, authentic impact.

We can’t wait to see where his thoughtfulness, openness, and outstanding talent take him in his career. And we know the design community will be better for his efforts.

Congratulations, Danu!

We’ll see you next year for a new crop of PRINT New Visual Artists. In the meantime, consider submitting your work for The 2025 PRINT Awards. Look for announcements this week!

The post The PRINT New Visual Artist Community Choice Winner is… appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

The Artifacts from the Eames Collection is a series of catalogs that comprehensively documents pieces from the Eames Institute collection, making these iconic designs more widely accessible to all, thus further advancing the legacy of 20th-century designers Ray and Charles Eames.

The Eames Institute has already offered themed virtual exhibitions and is thrilled to continue its growth into the physical print medium. Forty-thousand+ objects have been lovingly collected, preserved, restored, and documented by the Eames Institute so far, with Artifacts from the Eames Collection presenting curated selections from these objects in six thematically themed catalogs: Tables, Ray’s Hand, Eames Aluminum Group, Toys & Play, Steinberg Meets the Eames, and Postcards. (The first five have already been released, with the Postcards catalog coming soon.) Many of the objects featured in these editions have never been seen before, and all have been newly photographed to highlight design details.

Each catalog includes an introductory note from Llisa Demetrios, Chief Curator of the Eames Institute and granddaughter of Ray and Charles, and an essay written by a leading design expert. The catalogs also present a variety of archival material and photography from the Eames Office, Library of Congress, and the archives of Herman Miller and Vitra.

The catalogs are softcover with a short cover wrap and a special insert and range from 122–172 pages. They are available for purchase from the Eames Institute here.

The post All the Eames That’s Fit to Print appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

“We noticed that athletes today are increasingly seeking ways to personalize their experiences, and they’ve been early adopters of athletic equipment personalization,” said Xavi Cortadellas, Gatorade’s Sr. Director of Marketing, Athletic Equipment. “Through these AI innovations, we’re so excited to help athletes showcase their unique styles, passions, and personalities.”

Gatorade guzzlers can go to www.gatorade.com to generate their own water bottle designs through the brand’s partnership with Adobe Firefly. Gatorade also collaborated with digital product agency Work & Co, part of Accenture Song, to ensure the new AI experience was seamlessly integrated into their site and was user-friendly.

“Our ambition is to serve athletes better than anyone else, so we’re incredibly proud to be one of the first brands to put the power of an AI-fueled experience in the hands of athletes,” said Cortadellas. “This technology allows us to meet athlete needs with fully customizable solutions no matter their journey.”

“This is just the start of how AI will continue to fuel athlete personalization at Gatorade,” added Cortadellas. What the next AI pursuit for the brand will be, however, remains to be seen. An AI flavor perhaps?

The post The Classic Gatorade Water Bottle Gets the AI Treatment appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Mostafa Asadollahi was among the first graduates of the Graphic Design program at the Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Tehran, in 1976. Unlike the previous generation of graphic designers, mainly painting graduates, Asadollahi studied graphic design academically, though he had previously studied painting at the Tehran School of Fine Arts. Asadollahi found influence in teachers such as Morteza Momayez and Jalal Shabahangi in the field of graphic design and by professors like Karl Schlamminger, Rouin Pakbaz, Sima Kouban, Violette Mottahedeh, and Parviz Tanavoli, who taught the foundations of art. He describes that period: “Part of the exercises in college were related to the pure and essential expressions of graphic design, where we sought concepts. There, I developed an interest in simple and unadorned graphic design: the fewest fonts and colors for the greatest expression.” Subsequently, Asadollahi’s graphic design oeuvre draws on geometry, which is influenced by modernism and constructivism. His refined approach later incorporated classical Iranian art, making him one of Iran’s most unique and celebrated graphic designers.

Clockwise, from upper left: (1) Poster, The 9th Tehran International Poster Biennial, 2007; (2) Logo, Tehran International Poster Biennial, 2004; (3) Poster, Book Week, 1993; (4) Logotype, Kalameh weekly magazine, 1992; (5) Logotype, International News Network, 2001

Mostafa Asadollahi’s influence in my life reflects his generous nature and professional character as a mentor, graphic designer, friend, and colleague. All three roles hold equal priority; just as his role as a designer was of particular significance, his roles as a teacher and colleague were equally important. Asadollahi’s aesthetic, which made use of the three primary shapes, makes me think of each as an aspect of his influence: squares symbolizing his role as an educator, triangles a nod to his identity as a designer, and circles encompassing his professional persona.

Mentor

My most fundamental relationship with Mostafa Asadollahi involves his mentorship. He was one of the most influential, disciplined, and capable instructors during my studies at the College of Fine Arts at the University of Tehran in the 1990s. Having dedicated nearly three decades of his professional life to education, his passion for teaching was evident, paying attention to each student’s needs and supporting their growth. He was a beloved educator. His classes, especially those on poster and packaging design, are fond memories of my studies in the early 1990s. Asadollahi modeled strategy, discipline, and structure in the graphic design practice, which significantly impacted my work. His authorship of three books from the “Graphic Design Fundamentals for Visual Communication” series, including Environmental Graphic Design (2016), The Language and Expression of Imagery (2018), and Poster Design (2022), is the result of over five decades of teaching and professional experience.

Graphic Designer

Following in the footsteps of great designers such as Sadegh Barirani, Morteza Momayez, Ghobad Shiva, Mohammad Ehsaei, Farshid Mesghali, and Ebrahim Haghighi, I found Mostafa Asadollahi to be a uniquely distinguished graphic designer. Initially, I found his works overly rigid, but as I became more familiar with his perspective, I realized that he was a graphic designer unlike any who came before or after. One of his most brilliant works, a poster for the 5th Biennial Exhibition of Works by Iranian Graphic Designers (1996), helped me grasp the depth of his point of view as a graphic designer. In the poster, the tree balances simplicity and visual complexity, a nod to the dynamism of the graphic design profession. This work opened my eyes to his earlier poster masterpieces—such as the one for the Iranian Cultural Exhibition in Almaty (1992) and later works like the Book Week poster (1997). Asadollahi also designed remarkable logos for various companies and institutions, including Asia Insurance (1990), International News Network (2001), and the Tehran International Poster Biennial (2004), which, after nearly three decades, remain fresh, effective, and relevant.

Left: Poster, Exhibition of Iranian Culture in Kazakhstan, 1992; Right: Poster, Book Week, 1997

Logotypes: (Top) Day Bank, 2009; (Bottom Left) Asia Insurance Company, 1990; (Bottom right) Taban Printing, 1996

Friend and Colleague

The Iranian Graphic Designers’ Society (IGDS), established in 1998 through the persistence of Morteza Momayez and the collective efforts of several graphic designers, played a significant role in my relationship with Mostafa Asadollahi as a friend and colleague. During the three years (2003 to 2006) when he served as the board of directors president, I had the opportunity to work closely with him as the board treasurer. At that time, in addition to teaching and his professional graphic design work, he dedicated a large portion of his daily schedule to guild activities, organizing, and managing the profession of graphic design. This aspect of his personality reminded me that graphic designers must pay attention to industry and professional matters alongside their educational and professional responsibilities to ensure strong and enduring societies (outside of the governmental realm).

Posters, left to right: Commemoration of the Cultural Heritage & the International Museum Day, 2002; Polish Posters 2, 1973; Poster, Coffee-House Painting Exhibition, 2007

In 2019, when he was living in Toronto, his collection of works, Fifty Years of Graphic Design by Mostafa Asadollahi: 1968–2018, was published in Tehran. I brought him a copy on a trip to Toronto, but I couldn’t resist asking if I could open the package to have the first look. It was a fitting and comprehensive look at Asadollahi’s life and career. Though Mostafa Asadollahi, the patient teacher, brilliant graphic designer, and my responsible friend and colleague, is no longer with us, his legacy lives on among Iran’s most influential graphic designers.

Majid Abbasi is the design director of Studio Abbasi, an internationally active studio based in Tehran and Toronto. He leads design projects for start-ups, non-profits, and cultural institutions, specializing in visual identity and wayfinding. A member of IGDS and AGI, Abbasi contributes to the global design scene as an instructor, jury member, and writer. From 2010 to 2020, he was editor-in-chief of Neshan, Iran’s leading graphic design magazine. He is currently editing a book on the history of Iranian graphic design.

The post Remembering Mostafa Asadollahi (1950-2024) appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Line & Thread invites a reexamination of the place of prints and textiles in our understanding of art, and presents artworks that use the mediums as sites of resistance, critique, and expressions of self.

Explore a sample of images from the 50 or so pieces featured in the show below, along with Viljoen’s reflections.

What was the development process like for this exhibition? What was the genesis of the show?

The exhibition grew largely out of close study of the wide-ranging collection of prints in The New York Public Library’s Wallach Division of Art, Prints, and Photographs. Prints owns several examples of late seventeenth-century/early eighteenth-century “adorned” prints— works that were made by carefully cutting out parts of original printed artworks and facing and/or otherwise embellishing them with small pieces of fabrics and lace. It was an activity that literally engaged its makers (often women) in the act of “dressing” their creations— not accidentally, they are also commonly referred to as “dressed prints.” 

The department also has early modern etchings and engravings on fine silks, as well as several contemporary artworks impressed on humbler fabrics, including an old plaid handkerchief (Alison Saar) and vibrant African wax fabrics (Jonathan Monk). Most prints are printed on paper, so these examples intrigued me. 

After confirming that still little research had been done on the intermedial connections between prints and textiles and finding wonderful additional examples in the collection, I proposed to the Library’s Exhibitions Committee the idea of devoting an exhibition to the topic. 

Given the breadth of our holdings, my goal was to focus not on a single period or type of object alone but to explore the many and varied ways in which prints have intersected with textiles. My aim was also to bring the early modern examples into conversation with works from the 20th and 21st centuries.

Historical evidence confirms the many ways in which printed works of art were created in response to and in concert with textiles (and vice versa). The fifteenth-century discovery of a means to create reproducible images on paper has its origins in methods devised by textile designers to stamp repeatable patterns on fabric. Conversely, by the eighteenth century, textile designers looked to professional printmakers for knowledge about how to print on fabric from the sorts of copper engraving plates that were specific to their craft. 

What was the curation process like to select the works featured in the show? 

I wanted the exhibition to draw attention to the many ways in which printmaking has thought and continues to think of itself vis-à-vis textiles. For this reason, the show features not just prints on fabric but also prints made with, for, on, and about textiles, as well as paper as a textile-like support. I also wanted to frame the notion of what constitutes a textile expansively to include not just fabric but also lace, quilts, embroidery, knitting, and even a modified mesh window screen.

Broken into six sections, the exhibition begins with a section of early modern examples titled “Text(ile) Precedents” to uncover some of the earliest examples of the ways prints have intersected with textiles. The following five sections focus on works produced in the 20th and 21st centuries, entitled  “Prints on Fabric,” “Textured Prints,” “Prints and the Dress”, “Prints as Textiles/Textiles as Prints” and “Stitched Prints.” 

“Textured Prints,” for example, considers how printmakers have sought to replicate the rough, nubby qualities of fabrics, often by printing directly from various kinds of textiles. Significant examples in this section include works by Sue Fuller, an experimental printmaker active at Stanley William Hayter’s famed Atelier 17, who cut up and printed from an old Victorian collar, a collagraph by Dindga McCannon, and a print by Chakaia Booker composed of quilt-like strips of paper that are blind embossed to enhance its texture. 

An important sub-theme to the exhibition is the role gender has played—and continues to play—in prints’ involvement with textiles. Prints were an important conduit for women’s work with fabric, traditionally regarded as the province of female labor, often within the home. The well-known feminist artist Miriam Shapiro makes this the topic of her work Anonymous Was a Woman II: Mimi’s Baby Bonnet, which uses a bonnet as a matrix for printing. The title of the series points to how examples of women’s creative expression were habitually produced anonymously within the private or domestic realm and have consequently been both less visible and less regarded within the history of art. 

Similarly, Julia Jacquette in White Square (Wedding Dress) portrays a swatch of sequined and embroidered cloth to demonstrate how mass media has encouraged women to regard the perfect white wedding as the consummate expression of femininity and womanhood. The exhibition features many other examples too.

What sort of experience do you hope viewers of the show have when they attend? 

I’m hoping that attentive viewers will not only appreciate the full range of how prints have interacted with textiles, but also notice the visual and conceptual overlaps between some of the earliest examples in the exhibition with works created in the 20th and 21st centuries. The dressed prints of the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries are echoed, for example, in works like Valerie Hammond’s Great Memory (above) and Delita Martin’s Two Moons (below). Hammond uses an antique lace dress as a matrix, which she embellishes with minute tiny beads, conflating the print with the original textile. Martin, meanwhile, sews printed paper gowns onto the bodies of her printed figures, treating the paper itself as a sort of textile. 

The exhibition offers many opportunities for close looking and is arranged in ways that encourage viewers to make connections of this sort. 

Is there a particular piece in the show that speaks to you the most? Why does this one stand out to you? 

This is a really hard question! I love all the works in the show, and would find it very hard to pick a single work that speaks to me the most. The one that comes closest to visualizing the title of the show, “Line and Thread,” however, may be Analia Saban’s Transcending Grid, Black (with Fringe). 

Drawn to unconventional techniques, Saban consistently works across and between media to create her art. Here she employs linen as a support on which she imprints a grid of wavering etched lines, creating a dialogue between the fabric’s rigid weave and the etching’s freer, looser strokes. The marriage of textile and print is consummated at the margins, where the artist’s printed uneven lines meet and intermingle with the fabric’s wild, frayed edges.

Line & Thread is on view in the NYPL’s Rayner Wing from September 7, 2024– January 12, 2025

Hero image above: Sanford Biggers, The Floating World: Lotus (125th) (2013). Screenprint and collage. Print Collection, The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, New York Public Library. © Sanford Biggers.

The post ‘Line & Thread’ at the NYPL Reveals the Bond Between Prints and Textiles, Past and Present appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Pioneer 10 and 11 carried plaques conceived by Carl Sagan. The Golden Record hitched a ride on Voyagers 1 and 2. This 12-inch gold-plated copper record, covered in mathematical instructions for use, held Earthy greetings: sounds from nature, music from the bagpipes to Bach to Chuck Berry to Navajo chants, and spoken greetings in 55 languages. NASA has even commissioned engravings on its red planet rovers in case of a chance meeting with actual Martians.

Europa Clipper now travels across our solar system offering a special cosmic handshake. Aboard the robotic research spacecraft is an expression of the best of humankind— and who among us but the designers, poets, artists, and writers are best suited to translate us?

Europa Clipper’s vault (the vessel’s electronic “brain”) is clad in a triangular tantalum panel 1mm thick and only seven by 11 inches thick. The panel is designed to protect its precious cargo from harmful radiation and also features an artistic homage to life-giving water.

“Water Words,” the concept for the outer facing panel, was the brainchild of Dan Goods and Preston Dyches. Debbie Millman composed its design, representing audio recordings of ‘water’ in 103 languages, then engraved on the plate as soundwaves. A circular symbol at the center representing American Sign Language came to life through a technique known as Fourier transform. Debbie collaborated with linguistics researchers Dr. Sheri Wells-Jensen, Dr. Laura Buszard-Welcher, and interstellar message researcher Dr. Doug Vakoch of METI International on the project.

I am so thrilled to share my small part in this epic journey, which was one of the most thrilling experiences of my entire life.

Debbie Millman

The panel’s inward-facing side features an original poem entitled “In Praise of Mystery: A Poem for Europa” by Ada Limon, etched in the US Poet Laureate’s handwriting.

Directly above Limon’s poem is a microchip with the names of 2.6 million people along for the journey in a drawing of Jupiter and its four largest moons (Galilean satellites). But we’ve only scratched the surface of what’s expressed on the vault panel. Go down the rabbit hole on NASA’s website for more.

I am a proud space nerd. Like many of you, it does my psyche good to be in awe, witness the immensity and logic of the universe, and feel small and insignificant in a profound way. Last week, I saw the Northern Lights display in Colorado completely by accident—reader, I cried. Setting aside my feelings about Elon Musk—hell, I got goosebumps watching those mechanical arms catch a booster (yes, CATCH!) post-satellite launch just this week.

Human’s sheer willingness to continue to reach out across the stars is a reminder that, despite our terrestrial mess, we are still capable of wonder.

In the words of PRINT’s very own Debbie Millman, “Fly safe, Europa Clipper!”

The post Europa Clipper Heads to Jupiter in Search of Water and Cosmic Connection appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

As an avid soccer fan, I awoke to the news yesterday morning flooding my various social feeds and group chats that the newest NWSL team had been revealed: BOS Nation Football Club. 

You heard that right, BOS Nation. Begging the questions: What?, Why?, and How?

BOS Nation FC is a terrible name for a sports franchise because, to put it bluntly: it’s corny as hell. “Lady Boss” culture and the “Girl Boss” discourse is over. In fact, it never started. It’s an inherently dated and regressive concept that is the opposite of empowering. “BOS Nation” is trying too hard. It wants so badly to be cool, and there’s nothing less cool than wanting to be cool. It’s unnecessarily overcomplicating what simply should have been “Boston FC” or “FC Boston,” which are reportedly two of the options that were rejected in favor of their cringey counterpart. Apparently, “BOS Nation” is an anagram of “Bostonian,” which is one of those bad ideas reeking of the original brainstorm that should have been dismissed immediately—not taken seriously and then turned into an actual NWSL franchise. Alas, here we are. 

The BOS Nation design and branding aren’t doing the franchise any favors either. The stacked logo is especially baffling, with the “FC” split up oddly and placed galaxies apart on either side of the “BOS” and clipart-looking starburst icon. The brand names for the colors in the brand system are eye-roll-inducing in their own right: “championship green,” “relentless raspberry,” “loyal charcoal,” “daring pink,” “rise yellow,” and “orange press.” 

But while the name and branding are puzzling, the roll-out campaign unleashed by BOS Nation to officially announce the franchise is downright offensive. 

NOTE: The original video used for the rollout campaign has since been removed from all platforms by BOS Nation and the NWSL. A downloaded version can be accessed here.

I am far from alone in my incredulity toward every aspect of this campaign. For the first time ever, the internet is aligned in patently agreeing upon something: this is SO BAD. There are so many layers to how the roll-out so egregiously misses the mark, so let’s dive right in. First off, using men’s sports franchises as the main framework for the launch video is, in itself, infuriating. Why are we making a women’s sports franchise about men? What are they even doing here? But then on top of that, making the roll-out about male genitalia? Now that’s beyond the pale. 

In an attempt to be edgy and subversive, BOS Nation is simply being transphobic and misogynistic, reducing gender to genitalia in a tired and childish joke about balls. They double down on the joke by encouraging people to go to toomanyballs.com, which then redirects to the BOS Nation website. The whole concept sounds like a parody, satire, or comedy sketch, or perhaps an idea that was proposed by some frat boy intern at an NFL-themed podcast. 

Another layer in this lasagna of disrespect is the erasure of the many women’s professional sports teams that are, in fact, already playing and thriving in Boston. As The Athletic reporter Meg Linehan rightly points out, Boston’s women’s professional hockey team in the PHWL, the Boston Fleet, not only exists but made it all the way to the league championship series last season. Boston is also home to a women’s professional rugby team, Beantown RFC, and a women’s professional football team, the Boston Renegades, who have won five national championships over the last six seasons. Forgot about all of those incredible women athletes, did ya, BOS Nation?

So who’s to blame? Colossus Creative Co. was the agency behind the BOS Nation integrated campaign and brand identity, smugly posting about the work on their Instagram yesterday in which they thanked their “brave clients for having the guts to be wildly provocative with this launch.” They also thanked the various men’s sports franchises featured in the launch (for contributing creatively, as well?), for their “incredible sense of humor.” 

As a teaser for yesterday’s hard launch, more than 200 billboards and other OOH placements sprung up around Boston for 48 hours, which proclaimed the campaign’s idiotic refrain: “There are too many balls in this town.” The “cryptic (and entertaining) message” was meant to inspire shock, confusion, and intrigue from onlookers who would then be enticed to visit everybody’s new favorite website, www.toomanyballs.com. You simply can’t make this stuff up!

The lingering question is, of course, what comes next? Will BOS Nation FC (every time I type that out I can’t believe it’s real) see the error of their ways and pivot in a new brand direction before they’re in too deep? Or will they dig their heels even deeper into this name and brand system, despite literally everyone hating it? Only time will tell! Maybe they should ask Tom Brady what he thinks they should do.

Story update as of October 16 at 1PM ET / 10AM PT

The “too many balls” roll-out is actively being rolled back by BOS Nation, who have removed the brand launch video from their socials and posted this statement:

The post NWSL Announces a New Boston Soccer Franchise With a Brand Launch so Bad it Feels like Satire appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

The narrative is all too common in this country: an old building steeped in history gets demolished, only to be replaced by a cookie-cutter “luxury” apartment complex, filled with grey flooring and chrome cabinetry. There’s little to be done about the fate of most of these buildings, but what if they got one last hurrah before their demise? And what if that last hurrah benefited the artists and creative community within that city?

This was the very concept concocted by the RiNo Art District in Denver, CO, when they created their NO VACANCY program in 2021. The initiative partners with real estate developers to provide local artists with funding and studio space in Denver buildings that are slated for demolition. The innovative artist residency program transforms these vacant warehouses into temporary studios for vibrant installations and has paid out more than $100K to local Denver artists to date.

The third and most recent iteration of NO VACANCY wrapped earlier this month, in which 10 artists were provided a $5,000 stipend along with two months of free studio space at two buildings in Denver, courtesy of Uplands Real Estate Partners.

Upon hearing of NO VACANCY, the idea seemed like a complete no-brainer to me, that should be replicated across the country. I recently had the pleasure of speaking with RiNo Art District Executive Director of Programs and Partnerships Alye Sharp and Programs Manager Kiah Butcher about the impact of NO VACANCY on the artists they host and on the Denver arts scene at large. I was also able to chat with two artists who were in the midst of their residency at NO VACANCY, artisan, seamstress, and crafter Kate Major and musician Marcus Moody, about their experiences with the program. My conversations are below, lightly edited for clarity and length.

Alye and Kiah, can you shed more light on the genesis of NO VACANCY and its mission? 

AS: One of the main parts of the mission of the RiNo Art District is carving out and preserving space for artists in the community, and providing them with paid opportunities. So back in 2021, one of our board members was like, “Hey, I have this warehouse, it’s just sitting empty. It’s going to be demolished soon, but would you have any use for it in the meantime?” And our first reaction was a resounding “Yes!” We had no idea what we were going to do with it, but then we decided to make a temporary art installation and provide working space for artists. 

This is the third iteration of NO VACANCY, and they’ve always looked a little different year to year based on the space. In that first iteration, we did four months of four artists each month, so 16 total artists, along with an immersive theater group who did pop-ups throughout the four-month residency. 

KB: I’m new, so this is my first experience working with NO VACANCY. Coming from the fine arts world, and having worked in contemporary art museums, the thing that most artists need is space, time, and resources. Then, providing a pretty healthy stipend and budget for all of the artists to really utilize that space and time to the greatest effect, is such a gift to give to the community. 

NO VACANCY is the gift that keeps on giving, because it’s bringing art, it’s bringing awareness, it’s showcasing all the different wonderful expertise in art, cooking, sewing, whatever, in the district itself. 

So with each iteration of NO VACANCY, there’s a different empty building that’s slated for demolition you’re able to use for the residency? 

AS: Yeah— it’s kind of a bummer that ultimately these buildings are coming down, which speaks to the Art District as a whole; we’re in a rapidly gentrifying area. It’s our way of giving one last breath of life to these cool, old warehouse spaces and helping write their final chapter. We’ve gotten a little goofy with it; we had a funeral for the last building to send it off. But it’s a beautiful thing too, that artists get the last chapter in these spaces. 

It’s our way of giving one last breath of life to these cool, old warehouse spaces, and helping write their final chapter.

Alye Sharp

KB: Historically, these areas in Denver were the hub for so many artists, because there were affordable spaces within the warehouses. All of these buildings have so much history with artists and creatives in the area, and so it just feels like a good nod to historic Denver, bringing artists back into them. 

I’d imagine the concept also allows the artists to really let loose and create with reckless abandon since the buildings are coming down anyway. 

AS: Yes, go wild! That’s become the joke; we say, do whatever you want in here! Be safe, but fuck it up!

That must be so refreshing, even for the artists who have access to a space or a studio setup, where there might be rigid rules around what they can and cannot do. Only certain types of artists doing certain types of work are allowed in certain spaces, so it’s great that NO VACANCY encourages doing things that others wouldn’t allow. What’s better as an artist than to have the stamp of approval to be free?

KB: There’s nothing more exciting than just pure potential, right?

What sort of criteria do you use when selecting artists for the residency? 

KB: This year, we had massive interest; we had about 200 artists submit proposals. We then had a selection committee of RiNo staff, local artists, and previous NO VACANCY artists go through and decide which artists would work well within the space, but also complement each other. They work through demographics, mediums, what level in your career you’re at, if you’re more emerging, if you’re a more experienced artist, to try to find and curate the correct people that can work together and have a focus on community. 

Trying to define and figure out which of those artists would work well together is a big part of that puzzle piece because it’s a hugely collaborative residency. It’s ten people in a building, and you have to work together; you’re sharing space and resources, so it’s good to be mindful of that collaborative and community-forward-thinking artist.

I’d think that one of the best aspects of working in the space is the synergy with the other creatives. I’m a sign painter in addition to my writing work, and up until recently I was painting in a classroom with a lot of other sign painters for the last two years, and it was so much more exciting than now. I’m not in that class anymore, and I’m just lonely!

KB: I’m a curator and a video artist as well, and video art is always so collaborative, so it’s always pretty inherent in that practice. It’s pushing people to realize that they can do so much. Creativity knows no bounds when you work with others.

Creativity knows no bounds when you work with others.

Kiah Butcher

AS: I’d also add that, in the second year, a lot of the artists from the first year showed up to the openings to support and be like, “I’m so excited that you all are part of the alumni of this program now!” Some of them will ask to come in after the residency is over and add their own collaborations. It’s a really cool community. 

Why do you think Denver is particularly well-suited for the NO VACANCY program? 

KB: Denver is still a burgeoning art scene; it’s really rich and really connected, and there’s a lot more than people think, but it is still burgeoning. It’s still working its way to becoming something bigger than it is now. But because it’s in this particular state, I think people are more apt to be collaborative, they’re more apt to be supportive and work together. 

We all know working within the arts can be a bit cutthroat, but I think, specifically in Denver, “lift as you climb” is an ethos within the art community, because we’re all working to elevate the art scene itself. This residency, because it’s based in collaboration and community and also activating historic parts of Denver, so many people feel that emotional connection and that aspiration to be a little bit bigger and a little bit better. 

Specifically in Denver, “lift as you climb” is an ethos within the art community, because we’re all working to elevate the art scene itself.

Kiah Butcher

AS: The timing is good for something like this too. I like to joke that Denver is in its awkward teenage phase; we’re experiencing pretty exponential growth that really hasn’t slowed, so artists are also trying to carve out their space and find where they fit in a city that’s becoming rapidly unaffordable. So as much as we can take the role of helping create these opportunities and provide space for them to work that has no rules or boundaries around it, that’s our big goal with this project as well.

KB: It’s a great platform for artists too, because so much can come from it. When you have a space to showcase your work, you can start to invite gallerists, curators, museums, etc. to experience your work, and then it’s just moving forward from there.

Since NO VACANCY is dependent on a building opening up that you can use for each cycle, what is it like navigating that uncertainty when planning the next iteration?

AS: This hasn’t been a straight line, annual program, as much as we would like it to be. As these spaces come online or we get connected to a property owner, we have to move quickly to get all of our permits in place and get the call for artists out. We do try to set aside funding every year, just banking on the fact that we will find some opportunity. 

Our hope is that this program grows into something that’s more than just buildings that are going to be raised, but also existing buildings that are long for this world; how do we continue to try to carve out space for artists everywhere?

What aspect of NO VACANCY are you proudest of?

KB: Paying artists is the greatest gift ever, because so many people expect so much from artists on such little pay. Being able to give to artists, because they always give back, is really fulfilling. Putting funding where it’s really important for the arts and culture, especially when it comes to the vibrancy and the health of the city.

AS: I’ve been involved in the RiNo Art District for almost ten years, and this is, by far, my favorite project that we do; it’s just an all-around feel-good project. When you come to one of the openings and events, there’s so much diversity of art that’s happening in the space, it really does kind of bring me to tears. Seeing everyone all together in the space, and everybody’s having an amazing time, and just being themselves; we usually have drag performers in there! It’s just a really cool thing.

I think the fact that we’re in a building, making all of this stuff, putting so much energy into it, and we’re just going to demolish it. That’s amazing.

Artist Marcus Moody

Kate and Marcus, how did you first discover NO VACANCY, and why did you decide to apply?

KM: A friend of mine, Shadows Gather, who I believe was an artist in the first year of NO VACANCY, sent me a link and was like, “You need to apply.” Shadows is a photographer in the Denver area, and she’s come to a lot of the fashion shows I’ve put on. She was like, “I think you would do amazing things here. I think you could do so much cool stuff.” And she’s right!

MM: I was doom-scrolling and I saw an ad, and there was something about it, it really popped out, it just had an energy to it. Then, the more I read about it, I was like, “Oh, we’re gonna get a warehouse? It’s gonna get demolished? Impermanence?” It was all these things that are big themes in my work right now; coming out of impermanence on more of the resurgence, resurrection side, really examining the grief of change. 

I think the fact that we’re in a building, making all of this stuff, putting so much energy into it, and we’re just going to demolish it. That’s amazing.

KM: I love that too!

MM: I’m really happy to be here. It really fell into place. And some of the work being done in this warehouse… It’s wild. 

What has the collaborative nature of the residency and working amongst the other artists been like for you so far? 

KM: I do a lot of wearable art—costumes, fashion, I tend to even be weirder than fashion—so inherently I need somebody to wear it, it has to be collaborative or it’s nothing. Clothes are nothing without people to wear them. I love having a building full of people, and I can be like, “Put this on! Let me see it!” It’s fabulous.

Denver is so great for collaborating. I’m from New York where we don’t talk to each other, we’re actively trying to bring each other down, because it’s so cutthroat. But here in Denver, everybody wants to be together. They want to help each other. Like if I have a show, I’m going to have a friend put in work too. We want to build each other up. I had a friend come by the site yesterday, and they said, “The vibe in here is so good.” And it really is. Everyone’s the best.

MM: The vibes in the warehouse are great. It’s very honest, vulnerable, and safe. It’s been beautiful. Kate’s making a head for me! I’ve never been around anybody who had the skill, and then to be curated into a group of people who have all of the skills that I feel like I need right now, I’m just like, alright, universe, God, Buddha, whatever, thank you. I’m really excited to even just take photos with it! 

It’s been very intimate because what I’ve been asked to do with my music is intimate. Like Nadia, we’re collaborating on putting her father’s poetry into a song. To me, that’s intimate as hell. But that’s the kind of work I want to do, I want to make stories out of this stuff, and I’ve always wanted them to be stories that mean something to people. 

What has been the most unexpected value of NO VACANCY so far?

KM: I have more ideas than I could possibly do in the amount of time, which kind of surprises me. I’m working toward the pitch that I put into the application, but then I’m like, Oh, so I could do this! And also, I could do this! And I think that speaks to the potential of a raw building that has no potential anymore— it’s slated for demolition, but we’re making it a fun, cool space to hang. I didn’t expect that. 

MM: It’s like when you get really bad news, and you know you can’t do anything about it. There’s this moment of acceptance, and this makes me think of that. That moment in grief when you’ve found out that your thing is going to be destroyed— how are you going to act in the meantime? What this project teaches is you can make something beautiful, you can still do something that’s never been done. And I think that’s an awesome message. That’s the unexpected thing: this connection to grief, and I’m understanding mine more, even before we finish the process. It’s been emotional as hell.

The post Denver’s NO VACANCY Lets Artists Write the Last Chapter of Buildings Set for Demolition appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Our obsession with celebrating book and cover design finds good company—AIGA has just announced its 50 best book covers and 50 best book designs of 2023.

Just because we’re hurtling through the last quarter of 2024 doesn’t mean we can’t take a moment to reflect on these stellar book and cover designs from last year. AIGA 50 Books | 50 Covers of 2023 marks the 100th year of the competition, with 542 book and cover designs entered from 28 countries. All Eligible entries had to have been published and used in the marketplace in 2023.

One hundred years into this competition, the book seems to be as protean and chimeric as ever.

Rob Giampietro, AIGA 50 Books | 50 Covers Chair

“At times confounded and delighted, we asked ourselves [during the judging process], Is this a course packet or a manifesto? A sculpture or a monograph? A glossary or a guidebook? Is this book contemporary or retro? Gauche or chic?” Rob Giampietro, chair of the competition, said of their consideration process. “We debated books that blended the grotesque with the goofy alongside books that were delicate, subtle, and difficult to emotionally classify. In the end, we felt we found some of the best of this year’s offerings, books that in every case seem to show what design can do to bring the experience of reading to riskier-yet-more-rewarding places.”

Each of the 2023 winners can be viewed through AIGA’s online gallery, and will become part of the AIGA collection at the Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Columbia University’s Butler Library in New York. Entries for 50 Books | 50 Covers of 2024 can be submitted starting this November.

The post AIGA Looks Back on the 50 Best Book and Book Cover Designs of 2023 appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

There’s little else in America as inherently nostalgic as a bowling alley. From those ‘90s kids such as myself who grew up attending duckpin bowling birthday parties at kitschy spots in suburban strip malls to those who remember high school dates spent at the local lanes, to grow up in the States is to have a heartfelt reverence for the institution of the bowling alley.

The signature style and aesthetic of bowling alley architecture is central to their mystique, which originally developed in mid-century California after World War II, in an effort to get more people going to the lanes. Suffice it to say, the strategy worked, with bowling alleys blooming nationwide. The history of this bowling alley boom is beautifully preserved and articulated in a new book from Angel City Press of the Los Angeles Public Library, Bowlarama: The Architecture of Mid-Century Bowling.

Written by the LA preservationist and senior editor at Los Angeles Magazine, Chris Nichols, along with historian, advocate, and former president of the Museum of Neon Art, Adriene Biondo, Bowlarama encapsulates the enthusiasm and splendor surrounding mid-century bowling alley culture through vintage photographs, ephemera, and hand-drawn architectural renderings.

An architectural style called Googie architecture was the dominant look of this era of bowling alley design, which is characterized by space-age shapes, materials, signage, and more, meant to catch the eye and entice onlookers. Last year, I took a tour of relics of Googie architecture that remain in Los Angeles with Nichols himself as the charismatic tour guide. Considering the grip Googie had on LA in the 50s and 60s, it’s no surprise the city served as the epicenter for the mid-century bowling alley frenzy portrayed in Bowlarama.

For gamers and architecture buffs alike, Bowlarama is an at-home library must-have. So many bowling lane structures are no longer with us following the crash of the craze in 1962; Bowlarama is a critical historical record that helps keep them alive.

Hero image above: The gloriously googie Covina Bowl (1956, Powers, Daly & DeRosa), shortly after it was completed in 1956, was an instant landmark in the new suburbs. (Photo credit: Charles Phoenix)

The post A New Book Honors the Bygone Bowling Alley appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

I believe that censorship is the enemy of freedom. By banning books, we deny ourselves the opportunity to learn from the past and to envision a braver future.

Ava DuVernay, award-winning filmmaker & honorary chair for Banned Books Week 2024

According to the American Library Association, 2023 saw the highest number of challenges to individual books (4,240 titles) as well as attempts to censor library materials and services (1,247). These numbers are stark (up 65% from 2022). Though the numbers have declined in the first eight months of 2024, the attempts to censor books still far exceed the number we saw before 2020.

The vast majority of these challenges are trained on books written by and about people of color or members of the LGBTQIA+ community.

Now through October 22, we’re partnering with Bookshop.org to amplify banned titles. The Bookshop.org team has curated this list of books by authors currently on the banned books and censorship list. Visit the shop.

Take 15% OFF all titles in this list and use the discount code BannedBooks24 at checkout, valid through October 22!

Background of banner design by Tom Hermans on Unsplash.

The post Support Banned Books with PRINT appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Close down Sabrina Ionescu from three-point range.

Box out Breanna Stewart and Jonquel Jones in the paint.

Nothing can stop Big Ellie.

Who’s “Big Ellie,” you ask? A new top draft pick from the NCAA? A key signing from abroad? She’s neither. Big Ellie is the New York Liberty’s mascot.

Ellie the Elephant, affectionately known by her throngs of adoring fans as Big Ellie, has had a breakout WNBA season this year, though Liberty loyals have been on Team Ellie since her rollout in 2021. Ellie replaced the team’s previous mascot, Maddie (named after their then home court, Madison Square Garden in Manhattan), when the franchise rebranded from playing at MSG to the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. The Liberty’s chief brand officer, Shana Stephenson, was one of the team members who originally conceived of and developed the Ellie character and persona, though she has evolved beyond Stephenson’s wildest dreams into a viral sensation entertainer extraordinaire and downright diva. “I’m also a fan of Ellie, of course, but I’m also often blown away by her ability to just continue to blow minds and exceed expectations and rise to the moment,” Stephenson told me recently as we chatted about Ellie’s star power.

Ellie sets the exuberant tone for the game day experience at NY Liberty games, from her drippy arrival tunnel fits, iconic on-court dance performances, and mid-game antics on the sidelines and in the stands. As a result, the games appear to be more like parties than sporting events, with the packed stands overflowing with joy. Ellie’s popularity is indicative of the seismic growth in the WNBA over the last few seasons. With the 2024 regular season wrapping this past weekend, ESPN has reported that this has been the most-viewed WNBA regular season ever across their various platforms, with games averaging 1.2 million viewers. That marks a ridiculous 170% increase from 2023.

Of course, most of the credit goes to the athletes for these skyrocketing stats, but feats in the teams’ branding and entertainment value, like Ellie, have critically bolstered what the players are doing on the court. The rest of my conversation with Stephenson is below, where she reveals details about Ellie’s development and evolution, and why she thinks Ellie has connected with the masses in ways she never could have imagined.

(Conversation has been lightly edited for length and clarity).

An elephant mascot for a Brooklyn-based sports team isn’t the most obvious choice. Can you walk me through how the idea of Ellie first came about?

Our previous mascot at Madison Square Garden was Maddie, who was a golden retriever. When we knew we were relocating the team to Brooklyn, we knew we couldn’t bring Maddie (who was named after Madison the Square Garden) to the Barclays Center. Maddie was very beloved by our Liberty loyals, our fan base, and we also knew that we had to be really thoughtful about how we sunsetted Maddie, and introduced whatever this new mascot would be. There were big shoes to fill (no pun intended), and we didn’t want our fans to hate this new mascot.

So from that moment, we knew we had to think up a new mascot; not having a mascot was never an option. Mascots have always been key to WNBA teams, so we knew that it was important for us to dream up something different. As we were thinking of what were viable mascot replacements for Maddie, we tossed out everything that you could think of that’s New York related, from rats and pigeons to apples, just naming anything that New York was known for, but none of them hit in the same way that Maddie did. 

Our CEO, Kia, who never sleeps, was up late one night and Googled “Brooklyn and animal” and this story about the Brooklyn Bridge came up where Barnum and Bailey executed a stunt with elephants walking across it to prove that the bridge was sturdy, safe, and strong enough to withhold all the weight and traffic. She came into my office the next day saying, “Okay, I think I got it. Hear me out: what about an elephant?” And I immediately dismissed it. But then she told me the story. So then we thought of the name Ellie because of Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty (since she’s our muse) and “Ellie” being short for elephant. It just all made sense. It went from being an “absolute not” and immediate “no,” to a no-brainer.

Once you landed on the idea of Ellie, what was the character’s development process like? 

First, we had to pitch the idea to ownership and get them on board with this idea of an elephant as the mascot of the New York Liberty. We were successfully able to convince them that this was a direction that we should go in as an organization, and they gave us the green light. That was in 2019, and then in 2020 the pandemic hit, so we had a bit of a lag and some lead time in terms of when we actually had to start developing Ellie. 

We found an artist who sketched Ellie out and then put together a prototype model to show what Ellie could look like with the crown, the ears, the lashes, and the sea foam and black-and-white J’s. And we were like, she’s cute! We love her! Then we went into the phase of playing around with proportions and different things, and then we found a costume maker. We ended up working with a costume maker out of New York, and at that time there were so many challenges with ordering materials with the supply chain issues. Different pieces that we ordered from overseas were delayed, and we were really nervous if we would be able to complete the costume in time for the start of our season once things started to ramp up. But luckily we made our deadline.

How did your team handle launching Ellie to replace Maddie from a brand storytelling perspective?

There was a whole campaign and story around it. We had to figure out what the story was behind sunsetting Maddie and having her pass the torch to Ellie because, again, we wanted fans to really embrace Ellie. We wanted fans to love who Ellie was. So we came up with the idea of having Maddie film herself at Madison Square Garden, get on the subway traveling to Brooklyn, getting off at the Atlantic Avenue Station, and coming up the steps out of the subway at the Barclays Center. Meeting Maddie at the top of the staircase in front of the Barclays Center was Ellie. Maddie then literally passed the torch to Ellie, and then Ellie went inside the Barclays Center and waved to Maddie. When Ellie walks inside the building, all of the LEDs say, “Welcome home, Ellie!” 

The fans initially, like most people, were confused by the idea of an elephant, but after they actually read the press release and we explained the story behind it they got on board with the concept of an elephant. 

It’s brilliant to use the mascot storyline to not only explain the mythology of Ellie as a character, but to encapsulate the wider rebrand the NY Liberty was undergoing as a franchise in the transition from Manhattan to Brooklyn. Those boroughs have such different identities, and New Yorkers know that better than anyone, so I’m sure every aspect of that rebrand rollout needed to be handled with the utmost delicacy and thoughtfulness. 

Exactly; Ellie could not exist at Madison Square Garden. It’s such a different culture. Her personality is very New York, but it’s also very Brooklyn. And that brings me to the mascot tryout.

I think you have to be a really interesting individual to want to be a professional mascot.

We held auditions for different people who wanted to be Ellie, advertising at different entertainment casting agencies, and posting it on social. The tryout was one of the craziest things I’ve ever been a part of; I think you have to be a really interesting individual to want to be a professional mascot. We were able to identify the person, and they’re still Ellie to this day. They were a mascot prior to becoming Ellie, so they had that unique experience before transforming Ellie into this major character who’s an entertainer, a performer, and a dancer. 

When we first met with them, we asked to see what ideas they had. We already knew that we wanted Ellie to be female and we wanted Ellie to dance. It wasn’t that important to us for Ellie to be athletic just because we were a basketball team. Most basketball mascots can dunk, they can dribble, they can do all the things. But we definitely wanted to do something different. 

Obviously, the love for Ellie has blown up now, but after the reveal of moving from Maddie to Ellie, what was the initial reaction from the fans?

The first season we introduced Ellie was in 2021, and we were still dealing with a lot of the effects of Covid, and we had a lot of restrictions in place to protect the players. So that meant we were still testing players every day and testing everyone who was in direct contact with players every day. As a result of that, there were tiers of people who could be down on the court, and our entertainment, dance teams, and Ellie weren’t able to be on the court. 

So when we introduced Ellie that season, we had a stage built on the baseline where she performed. She couldn’t interact with the fans in the way that she does now, so it took a little bit of time for people to understand who Ellie was, what her strengths were, what her personality was, and how her character was evolving into what it is now. 

In time, we’ve continued to try new things. When Ellie was introduced, Ellie had typical mascot shoes, and by season two, we ditched those completely and realized Ellie should just rock some sneakers. It just felt more authentic to her, especially as a dancer. She likes to move around, and we didn’t want those shoes to hinder her in any way. Ellie also initially had a little curl on the top of her head, and, quite honestly, we couldn’t keep it curled, so our senior director of entertainment, Criscia Long, came up with the idea of getting hair extensions and braiding it, and that’s how Ellie’s ponytail braid was born. So, out of a need to solve a problem or just ingenuity, we’ve been able to continue to find little tweaks here and there that bring more of Ellie’s personality to life. 

Also, because the person who embodies Ellie was a mascot before, they have ideas. They’re from Brooklyn, which was also very intentional. We wanted someone who really understands the culture and the core audience we’re hoping to connect with. 

“Authenticity” is the key word that comes to mind when I analyze Ellie— it so clearly has driven every choice you and your team has made in creating her. I’m sure that’s what resonates with your fans and why they love her so much. 

I’m just as blown away by Ellie on most days as everyone else is. For example, when Ellie performed with Ciara, she went backstage and met her, and Ciara completely fangirled out about meeting Ellie. And then when Ellie took the stage and performed, she truly owned that moment. My jaw was on the floor. I was like, Ellie is performing in front of 18,000 fans right now! I’m often blown away by her ability to exceed expectations and rise to the moment. 

The players love Ellie too, and they love sharing the player tunnel fit moment with her. They shouldn’t be watching Ellie during the games, but it’s hard not to! I sit not too far from the player bench, and sometimes they just look over at me and shake their head like, What is she doing now? 

I sit not too far from the player bench, and sometimes they just look over at me and shake their head like, What is she doing now? 

You mentioned before how you didn’t necessarily want Ellie to be conventionally “sporty,” dribbling around and dunking the ball like other mascots do. Instead, you’ve played up her femininity with her styling, outfits and bags, her signature braid, her lashes, the way she moves, etc. I love how she’s reflective of so many athletes in this era who are also embracing glamour and presenting so femme, even as they play. It feels like they’re reclaiming the power of femininity, dismantling binaries, and defying stereotypes about what types of women are good at sports. 

We’re seeing a lot more femininity in sports right now, and that’s always been a goal of mine as a chief brand officer. Even in terms of the photography and how we talk about our athletes, I always wanted to highlight the femininity of those who identify as feminine (because not all of them do), but you can also show them as being strong. It’s not an “either-or,” it’s a “both-and.” They can exist together.

It’s just really fun that our game has evolved to a place of acceptance and celebrating, pushing boundaries and trying new things. 

One aspect that makes women athletes different from men is their hair, their nails, their lashes, and their makeup. It’s important to me that we really lean into that and celebrate that. So in the photographs we’re taking, I want them to flip your hair if you have braids or locks. I want us to show the multidimensionality and the diversity with which all of the players show up as women in sports. It’s just really fun that our game has evolved to a place of acceptance and celebrating, pushing boundaries, and trying new things. 

Your team has struck gold by creating such a powerful brand-building tool with Ellie. How have you capitalized on that outside of her entertainment value as a performer? 

We are definitely consistently thinking through ways we can integrate Ellie into the rest of our brand outside of just being in the arena. Integrating a new drop into Ellie’s tunnel fit, for example. So if we’re launching a new merch item, maybe Ellie can wear that on her way into the arena when we’re capturing the player’s arrival. We’re strategically placing these items on Ellie and having these moments, continuing to innovate and elevate around it. 

The Jets released a new uniform this season, and they asked if they could gift Stewie a new jersey and have her wear it. And I was like, “Yeah, but what do you think about Ellie also wearing it?” and they were like, “Oh my god, yes!” so then they gave Ellie a custom jersey. So it’s not just us who are recognizing Ellie’s power and influence, but other teams in New York are seeing it, other brands. Brand Jordan customized a whole Ellie fit for her, and Jordan doesn’t collaborate with just anybody or any athlete; it’s a very specific and elite group of people that they often work with, so for Ellie to be on that list it’s like, yeah, we have something special here. 

The social media aspect of Ellie’s meteoric rise can’t be understated, considering almost every video of her seems to go viral. I’m sure there’s a whole team dedicated to that part of her persona, but I’m curious about the voiceover you’ve chosen to give her in those videos and how that’s pushed her character forward.

Our ultimate goal with Ellie is for her to have a show like Sesame Street, with a puppet sitting on a stoop in New York City interviewing people. But at first, we were like, but Ellie doesn’t have a voice so we can’t do that. As a workaround, the person who plays Ellie suggested we use a trending TikTok voice. 

We were a little uncomfortable with it at first, but the first video they used it on was really funny, and the reaction that it got was amazing, so we just decided to go with it. That’s just another one of those risks that we took, because in the mascot world mascots don’t speak, they’re nonverbal. So this was something that hadn’t been done before; it was unexpected, but the reaction has been great, so now that’s the voice of Ellie.

The voice is very New York, it’s very Brooklyn, and I think that’s also what people are drawn to. I speak to people who sound like Ellie every day. Her accent is so thick; I’m from New York, and even when I listen to it I’m like, Ellie’s accent is out of control right now in this video. 

The post The NY Liberty’s “Big Ellie” Takes the Big Apple By Storm appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Much like at the 2024 Paris Olympics, the Paralympics were rife with savvy design in all forms that thrilled us (almost) as much as the sports themselves. From adaptive design concepts to inclusive fashion, and statement-making equipment, innovative and exciting design at the Paralympics is critical to the Games’ function and to the athletes’ success. A “disability” is socially constructed, after all, and design is one of the keys to addressing deficiencies in society for those with disabilities, which extends into the world of sports.

To celebrate the end of this Paralympics season, we’ve compiled a roundup of some of the best design from the Games below!

Arjola Dedaj’s Butterfly Blindfold 

Italian paralympic athlete Arjola Dedaj competed in the women’s long jump T11 wearing an elegant butterfly-shaped blindfold featuring the colors of the Italian flag. All athletes competing in the T11 class have near-total visual impairment and are required to wear blindfolds. Many of them seize the opportunity to make statements with their blindfolds, just as Dedaj did. She’s known for her bold blindfold choices, having previously competed in a metallic gold design at the 2024 World Para Athletics Championships in May.

Assunta Legnante’s Mona Lisa Blindfold 

Assunta Legnante is another Italian paralympic track and field athlete who had some fun with her blindfold choices. The F12 shot put gold medalist donned two blindfold designs while competing at the Paris Paralympic Games, which were submitted by graphic design students at the University of Bologna. From 44 original submissions, a public vote was then cast on a pool of eight finalists, with the Mona Lisa design and another depicting Legnante’s eyes in the colors of the French and Italian flags selected as the winners.

“When I choose an eye mask, there is always a link between Italy and the host country,” Legnante told The Independent. “This time round it was France, so what’s better if not the Mona Lisa?”

Vinicius Rodrigues’s Retro Sunglasses

We’d be remiss if we didn’t mention the Brazilian bronze medalist in the 100m T63, Vinicius Rodrigues, and his retro eyewear. These iconic “Over the Top” sunglasses from Oakley were a throwback to a similar pair worn by Nigerian track and field Paralympian Adekunle Adesoji in Beijing 2008. The sci-fi, bionic style of the sunglasses drives home the otherworldly levels of accomplishment Paralympic athletes achieve.

The Paralympic Medals

Similar to the medals that were given out to the Olympic champions in July, the design for the Paralympic medals features a piece of the Eiffel Tower cut into the shape of a hexagon at the center on one side. The iron has been stripped of the brown paint used on the Eiffel Tower itself, returning it to its original color, giving each gold, silver, and bronze medal a two-tone effect.

The other side of the Paralympic medals are unique from their Olympic counterparts, featuring a view of the Eiffel Tower from beneath, framed with the words “Paris” and “2024” in universal Braille. This choice symbolizes accessibility and references the language’s French inventor, Louis Braille. Meanwhile, the edge of each Paralympic medal is engraved with the name of the sport, discipline, and event of the medalist in English (the official language of the International Paralympic Committee). To allow visually impaired athletes to distinguish the three metals by touch, lines are engraved on the edge of the medal: I for gold, II for silver, and III for bronze.

Para Sport Explainer Videos

The Germany-based creative studio Kreatives created a series of animated explainer videos to accompany each of the 22 Paralympic sports featured in Paris. Many Paralympic viewers might not know certain sports, so these videos were created to help explain each in a fun, visually compelling, and informative way. Most Paralympic sports have unique sets of rules, adaptive equipment, and athlete classifications that audience members are unfamiliar with. Kreatives aimed to fill that gap with these videos, enlisting a diverse team of creatives to do so.

“In a project where diversity and inclusion are at its core, we knew we had to elevate unique styles while balancing the series’s comprehensive, harmonious look,” Kreatives says on its website. “Therefore, we hired artists from around the globe with diverse cultural backgrounds and artistic expression.”

Assisted Viewing Tools

 The Paralympic Games deployed technology to help viewers fully experience each sport. Vision Pads were used by those watching Goalball, for example, so that they could track the ball and feel vibrations during key moments of the game.

Caironi Martina’s Rainbow Running Blade

The specialty equipment on display at the Paralympics is design at its best. The functionality of the prosthetics being used is a tremendous feat in its own right, but it’s particularly fun when athletes make them their own with personal flair. Long jump T63 athlete Marty Cairo did just that with her rainbow running blade design, which features multicolored stripes and a cartoon unicorn.

Inclusive Fashion

The 2024 Paralympics have marked an important shift toward more inclusive fashion for many athletes. At the Opening Ceremony, Team Canada, for example, wore bright red jackets designed by Lululemon that featured magnetic closures to make them easier for everyone to take on and off. Lululemon also designed a pair of carpenter pants for athletes with pockets at the shins, so an athlete in a wheelchair can easily access them. These strides are reflective of a larger cultural movement toward more investment in and awareness around inclusive fashion, with the industry picking up steam and capital to make an impact on an even bigger scale.

Aymane El Haddaoui’s Running Shoes 

Moroccan 400m T47 gold medalist Aymane El Haddaoui ran in a pair of shoes he embellished by hand seemingly with a Sharpie, penning the words “hope” and “we did it” on the fabric along with “Mom” inside of a crude rendering of a Nike swoosh. The street-style nature of the shoe’s aesthetic makes for a compelling look, as does the symbolic nature of the hand-drawn logo of such a massive sports brand onto the shoes of a Paralympic athlete.

The post The Best Design from the 2024 Paris Paralympic Games appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Amidst the typography industry’s corporate consolidations, Positype proudly asserts that it remains one of the largest independently controlled font collections.

Customers, agencies, and creatives are looking for independent foundries to offer more. This new site is a blend of modern functionality with subtle nods to successful approaches from our past.

Neil Summerour

Positype celebrates “subtleties of mass, perfect imperfections, warmth, and uniqueness,” making the website a pleasure to peruse.

We had some fun exploring the newest typefaces in the Positype family, from the techno-futuristic Ginza Pro Wide (above) to the award-winning Clear Sans Pro. The accessible and multilingual typeface was influenced by early 20th-century signage in five new writing scripts (we love its Korean expression, shown below in Extra Bold).

Envy (above) is, well, fun—and that’s the official word on the site, folks. Smiles is a whimsical and retro-fabulous release, influenced by wood type designs and hovering at the edge of legibility (below).

You’ll also find workhorse typefaces like Overture (below). The Bodoni-inspired typeface, 24 years in the making, was aptly named as a nod to the Debussy Summerour listened to on loop while designing it.

We’re partial to Overture’s fantastic ornaments and swashes.

Halogen Pro is a softer, refined take on its iconic predecessor, with expanded script support in Greek and Cyrillic.

Read more about the relaunched website and the new typefaces on Positype’s blog.

The post Positype Declares Independence with a Refreshed Website & New Typefaces appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

As a lover of all manner of bars, pubs, dives, speakeasies, and cocktail lounges, I was eager to learn more about this latest endeavor from the Murrays and get my hands on my own copy. The pair’s responses to my questions about Great Bars of New York City are below.

Why bars? What is it about bars that you find so compelling and reflective of NYC culture and history?

We chose to publish a book highlighting New York City bars as we consider them to be the heart of New York City’s culture and neighborhoods. Historically, bars have always been melting pots and places where people from all backgrounds and cultures can mingle and share stories while enjoying a drink, and where relationships often start. For many New York residents, their neighborhood bar serves as a home away from home, where people can choose to be alone together. 

For many New York residents, their neighborhood bar serves as a home away from home, where people can choose to be alone together. 

We also feel the need to document these special places, similar to our work featured in our previous book, Store Front NYC: Photographs of the City’s Independent Shops, Past and Present, as many beloved bars have been forced to close in recent years due to economic pressures and rapidly changing neighborhood demographics.

You’re known best for your exterior photographs of storefronts. How is documenting interiors different when it comes to capturing tone, mood, and telling a story?

We approached our interior photography of the bars with the goal of capturing the essence of each location as well as including often overlooked details, especially ones that even regular visitors may have missed. We included an establishing photograph, often showing the overview of the space as you would walk through the door, and also photographed areas where patrons would spend most of their time while drinking, either at the bar itself or at a specific booth or table.

We photographed each bar using only available light, not bringing any additional equipment inside so that our photos would mirror the way the bar would appear during a typical visit.

What sorts of details typically capture your photographic eye?

We always seek out interesting architectural details, including handcrafted woodwork such as the mahogany balcony with its quatrefoil design inside The Campbell, the stained glass windows and back bar insets made by Tiffany at Peter McManus Cafe, and even the shoulder-height porcelain urinals in the men’s bathroom at Old Town Bar and Restaurant.

We also focused our lens on many of the items hanging on the walls and from the ceiling of the bars as they also provide insight into the bar’s history, including the turkey wishbones hanging at McSorley’s Old Ale House and the old saloon licenses at Fanelli Cafe.

How did you approach curating the 30 bars included in the book? What was your selection process?

In choosing which bars to include in our publication, we decided to concentrate on only the borough of Manhattan and focused on historic establishments, former speakeasies that sold illegal alcoholic beverages during the Prohibition era, as well as bars immortalized in film and literature. 

We additionally featured many lesser-known spots and dive bars including Rudy’s Bar & Grill, one of the city’s last affordable “working man” bars. Of course, there were numerous noteworthy locations we would have loved to include, but those will have to wait for another book!

Of the 30 bars cataloged in the book, do you have a favorite?

It’s so difficult to pick a favorite, but Pete’s Tavern holds a special place in our hearts as it not only has a beautiful historic interior, but also a welcoming staff and great food and drink. We try to stop by as often as possible and especially love visiting at Christmastime when the bar is strung with hundreds of lights and decorations.

Why does creating physical books continue to be so important to you both as photographers?

Since our journey as photographers began with documenting the streets of New York City using a 35mm film camera, printing our photographs and studying them has always been important to us. We have always felt that sharing our work in book form complements the subject matter by staying “old-school,” similar to the stores and bars we have photographed, while also capturing the patina and texture of the locations.

The post James and Karla Murray Raise a Glass to NYC’s Storied Bars in New Book appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

“Quiltmaking is a tradition and a mode of expression that is both intimate and esteemed,” says Mazloomi on the power of the medium. “Every human being has an intimate relationship with cloth. It is the first thing we are swathed in at birth, and the last thing that touches our body upon our death. Through the nuance of textile, difficult stories can reach audiences across identities and generations from a place of care, hearth, peace, and nurture.”

The Claire Oliver Gallery in Harlem is set to present a solo exhibition of Mazloomi’s work from September 3 through November 2 entitled, Whole Cloth: Narratives in Black and White. Marking Mazloomi’s first-ever gallery exhibition, Whole Cloth features a collection of her large-scale quilts that recount the oft-overlooked impact of Black civil rights activists, leaders, and revolutionaries on American history. Mazloomi reflects on her practice as a quilter, the power of the medium to address tough subject matter, and the Whole Cloth exhibition below.

Through the nuance of textile, difficult stories can reach audiences across identities and generations from a place of care, hearth, peace, and nurture.

How would you describe your ethos as an artist?

 I am committed to using quilting as a means of storytelling and cultural expression.

You were trained as an aeronautical engineer before becoming a quilter. How did that major career pivot come about?

I was trained as an aviation engineer and was very unhappy with my work. I worked with no one who looked like me, and most importantly, working took me away from my three small boys. I wanted to do something that would keep me close to my children; I didn’t want them with a nanny or in a nursery. My first obligation in life is to my children and my role as a mother, and everything else must fit around that parameter.

My brother and sister were artists, so I decided to give it a try. Instead of paints, I use textiles. Making art afforded me the opportunity to work at home and be with my children. I made the decision to become an artist 55 years ago, and I have no regrets.

What does quilting offer you as a medium that other art forms don’t?

Quilting offers an endless variety of materials and techniques available to create work. Most people are familiar with quilts. Since I like to make work that revolves around social and political issues, using quilts to tell a story makes way for a soft landing for difficult subjects. Issues dealing with race are particularly difficult for people to accept. Viewing a narrative quilt makes it a bit easier.

Using quilts to tell a story makes way for a soft landing for difficult subjects.

What themes do you address in the Whole Cloth: Narratives in Black and White exhibition? What was your process like for assembling this show?

Most of the work in the show deals with Black history— the good, the bad, and the ugly. The work is pulled from my sketchbooks and notes. Over 30 states have placed restrictions on teaching Black history, making it so important that these stories be told, otherwise they would be unknown. There will be 55 quilts in this series and I plan to write a catalog. I also hope the exhibition will travel.

Over 30 states have placed restrictions on teaching Black history, making it so important that these stories be told.

What experience do you hope viewers of the exhibition have?

The exhibition is about educating the public on aspects of American history they may not be familiar with, and raising awareness around social justice issues. I want viewers to understand and challenge social injustices so we might alter oppressive systemic patterns of racism in this country.

What legacy do you hope to leave in the art world? 

It’s my hope that the quilts I’ve made will be a catalyst for social change, raising awareness, challenging norms, and fostering dialogue. As the Founder of the Women of Color Quilters Network, the oldest and largest organization of Black quilters in the country, I have played a major role in documenting and preserving the history of African American quilts, ensuring these stories and traditions are recognized and valued. 

Through the books I’ve written and exhibitions curated over 40 years, I’ve fostered a sense of community among Black quilt artists. The Women of Color Quilters Network has become their home, and the network is my legacy.

Header image:
Hands Up … Don’t Shoot #2
2024, Poly-cotton fabric, cotton thread, cotton batting, fabric paint.
58 x 102 inches | 147.32 x 259.08 cm

The post Carolyn Mazloomi Uses the Power of Quilting to Honor Black History appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Hostile architecture is a design element in a public space that is intended to keep people away. It’s primarily an effort that targets the houseless community and makes sleeping and simply existing even more challenging than it already is for such a vulnerable and under-supported group.

The always thoughtful and impassioned Semple answered a few of my questions about the awareness campaign, shedding light on the evils of hostile architecture and why he felt compelled to do something about it.

(Conversation lightly edited for clarity and length.)

Can you define “hostile architecture” for our readers?

Hostile architecture is the practice of designing things to create environments that discourage people from being there or using the space in specific ways. 

An example would be installing spikes in a doorway so homeless people couldn’t sleep there. Or using a high-pitched sound in a city center that young people can hear yet older people can’t, which is used to discourage skateboarding. It could be a metal bar on a bench so nobody could sleep on it. 

I like to call it “hostile design” because I see it as a subversion of design, and when we refer to it as architecture, we think about buildings. I think of it more as a perversion of creativity, something used against humanity and tends to appear in things like street furniture. 

[Hostile design] is a perversion of creativity, something used against humanity.

Why is raising awareness around hostile architecture so important to you?

I believe our towns, cities, high streets, and civic centers are really important. They are social spaces that we all use, and they are becoming increasingly hostile. As an artist and a designer I’ve always tried my very best to use what little talent I have to make things better for people and solve problems. Hostile design is the opposite of that; it’s using creativity to cause harm. 

I want to raise awareness because hostile design can be invisible until you understand what you are looking at. It hides in plain sight. Once you see it and know what you’re looking for, you literally see it everywhere. Once we become aware of something, we start to change it. I’ve seen a lot of cities and towns changing track now because they understand the issue, and they know they won’t get away with creating cruel spaces. 

The more the public understands this, the more our leaders will be under pressure to stop doing it. I hope that in the future, we start to look at proper solutions for homelessness and anti-social behavior rather than using design to move the problem on to somewhere else. I want to see our public spaces being inclusive, compassionate, and helpful. 

How did your idea for this campaign develop?

I was working with a big US city, and one of the things I was doing was designing a train station. I found myself in quite bureaucratic meetings with the transit authority. It wasn’t long before they started trying to co-opt my design and make sure it repelled homeless people, skateboarders, and drug users. My scheme was much more humane than that, but they pushed back hard. I remember telling them I didn’t want the gig, even though it was (and probably still is) the biggest thing I’ve ever walked away from. I couldn’t bring myself to be part of something like that.

I got home to my hometown of Bournemouth, where I noticed metal bars on the benches in the high street. I’d probably walked past them a million times. But this time, I could see they’d been retrofitted so homeless people couldn’t sleep on them. I took a photo of it, put it on Facebook, and explained what it was. The next day, I woke up, and the post had a million shares. People all over the world were saying they had similar things in their local areas. I knew it was important and something that needed to be challenged. 

I launched HostileDesign.org and worked with the homeless community in Bournemouth to decorate the benches, turning them into art installations called ‘love benches.’ It was all over the news, and the council took all the bars off the benches in the middle of the night. People from all over the world started ordering the stickers from the website and tagging hostile design in their communities. Recently, I teamed up with TBWA, and they installed posters over doorway spikes in London. 

The potency comes from the fact that the photographs are life-size; you are confronted with the harsh reality of a human coming into violent contact with the spikes.

What was the installation process like?

It was quite easy. Sadly, the spikes themselves are so nasty that pushing a poster through them wasn’t hard. What I really like about the campaign is how direct it looks and that the posters are made to measure the [installation] site. 

How has the campaign been received so far? 

It’s been incredible. It’s got a lot of people talking and helped push the campaign and dialogue forward. The potency comes from the fact that the photographs are life-size; you are confronted with the harsh reality of a human coming into violent contact with the spikes.

The post Stuart Semple Calls Out Hostile Architecture with Powerful OOH Campaign appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Letterform Archive is offering a reprinting of W.A. Dwiggins: A Life in Design by Bruce Kennett with a Kickstarter campaign and a special $60 pricetag until September 10.

This is a book to spend a year with.
—Steven Heller

Letterform Archive kickstarted the first printing of Bruce Kennett’s comprehensive biography of Dwiggins. It was funded in two days and quickly sold out. This beautiful book is not just a biography; the pages are typeset in a custom digital version of Dwiggins’ Electra typeface, with 1200-plus images and Dwiggins’ essays set in his typefaces.

“The name W. A. Dwiggins usually brings to mind typefaces for Linotype and books for Knopf, but his amazing career has myriad additional facets. Over a period of fifteen years, I researched, wrote, photographed, and designed this book to honor his creative forces, exploring material from the Boston Public Library, Letterform Archive, my own private collection, and other archival sources,” says Kennett, the book’s author. “The book serves as inspiration for anyone in the visual arts — whether it be graphic design, illustration, textile design, printmaking, calligraphy, type design, or puppetry.”

The book will remain available on Kickstarter and at museum shops after this date. However, the early campaign premiums are worth a look.

Running through his life is a joie de vivre and lightness of spirit than can serve as inspiration for all of us.
—Bruce Kennett, author

Learn more about W.A. Dwiggins: A Life in Design and become a backer on the book’s Kickstarter page.

The post Call Yourself a Graphic Designer? You Have W.A. Dwiggins to Thank appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Now, let’s meet the team!

Emily Oberman – Pentagram Partner and designer

Ash Phillips – Co-founder, Creative Director, and CEO of the Montreal-based strategic brand consultancy Six Cinquième

Todd Radom – Graphic designer and sports design expert

Alex Center – Designer and founder of the design and branding studio CENTER

Terrance Weinzierl – Creative Type Director at Monotype Studio

Overall, our design experts were fans of the Paris 2024 branding system. The logo continues to be the most contentious aspect of the package, with the typography also receiving varied reactions from the panel. Ash Phillips was actually at the Games and spoke about how the branding played out in the physical spaces throughout Paris.

The modern geometric shapes created an interesting contrast with the city’s architecture which is frozen in time. The past and future were colliding.
—Ash Phillips

“While I was visiting Paris in July, shortly before the Olympics began, I got to see some of the early setup and outdoor implementations of the branding. My initial response was that the modern geometric shapes created an interesting contrast with the city’s architecture which is frozen in time. The past and future were colliding,” Phillips shared. “As I looked deeper into the branding, that’s exactly what they intended. They pulled from the past, taking inspiration from art styles like Art Deco and the city’s iconic architecture, and attempted to bring French culture into the future. Interestingly, this dichotomy between past and future is prevalent today in French culture, as I overheard the concerns of the French regarding the potential rise of far-right politicians like Marine Le Pen as I was people-watching. It was a close call. But looking back at my time there and seeing the branding now, I can see this struggle between modern/progressive and traditionalist France reflected in the visuals.”

Monotype’s Terrance Weinzierl reflected on what makes Olympics branding an exercise unlike any other. “What’s unique about branding the Olympics is that it represents a specific time and place and doesn’t need to perform beyond that. It’s short-lived,” he said. “I’m reminded of the ’68 Mexico Olympics; it fits perfectly for that time and place and now represents a bookmark in time, like a tattoo. Most brands are intended to live and grow for many years, so they have the advantage of iterations, edits, and improvements over time. The Olympic branding is expected to be perfect right away, with the added pressure of being globally palatable. It’s a very difficult scenario for any designer involved.”

Alex Center also referenced the ’68 Mexico Olympics branding, heralding it as a beacon that all others have failed to reach. “Every Olympics branding will forever pale in comparison to the 1968 Mexico identity by Lance Wyman. Every other Olympics branding is just competing for silver,” he said.

About the overall Paris 2024 brand, Todd Radom made his thoughts clear: “I love it,” he told me. “Paris itself is, of course, the star, and few cities can compete in terms of the overall vibe and cultural experience, even from afar.”

Every Olympics branding will forever pale in comparison to the 1968 Mexico identity by Lance Wyman. Every other Olympics branding is just competing for silver.
—Alex Center

Logo

From the moment the Paris 2024 branding was unveiled, the logo was the talk of the town. It’s been a controversial design, to say the least, and one I’ve already taken down in some of my previous Paris 2024 design coverage. But a few of our panelists defended its honor, particularly Radom. “Can I give it a platinum medal?” he gushed. “It’s simple, stylish, versatile, easy on the eye, and oh-so French. 11/10.” Center is also a fan. “Sure, I can’t stop seeing Mary J. Blige ever since it was brought to my attention that it looks like her, but is that such a bad thing?” he said. “Who wants more drama in their life? Not me.”

The logo is somehow too cute and too small to represent the event, location, and feeling of the Olympics and Paralympics. I appreciate the idea of using a woman (Marianne) to represent the games, but perhaps not a woman reduced to lips and hair.
—Emily Oberman

Pentagram’s Oberman adamantly represented the other end of the logo spectrum. “The actual logo is a head-scratcher, almost literally. I would say it’s the weakest aspect of the entire branding suite,” she said. “With any design project, of course, there are committees and clients, and for this one, I know there were a lot of cooks in the kitchen, so I do not want to disparage the work of Sylvain Boyer or the design team. Also, I know previous Olympic logos have not been without their controversies, and this does not reach that level in any way, shape, or form. However, the logo is somehow too cute and too small to represent the event, location, and feeling of the Olympics and Paralympics. I appreciate the idea of using a woman (Marianne) to represent the games, but perhaps not a woman reduced to lips and hair. I keep wanting to say, ‘She’s hot.’ Overall, it just seems too trite. The woman it uses to represent the games is nothing more than a decorative style reference. (Not to mention the similarity to the Tinder logo!) Especially when the women of the Olympics really brought it this year, from Simone Biles to Imani Khalif to Sifan Hassan to Gabby Thomas, they have been powerful examples of female Olympic athletes.”

Phillips was on the same side of the logo debate as Oberman. “Overall, it feels dated, the icon is awkward, and it doesn’t seem to fit with the rest of the design system,” she explained. “The choice to use Marianne feels like they tried to force this old symbol into the branding rather than thinking about what France represents today or in the future. What message is that sending? To me, it shows a mindset that is stuck in the past rather than forward thinking. It feels like France is undecided on its values and what it wants to represent culturally moving forward.”

Pictograms

The Olympic pictograms are an iconic design element of each Games (pun intended), and the designs created for Paris 2024 pushed the boundaries of what the form can be. These symbols, described as “coats of arms” instead of pictograms, bucked tradition in ways our design experts (mostly) commended.

“For the most part, the pictograms were very pretty and interesting; however, many are confusing and indecipherable,” said Oberman. “I might have a hard time using them for wayfinding, but they look very cool on a court or field. I like the playing card/symmetrical aspect and the attempt to do something different from what has become the standard use of a representation of a human in all of them. Some are more successful than others (skateboarding looks a little like band-aids, but I love rhythmic gymnastics!), but I appreciated the effort and overall cohesive concept.”

“I think they’re pretty well done,” added Center. “I like how they stack together to form patterns. I haven’t seen that approach used a ton outside of Basketball, but it looks really great on the court.”

Typography

Much like the logo, the typography developed for Paris 2024 proved to be a polarizing topic for our panel. Center deemed it the weakest part of the entire system. “It’s far too fussy for my liking,” he said. “There are too many funky letters and, overall, it feels too whimsical for the Olympics. I also noticed it doesn’t fit on bibs when athletes have longer names. I love squished type, but not at the Olympics.”

Meanwhile, Weinzierl wholeheartedly approved of the typeface and dubbed it the strongest element in the system. “The custom typeface is expressive and plays on notes of Art Nouveau and Art Deco, both synonymous with Paris,” he explained. “The balance of utility and aesthetics is what type design is all about, and the best typefaces achieve both. Like a good shoe, it is useful and beautiful. The Paris 2024 typeface has a good balance, which helps it perform well for the massive number of applications.”

I enjoy the alternate glyphs designed for the typeface that give it visual variety and flexibility in tone. The rounded-top capital A is a satisfying connection to the arch motif they used in images and layouts.
—Terrance Weinzierl

Weinzierel elaborated on the success of the typeface, saying, “I enjoy the alternate glyphs designed for the typeface that give it visual variety and flexibility in tone. The rounded-top capital A is a satisfying connection to the arch motif they used in images and layouts.” However, he identified areas for improvement, specifically in terms of optical sizing. “Optical sizing adapts the drawings and spacing to be better suited for certain sizes or viewing distances,” he said. “I imagine a version of the typeface that would mellow out and be easier to read when very small. That’s always a challenge with expressive typefaces designed for display sizes— how do they perform when used small, and if they fall short, how can they adapt, or can you pair them with another typeface?”

Overall Favorite Design Moments

Outside of the brand system, Paris 2024 overflowed with feasts for the design senses. Center uplifted South Sudan’s all-black Opening Ceremony uniforms and the photo finish of Noah Lyles winning the 100m. “You see each runner at every stage of the race showing just how close it was. That’s an incredible visual,” he said.

Oberman also mentioned that fashion reached great heights during these Games. “I’ve been very focused on how modern and futuristic all the uniforms have gotten,” she said. “The sleek designs intended to help the athletes perform at their best are fascinating and beautiful. Also, Snoop’s hilarious Olympic rings glasses were kind of amazing.” Oberman went on to flag a few other favorites: “I like the medals, which I think have a reference to the Eiffel Tower without being cliche, and the torch is cool and modern, too. (Though it looks a little like a blunt, which seems appropriate for how prevalent Snoop was in all the coverage).” 

Meanwhile, Radom couldn’t help but mention the setting of Paris playing such a magnificent role in the Games’ overall design, shouting out the Eiffel Tower Stadium, in particular. “It puts this iconic landmark in the middle of every visual impression, a virtuoso achievement that speaks to ‘total design,’ beyond the graphics and the environmental visuals.” He also loved the Grand Palais and the purple track and field surface. “Also, can we propel memes to ‘design moments?'” he added. “I’d include the Turkish shooter Yusuf Dikeç.”

It put this iconic landmark [the Eiffel Tower] in the middle of every visual impression, a virtuoso achievement that speaks to ‘total design,’ beyond the graphics and the environmental visuals.
—Todd Radom

Looking Ahead to LA 2028

To help get us through the void left by Paris 2024’s conclusion, let’s discuss LA 2028! We have just four short years to prepare for the next bout of Olympic mania, and we’re already getting some glimpses at designs for those Games.

Reports are that LA2028 is getting a dynamic, moving logo that features an A that continuously changes and morphs to reflect the diversity and creative spirit of the city. Each A has been designed by athletes and celebrities to show what LA means to them. The type within the broader LA2028 Olympics identity is in the hands of LA-based typographer Jeremy Mickel. This should please Center, who told me, “A designer local to the hosting city should do the branding for each Olympics. That only seems right.” He raises a solid point, and in a city like LA, that shouldn’t be a tall order.

The post Oui or Non? Design Experts on the Paris 2024 Olympics Branding appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

It’s essential to have a visual language for the Olympic Games since many athletes and viewers speak different verbal languages. “Pictograms were designed to create a universal and easily understandable language,” writes Markus Osterwalder in his book Olympic Games – The Design. Osterwalder is a graphic designer and a bonafide Olympics historian obsessed with Olympics design. Aside from his book and his accompanying The Olympic Design project, Osterwalder also curated the exhibition “Olympic Language – Exploring the Look of the Games” at the Olympic Museum in Switzerland, which was on view in 2018 and 2019.

A new set of pictograms is designed for each Olympics, unique to the visual language of those Games and part of the greater branding system to create a cohesive look. According to Osterwalder, this has been the case since the 1964 Tokyo Summer Olympics, which featured pictograms designed by Katsumi Masaru and Yoshiro Yamashita using isotype iconography. Invented by Viennese scientist Otto Neurath in 1925, the isotype is considered the origin of our modern-day icon and emoji lexicon.

Every set of pictograms redefines the genre and marks a moment in time through their look, feel, and style. Clinton Yates of ESPN recently started a conversation around pictograms on X, referencing those designed for the 1988 Olympics in Seoul, South Korea.

Another highly regarded set of Olympics pictograms accompanied the Munich 1972 Summer Olympics. Created by graphic designers Gerhard Joksch and Otl Aicher, these pictograms used the 1964 Tokyo designs as inspiration but with a more formalized structure. “In contrast to Tokyo, the Munich pictograms were brought to a formally consistent style by a consistent application of constant elements in standardized grids,” writes Osterwalder. “This system is based on a square whose geometry defines the four directions of the movement phases.” Joksch and Aicher developed a “body alphabet” for these pictograms, using the basic shape of tongue depressors as the core visual building block for each figure.

We all watch the Olympics for sports, of course, but it’s clear that a subgroup of designers and design lovers are equally as invested in the achievements of the pictograms. During the Tokyo 2020 opening ceremonies, the organizers even conceived and wonderfully executed an Olympics pictogram tribute performance that really got people going.

So what about the pictograms designed for the 2024 Paris Olympics?

As shown in the video above, Paris 2024 has done away with the typical pictogram convention and instead created what they call coats of arms. “Pictograms are a thing of the past,” the Paris 2024 Brand Director, Julie Matikhine, said when they unveiled the coat of arms re-imagination. The set comprises 62 coats of arms across the Olympic and Paralympic Games, which are featured prominently throughout the city, venues and stadiums, television broadcasts, and everywhere else. Movement has been incorporated into each design, creating animated versions to add more intrigue and flair.

The coats of arms incorporate three key elements:

1. An axis of symmetry often mirrored across a diagonal.
2. A depiction of the ground.
3. A representation of the sport through a piece of equipment or gear affiliated with that sport, but not of the athletes themselves.

While many of these designs are visually compelling and pleasing, they are far less legible than the classic Olympic pictograms of yore. Given that pictograms’ primary purpose is clear and immediate communication, we must admit most of these coats of arms miss the mark. Bucking convention is commendable, but here’s hoping Los Angeles 2028 brings back actual pictograms.

The post Diving into Designers’ Favorite Olympic Sport: the Pictograms appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

In the summer of 1984, Burt Shavitz picked up a hitchhiker and future business partner, Roxanne Quimby. The couple turned their holistic hobby into a business that is now a multimillion-dollar corporation, all while furthering their mission of environmental sustainability. Since the beginning, Burts Bees‘ founders have intentionally prioritized conservation. Utilizing responsible sourcing, natural ingredients, and recyclable packaging has aided in preserving our land now for a better tomorrow. Starting in the 1990s, Quimby began putting profits toward protecting land threatened by logging. By 2016, the couple had preserved 87,500 acres of land, which they donated to establish the Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument.

The Camp Burt ‘84 Summer Merch collection embodies the company’s love for nature through intentional, environment-friendly packaging while leaning into a retro summer vibe. New lip balms in eco-friendly 90%+ recycled paper packaging keep waste at an all-time low.

The collection features a line of outdoor apparel and accessories combining vintage-inspired designs from the Burts Bees archives with the longstanding brand aesthetic. Reusable water bottles, hammocks, and towels encourage adventure while mimicking the look of the iconic red and yellow lip balm. T-shirts adorned with Burt riding a motorcycle and the family dog add a personal, vintage-inspired touch.

The post Burts Bees ‘Camp’-aign Goes Retro with Limited Edition Merch appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

It takes a whole team to create the fastest woman in the world.

USA Olympic sprinter Sha’Carri Richardson’s 100m silver medal win in Paris was thrilling to watch. Richardson’s incredible accomplishments on the track come down to grit, persistence, and countless training hours. But there’s also a team of coaches, nutritionists, family, friends, and many others who help Richardson soar. A core group within Team Sha’Carri is her trusted nail technicians, whom she turns to for her signature press-on nails she dons for all of her races. Nail technicians might strike outsiders as less important to Richardson’s success, but they would be sorely mistaken.

Paris 2024 has given us a lot to take in, including the exuberant ways many athletes have chosen to present themselves as they compete. Richardson has been known for her flashy fingernails since she quite literally burst onto the scene during the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and she’s continued to push the boundaries of her signature accessory every time she takes her mark. I recently had the joy of speaking to one of the nail technicians, Kinaya Haug, who has designed a few sets of nails for Richardson. Richardson wore Haug’s designs while competing in the US Track & Field Olympic Trials in Oregon this past June, in which she won the 100m and secured her spot in Paris.

The Oregon-based Haug works with many athletes, primarily track runners affiliated with Nike. She loves having the power to help these athletes feel their best as they compete, and she relishes the intimate moments she shares with them as she does their nails before races. Check out our conversation below!

(This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.)

How did the opportunity to work with Sha’Carri first come about? 

I had a client named Raven Saunders, an Olympic shot-putter, and we just hit it off and became friends. She took me to the track with my daughter one day, and we saw Sha’Carri, so I ran up to her. She’s always been a dream client of mine as a nail tech. Sha’Carri is our modern-day Flo Jo! Also, I became more involved in activism starting in 2020, and Sha’Carri is a big voice for Black women. She’s always been someone I was super attracted to, wanting to do her nails.

This year, I was invited to the Olympic Trials. I met so many cool athletes when I went, and it was so special to provide my service and my art to people who are literally donating their bodies for their sport— they deserve to be taken care of! While there, I ran into a woman who asked if I was a nail tech because she needed some press-ons for somebody. As soon as she asked I already knew. There’s only one Press-On Queen out there doing that.

They told me they wanted them long and to match her uniform. I busted my ass from five o’clock to one o’clock in the morning in my shop, messing with stuff, trying to figure out what I wanted to do, trying to plan it out. I finally finished and presented them. A couple of days later, she came back and asked for a couple more for the 200 meter. She ended up wearing my press-ons for the first 100-meter heat! I was just so jazzed that I could be the one to provide her with multiple nail sets for this event, and she finally wore them on the track. It was a really big moment, so exciting for me.

It was so special to provide my service and my art to people who are literally donating their bodies for their sport—they deserve to be taken care of!

You weren’t given much guidance and were encouraged to freestyle. What was your design process like? How did you come up with the ideas for press-ons that would be worn by one of Team USA’s biggest stars?

I have to make these so bougie! I want this to be over the top! They have to be flashy and get people to look and ask, what is that? So I went to the craft store and got as much stuff as I could. I just let it free flow. I grabbed a bunch of stuff that matched—kind of—and put it all together. It’s really exciting to do freestyles, but it’s nerve-wracking because you never know if what you create will be something somebody else likes. I had to sit there and think about every single nail. They’re all mismatched, but they all have to go together. 

The second pair of nails I did for her are rainbow airbrush, Black hippie-esque. Erykah Badu style!

I’d imagine that applying these nails to the athletes and interacting with them in an intimate one-on-one moment before they run is a fun and rewarding aspect of your job. What’s that part of the job like for you?

That’s actually my favorite part because I am a yapper! I love to talk. I get so excited to get to know them on a personal level. When somebody is in the spotlight, I wonder what they’re actually like.

Since I’m a mom, I see everyone as somebody’s kid. To me, these are all just a bunch of kids running track and having so much fun. I get to know where they came from, how they like the area that they live in, and if they’re being treated right. The conversations are amazing; I love to get to know them. It’s so personal, and they’re all very nice people.

We’re all just people. We’re all at different parts of our lives and careers, so it’s really nice to relate. At the end of it, I’m like, that’s my friend! That’s how I feel about my clients. It’s so great to get that connection.

There seems to be a movement right now in which many athletes like Sha’Carri are reclaiming the power of presenting themselves in overtly feminine and glamorous ways, whether through their nails, make-up, hair, etc. They’re using their time in the spotlight to express themselves and their culture as they compete. What are your thoughts on this, and how does being part of that feel?

My favorite part is that everything that Sha’Carri does is deeply embedded in Black culture. That’s why I love this gig too, as a Black woman specifically— I get to work with many Black women. We love our nails, we love our hair, we love our lashes. We love to look so good and blingy and extra. But that’s also something we’re consistently ridiculed for.

For Sha’Carri to be like, I don’t care what any of you have to say. This is me, and I’m Sha’Carri, and this is my legacy. It’s so iconic.

For Sha’Carri to go out there and be like, yeah, my lashes are touching my eyebrows, and I have a bright orange wig on, and my nails are long as heck, and I have all this bling and the biggest smile on my face, and I’m doing what I love, and I feel great— that’s exactly what we need for little Black girls to be inspired. And she’s bringing it to sports! She is reclaiming that energy and showing her culture, roots, and where she’s from. That’s what Flo Jo did. Flo Jo was authentically herself and really collided worlds with beauty, fashion, and athleticism. She was like, I can be strong and be a bad bitch as well. It’s very powerful to watch, and I love being a part of it.

Black women are creative. We have so much creativity. In the beauty industry right now, there are a lot of Black women killing it out there, doing it for each other, supporting each other, and pouring our art and creativity into one another. It’s nice to see Sha’Carri support other nail techs—she supports so many beauty collectives. It takes a whole team to create the fastest woman in the world and help her feel good. What she does is mental, too! If you don’t feel like you look good, or if you don’t feel good about yourself, you’re not going to perform well.

Especially in this day and age, with all eyes on athletes across so many platforms, with every inch and angle captured, of course, they’d want to look however makes them feel their best.

Everyone always has something to say about you, even when you look good. Those nails are ugly! Those nails are too long! How does she do anything with those? How does she see with those eyelashes? For Sha’Carri to be like, I don’t care what any of you have to say. This is me, and I’m Sha’Carri, and this is my legacy. It’s so iconic.

The post Meet One of the Artists Behind Sha’Carri Richardson’s Signature Accessory appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Paris 2024 has also provided us with much to chew on by way of design. We’ve got state-of-the-art facilities in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, dazzling looks and fits on athletes, and a unique Opening Ceremony on the Seine that was just so French. Of course, there have been far less successful design displays, including questionable kits and even aspects of the Games’ overall branding.

We’ve compiled a non-exhaustive list of some of the good and bad design we’ve clocked so far from our couches. Let’s get into it!

The Good

The Opening Ceremony

For the first time ever, the Olympics Opening Ceremony unfolded on a body of water. While there had been a fair amount of skepticism around the cleanliness of the Seine leading up to the Games, most of that concern seemed to float away during the show, as the Opening Ceremony delivered a true, avant-garde spectacle. Paris served as the stage for the production, with the athletes sailing down the Seine on boats in the Parade of Nations. The Passerelle Debilly bridge turned into a runway for a fashion show with a Last Supper vignette that featured drag queens, differently abled performers, and bodies of all sizes and shapes. The state of Mississippi wasn’t a fan of the progressive re-imagination and pulled all of its advertising from the Olympics, but we thought the vignette was a poignant highlight.

In our humble opinion, the show’s high point was an operatic thrash-metal tribute to Marie Antoinette that portrayed the famously guillotined Queen of France singing the French revolutionary song “Ça ira” while headless. That it took place in the Conciergerie, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the place of Antoinette’s imprisonment during the French Revolution was an added stroke of genius, right down to the blood-red streamers exploding from the structure.

The Medals

The medals that winning athletes receive are arguably one of the most important designs at each Olympic Games. Outside of the fun, zig-zag textured face of these Paris 2024 medals, each contains a small Eiffel Tower fragment. Iron that had been removed and preserved during renovations made to the Eiffel Tower over the last century has been infused—18 grams (0.04 pounds), in fact— into each and every medal. How cool is that?

USA Women’s Gymnastics Leotards

While all eyes have been on the breathtaking athletic abilities of these women, we couldn’t help but marvel at the gorgeous leotards Team USA sported. We found the rhinestone star-spangled navy blue designs pictured above particularly fetching, with each stone catching the light magnificently as Simone Biles and her comrades spiral through the air.

Stadiums and Facilities

Given that these Olympic Games are playing out in one of the most gorgeous cities in the world, it’s not surprising that many of the stadiums and facilities are true knock-outs in their own right. The brightly colored pastel palette of the Games’ branding has been incorporated into many of these venues, making for fun and vibrant backdrops as the best athletes in the world compete.

Pierre Mauroy Stadium Basketball courts

Our favorite part about these gorgeous basketball courts is the textile-like pattern repeated throughout the arch, punctuated by the turquoise rectangle marking the foul-shot line. We also love the subtle touch of lavender accent details throughout the space.

Place de la Concorde Skateboard Course

The Games’ skateboard arena uses the same color palette as the basketball courts, bringing a sense of calm to the concrete and infusing an otherwise gritty sport with softness.

Volleyball Eiffel Tower Stadium

This photo speaks for itself. Beach volleyball at the base of the Eiffel Tower? It doesn’t get much better than that!

Grand Palais Fencing Facility

The Grand Palais is already a historic site whose construction began in 1897 for the Universal Exposition of 1900. Add a duo of dueling fencers to the foreground, and you have the ultimate view.

Place de la Concorde BMX Freestyle Course

This sea of lavender slopes is so soothing and adds an air of intrigue when juxtaposed with the tenacity of BMX riders.

The Olympic and Paralympic Village Playground

We all know things are getting a little rowdy inside the Olympic Village, but what’s more exciting to us is the design of this playground on the premises. Olympic and Paralympic athletes need a spot to relax and unwind after achieving glory, and this is just the place.

USA Soccer Player Trinity Rodman’s Hair

USA soccer star Trinity Rodman was already known for her style and swag before these Olympics, but she upped her game to even greater heights with the choice to go with long, pastel pink braids on the world’s biggest stage.

Great Britain Diver Tom Daley’s Hand-Knit Sweater

Anyone paying attention to swimming and diving in Paris already knows about fan favorite Tom Daley, a diver for Great Britain. This is the second consecutive Games in which the 5x Olympic medalist has sought refuge in the stands with his knitting needles, creating a kitschy keepsake to memorialize his time in Paris. Daley is far from a knitting novice, as he has his own clothing line called Made With Love By Tom Daley. Some people are just good at everything!

South Korea Sharpshooter Kim Yeji’s Eyewear

Some might say South Korean Sharpshooter Kim Yeji broke the internet with her aura last week, taking home the silver medal in the 10-meter air pistol women’s event while looking like the next big star of an action movie franchise. Her Sci-Fi-looking eyeglasses were a major contributor to her arresting coolness, which had all of us collectively swooning.

USA Track Runner Sha’Carri Richardson’s Nails

While the one and only Sha’Carri Richardson has yet to take to the track, she already gave us a sneak peek of her always statement-making nails at the Opening Ceremony. If we know one thing about Richardson, it’s that she will run incredibly fast, and she will be wearing a mesmerizing set of nails as she does so.

The Bad

2024 Paris Olympics Logo

Upheaval surrounded the 2024 Paris Olympics logo well before the Games began. The general concept of the logo was to meld two symbols associated with the games—a gold medal and the Olympic torch—with Marianne, a figure that represents the French Republic. While these intentions seem well and good, the finished product is odd. Many have been comparing the logo to a “Karen,” with a prissy hairstyle that harkens to suburban moms on their kids’ school PTA boards. The logo isn’t sophisticated or classy in the slightest, especially when coupled with the Games’ attempt at an Art-Deco-inspired brand typeface.

The Phryge Mascots

Did you know that the Paris Olympics has an official mascot? They sure do! But not one that makes any sense. The mascot for these Games consists of a pair of anthropomorphic Phrygian caps, a beloved cultural symbol of France. You can see they were trying to think outside the box here, but where they landed is just downright befuddling. More than hats, these puffy characters look like amorphous red blobs that elicit confusion, not French pride.

Team France’s Opening Ceremony Garb

As we’ve already discussed, there was much to take in during the Opening Ceremony, but we can’t un-see the questionable outfits the French athletes wore as they floated down the Seine. Why are the blazers sleeveless? We’ll never know. More than anything, these look like flight attendant outfits gone terribly wrong.

Japan’s Soccer Jerseys

Every major world soccer tournament blesses us with a fresh batch of kit designs, but some don’t hit the mark. Japan’s soccer teams are wearing jerseys this tournament that look a bit too much like they’re smeared with blood. The design motif might have worked in another color, but the red on white doesn’t land.

US Soccer’s Olympics Branding

We’re thrilled by how well the USWNT is doing in Paris, advancing to the tournament’s quarterfinals with three wins in three games. We’re less thrilled about the branding the US Soccer Federation rolled out for the Games, which is too close to funeral home aesthetics for comfort.

Michael Phelps’ Hair

Michael Phelps might be the best swimmer of all time, but that doesn’t give him the right to do whatever he wants with his hair … Or maybe it does!

The post The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly at the 2024 Paris Olympics (So Far) appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

The project is the brainchild of LJ Rader, a guy in New York City who works for a sports data and technology company and happens to have an uncanny ability to recall works of art that are reminiscent of moments in modern-day sporting events. Rader posts these side-by-side frames on Instagram and X, and has also launched a Substack.

Rader isn’t an art historian or a curator, and he doesn’t work at a museum or a gallery. He is quick to share in his social media bios that he doesn’t use AI to help source the work he references either, making his compelling diptychs all the more impressive. Since following Rader’s accounts, I highly anticipate seeing whatever he will create out of a given day’s slate of sporting events. “Art But Make it Sports” became a key aspect of my enjoyment of the recent European Championships and Copa America soccer tournaments, as Rader posted regularly following games’ biggest moments.

With the 2024 Paris Olympics on the brink of lift-off, now’s the perfect time to smash that “Art But Make it Sports” follow button. Rader has no doubt been rifling through art books and databases in preparation for the games, training for this big moment much like the athletes themselves gearing up for their respective competitions.

Too often the art-sports binary rears its ugly head, but Rader’s gifted eye reveals that there’s much more connection between the two than we might think.

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Understanding Bayer’s connection to Aspen and honoring his legacy is the singular mission behind The Resnick Center for Herbert Bayer Studies (The Bayer Center). In the three years since it opened, the center has put on two deeply researched exhibitions (the inaugural retrospective showcased Bayer as a fine artist, and the second, in 2023, explored a particular moment in Bayer’s career and life after he moved to Aspen until 1953, and his work on the World Geographic Atlas).

The Bayer Center’s third exhibition covers new ground, putting Bayer in context with fellow artists and contemporaries. Bauhaus Typography at 100 (open June 2024 through April 2025) is the center’s first collaborative show and the first traveling exhibition for Letterform Archive (the original was in the archive’s San Francisco gallery in 2021). Lissa Ballinger, The Bayer Center’s executive director, worked with James Williams of The Common Era, one of Letterform Archive’s original exhibition designers, to help the center translate the exhibition into a much larger space. While keeping to its intent, Williams helped The Bayer Center create a unique flow specific to its space while expanding the scope and size of the original exhibition. “It seemed like a wonderful opportunity to collaborate with another organization,” says Ballinger. “The Bayer Center and Letterform Archive are both very young organizations. We’re learning a lot through this process.”

We are so happy to collaborate with Letterform Archive to explore what Bayer is most known for—his graphic design, typographic contributions, and his work with the Bauhaus.

Lissa Ballinger

Bauhaus Typography at 100 spans the center’s lower galleries, flowing from its expressionist origins to the singular aesthetic we most associate with the school to conversations far beyond the mid-20th century. Following the organization of the book of the same name, the exhibition’s five curated sections detail “Early Visions,” “The First Exhibition,” “Bauhaus Publications,” “Typographic Masters,” “Toward a New Typography,” and “Beyond the Bauhaus.” In addition to chatting with Ballinger, I was delighted to chat with Letterform Archive’s executive director, Rob Saunders, to get his perspective on this expanded celebration of Bauhaus typography.

New Acquisitions in the Exhibition

New Letterform Archive acquisitions in the exhibition. On the left: Herbert Bayer’s original boards for Universal Type lettering, 1925, Ink on paperboard, which Saunders describes as “fucking amazing.” Center: Work from László Moholy-Nagy’s preliminary course, 1926 by Erich Comeriner, Collage on board; Right: Letterhead for Das Bauhaus in Dessau, 1926 by Herbert Bayer, Letterpress

When we think of the Bauhaus, we tend to think of the later work: asymmetrical, photo montage, stark layouts with lots of white space, and the distinct aesthetic of internal documents, publications, and books. But, Saunders explains, “The Bauhaus encompasses two very significant and different bodies of work. Both have had echoes in time.” In the early years, as the school had no typographic master, the design was all produced without type. Johannes Itten’s Utopia is one incredible work of the early Bauhaus. In the exhibition, you’ll see a full breadth of this work, including a dozen letterpress compositions by Friedl Dicker and Itten’s interpretations of old master paintings. Saunders believes the early expressionist output is worth a larger conversation, calling it “bizarre and magical.” He explains that we can see its influence in punk, counterculture, and digital work.

Bauhaus’ Expressionist Beginnings

Beyond the Bauhaus

Left top: The Igarashi ABC Book, 1988 by Takenobu Igarashi, Offset lithograph; Left bottom: Emigre #19: Starting from Zero, 1991, by Rudy VanderLans, Offset lithograph; Right: Waimiaku Kakarmari, Transmission of Knowledge, from Ecuador, the Land of the Shuar poster series, 2020 by Vanessa Alexandra Zúñiga Tinizaray, Digital printing

Herbert Bayer is well-represented, and it makes sense. Bayer had a long, illustrious career. His two fellow Bauhaus typographic masters had their careers cut short. László Moholy-Nagy died young, while Joost Schmidt stayed in Germany. As the Bauhaus fell fowl of the Nazi idealogy, Schmidt’s career was truncated in a different way. 

In addition to the main exhibition, the upper galleries feature Herbert Bayer’s original artwork, paintings, works on paper, and photographs with text embedded in them. “The alphabet became part of his visual vernacular, and it’s fascinating to see how he integrated it into his fine art practice,” says Ballinger.

The Bayer Center sits on the campus of the Aspen Institute, a nonprofit dedicated to solving the greatest challenges of our time through dialog and leadership. It’s an apt environment to explore the Bauhaus because of the school’s similar principles centered around open dialog. “The Bauhaus was about using experimentation and collaboration between resources, mediums, and people to solve the design problems of the day,” explains Ballinger.

The [Bauhaus’] pedagogical openness is where the juice is still.

Rob Saunders

As to the Bauhaus’ continued resonance (though not without a fair share of “let’s throw Bauhaus under the bus”), Saunders explains, “There are things that will endure forever, and there are things that have become tropes. But, it was influential because it had a unified pedagogical purpose. It espoused one core knowledge of art and design, and while specialization was encouraged, so was cross-disciplinary exploration. It’s still the right idea, I think.” He continues, “The pedagogical openness is where the juice is still.”

Saunder’s advice? Lose the tropes. Get to know more about the early work—the expressionistic stuff is worth a deep dive. While existing literature on Bauhaus focuses heavily on the later work, both Bauhaus Typography at 100, the exhibition, and the book are unusual in that they underscore the entirety of the work. 

This collaboration between The Bayer Center and Letterform Archive is a testament to the Bauhaus’s ability to still surprise.

At the 2024 Aspen Ideas Festival in late June, Debbie Millman interviewed Paula Scher and Rob Saunders. Watch and listen in as they trace the roots of typography from Gutenberg to Bauhaus and beyond, drawing on how innovation in design is always in conversation with the past.

Header image: exhibition photograph by Tony Prykryl.

All other imagery from the Collection of Letterform Archive, San Francisco, CA, except where specifically noted.

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Only 1% of global healthcare research is invested in female-specific conditions beyond cancer.

Across 770 diseases, on average, women are diagnosed four years later than men.

Less than half of medical schools have women’s health curricula.

These are just four of the 100 staggering statistics compiled within Evvy’s newly released coffee table book that sheds light on the glaring sexism embedded in American healthcare. 100 Effed Facts About the Gender Health Gap, created by Evvy as an offshoot of their Equal Research Day 2024 campaign, is a “Very Incomplete List of Ways the Female Body Has Been Left Behind by Modern Medicine.”

Evvy is a care platform for women and people with vaginas that provides at-home vaginal microbiome testing and clinical care. Its mission is to close the gender health gap by discovering and leveraging overlooked female biomarkers, starting with the vaginal microbiome. As part of this mission, Evvy launched the annual Equal Research Day on June 10 each year to promote inclusive research and raise awareness for the gender health gap.

For this year’s Equal Research Day, they expanded their campaign by creating and distributing the limited edition 100 Effed Facts About the Gender Health Gap coffee table book. 100% of the proceeds from the book are being donated to Women’s Health Access Matters (WHAM) to help accelerate women’s research and funding. You can purchase the book at equalresearchday.com— though it is currently sold out, it will be restocked.

The 250-page book is striking and intentionally demands attention. It features a bright red printed softcover with a cut and foil-stamped jacket. Its significant size (8.5″ x 10.5″) takes up space and makes the interior imagery and text big, bold, and undeniable. The large circular motif on the cover features on every page of the book, symbolizing the gender health gap visually and replicating the sense of inaccessibility as it obscures imagery and text.

Evvy’s CMO, Laine Bruzek, led on the book’s creation. She answered a few of my questions below about the process, the importance of Evvy’s work, and the severity of the gender health gap.

The female body shouldn’t be a medical mystery.

At what point and why did your team decide to release a book to address the gender health gap? How is this book an extension of the work you’re already doing, and what does it provide that your other offerings don’t?

We founded Evvy because the female body shouldn’t be a medical mystery, but to this day, it is. On average, women are diagnosed four years later than men across 770+ diseases, in part because women weren’t required to be in US clinical research until June 10, 1993.

That’s why Evvy created a holiday called Equal Research Day on June 10— think Equal Pay Day but for the gender health gap. Every year, we invest in a large-scale campaign to raise money for Women’s Health Access Matters and bring awareness to the disparities in scientific and medical research. This book was published in honor of Equal Research Day 2024. 

Year-round, Evvy focuses on pioneering precision clinical care for vaginal health powered by our state-of-the-art vaginal microbiome test. But Equal Research Day is when we step back and spark conversations about the gaps in women’s health more broadly. 

What was the book development and design process like? It’s a distinct and visually compelling design, with the large circular gap motif throughout. How did that concept come about?

First, we decided to make a book because we need to be having more conversations about the gender health gap, and I believe in the power of physical artifacts to start those conversations. 

Additionally, and unfortunately, the facts about the gender health gap speak for themselves. They are powerful, angering, and motivating, so a book is merely the best way to gather those facts in one place. 

We decided to make a book because we need to be having more conversations about the gender health gap, and I believe in the power of physical artifacts to start those conversations.

Finally, we wanted to make something that could live at the center of where people are gathering— in your living room, in an office lounge, in the waiting room at the doctor’s office. All it takes is someone to open the book to get them hooked and want to talk about it. Each page is downright shocking when the facts are things like, “Women are 32% more likely to die if their surgeon is a man” or “Less than half of medical schools have women’s health curricula.”

When it comes to the design of the book, we wanted to infuse it with the sense of frustration and loss that women experience after delays in diagnoses, failed treatments, mystery symptoms with no answers, or medical gaslighting. 

We realized that putting a huge graphic hole—a literal gap—on every page achieves that. It obscures key parts of photos, covers certain letters and words, and generally leaves the reader with a sense of incompleteness and loss, plus the motivation to uncover what’s behind it to fix it. That’s precisely how we hope readers will feel about the gender health gap when they’re done reading, too.

How did your team go about sourcing and curating the facts in the book?

There is no shortage of “effed” facts about women’s health— the hardest part was narrowing our book down to just 100. It was important to us to highlight gaps in healthcare across all categories—not just what typically falls under “women’s health”—so we initially had hundreds of facts across cancer, heart health, hormonal health, autoimmune disease, vaginal health, menstrual health, and beyond. 

That makes this book one of the most comprehensive compilations of gender health gap facts ever assembled. While our team did the sourcing and curation, every fact featured in our coffee table book exists because a researcher persevered to bring it to life— not an easy task when funding for women’s health is so scarce.

What is Evvy doing on the clinical research side to close the gender health gap?

Evvy is closing the gender health gap by discovering and leveraging overlooked female biomarkers, starting with the vaginal microbiome. 

Vaginal discomfort is a leading reason women seek healthcare advice (for conditions like bacterial vaginosis, yeast infections, recurrent UTIs, and more). Additionally, research has uncovered groundbreaking links between the vaginal microbiome and critical female health outcomes like infertility, STIs, preterm birth, gynecologic cancers, and more. Yet, the vaginal microbiome remains under-researched, and current standards for vaginal healthcare are underpinned by simplistic methods like microscopy and brute-force antibiotics.  

In 2021, we launched the Evvy Vaginal Health Test, the world’s first CLIA-certified, at-home vaginal microbiome test that tests for 700+ bacteria and fungi with a single swab. Evvy’s larger vaginal healthcare platform is the first to combine state-of-the-art vaginal microbiome and STI testing, precision clinical care, and coaching to give women and people with vaginas the care they deserve. Through this platform, Evvy is building real-world datasets that can transform our understanding of complex female health conditions. 

Our platform has not only provided tens of thousands of women and people with vaginas with better vaginal healthcare, but it has also built the world’s largest comprehensive dataset on the vaginal microbiome — enabling a new age of precision medicine.

Have you seen the gender health gap shrink in any way since Evvy’s inception? Is there any hope we can cling to? And inversely, what are the most critical areas where work still needs to be done?

One key way we can close the gender health gap is through innovation. Over the last few years, I have been greatly encouraged by the proliferation of brilliant founders (many of them female) tackling women’s health challenges across whole-body health, from cancer to heart health to menopause to vaginal health and beyond. 

Some of the brightest minds are working on women’s health right now as researchers, doctors, policymakers, founders, and advocates— and that should be a source of great hope. 

That said, we still have a long way to go when it comes to funding women’s health research. Only 1% of global healthcare research and innovation is invested in female-specific conditions beyond cancer— that’s just 1% for all of menopause, endometriosis, PCOS, vaginal health, and much, much more. Additionally, half as much funding goes to diseases that mainly affect women compared to those that mainly affect men. The incredible people building the future of women’s health can’t do so without the proper resources, and the funding gaps in women’s health are staggering and alarming. 

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Besides the gas prices, one of the most devastating things about living in Los Angeles is witnessing beloved businesses and buildings get bought, demolished, and replaced by soulless “luxury” apartment behemoths or chain coffee shops. I’ve only lived for the better part of a decade. Still, even I have seen legendary movie theaters like the Cinerama Dome fight for their lives, institution dive bars like the Good Luck Bar shutter their doors, and Googie architecture gems like Dinah’s Family Restaurant forced to change locations.

If you care about preserving historic architecture and protecting mom-and-pops, LA can be a heart-breaking place to live. But every now and then, we get a win.

On June 26, custodians of classic California design and old Hollywood movie lovers joined in collective euphoria and relief as the LA City Council unanimously voted to designate Marilyn Monroe’s former home in Brentwood as a Historic-Cultural Monument.

The future of the four-bedroom Spanish colonial-style hacienda has been in limbo over the past year, as next-door neighbors, heiress Brinah Milstein and her husband, reality TV producer Roy Bank, bought the property last July for $8.35 million. They were granted a demolition permit with plans of expanding their current estate into the property. News of this permit was met with widespread disbelief and prompted swift action from Councilwoman Traci Park. She secured a temporary stay on the demolition permit and set efforts to protect the residence in motion through the Historic-Cultural Monument designation.

Built in 1929, Monroe purchased the house in 1962 for a humble $75,000. It was the only home she ever owned, as she bought it following her divorce from Arthur Miller. She tragically only lived there for six months before she died of an overdose in the house on August 5 of that same year, at just 36 years old.

The relatively modest, single-story, 2,900-square-foot estate has undergone alterations and renovations since Monroe lived there, passing between 14 different owners throughout the last 60-plus years. Such changes include connecting the guest house to the main structure and overhauling the bathroom and kitchen. Despite these changes, the home’s original charm and authenticity remain intact—casement windows, terracotta tile floors, and wood-beamed ceilings—and deserve protection.

Upon notice of the initial demolition permit, Brentwood residents, Angelenos, and Monroe fans everywhere sounded off to call for the home’s preservation and have emerged victorious.

“To lose this piece of history, the only home that Monroe ever owned, would be a devastating blow for historic preservation and for a city where less than 3% of historic designations are associated with women’s heritage,” Councilwoman Park said in a speech before the vote. Thanks to her efforts and those of the LA Conservancy and community advocacy, an essential piece of Monroe’s legacy and a bygone LA will endure.

The post The Marilyn Monroe Residence Has Officially Been Saved from Demolition appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

This year marks the 100th anniversary of the Surrealism movement, a boundary-busting way of thinking, creating and imagining the world that developed in Europe in response to World War I and the 1918 flu epidemic.

When a society is shaken to its core, artists are typically some of the swiftest to react, reflecting the greater unrest in their work. Back in the1920s, those artists included legends such as Salvador Dalí, René Magritte and Joan Miró, whose brilliant minds created alternate versions of reality unlike any envisioned before.

To honor and celebrate 100 years of Surrealism, 99designs by Vista hosted a global competition in which they invited members from their creative community to reimagine modern-day logos through a Surrealist lens. As a graphic design marketplace encompassing 1.4 million creatives, many artists took on the challenge, but 99designs chose only 18 winners. The crowned designs interpret logos across industries, including social media platforms, consumer brands, tech and media companies, and even nonprofits.

“Surrealism challenges widely accepted conventions, encouraging creativity, but also critical thinking and a healthy skepticism towards the curated realities often presented in society— particularly online and in social media,” Patrick Llewellyn, CEO of 99designs, noted in a statement. “The talent and creative execution shown by our designer community has been incredible, with artists from 17 countries participating in this project. In a time of digital saturation and (mis)information overload, this project shows how Surrealism’s push for authentic expression and escape from the status quo remains profoundly relevant for designers and communities around the world.”

Check out a sample of some of our favorite winners below.

View the rest of the winners here!

The post Celebrating 100 Years of Surrealism by Reimagining Modern Logos appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Clockwise from left: Poster from an artists’ workshop on unconventional narrative in film and media, 2007; cover and spread from a children’s book about a boy and his blimp, 2008; packaging design for Azita’s Almost-All-American Hot Sauce, 2007.

A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, Freimuth was working at VSA Partners as a senior designer. He was thriving in the firm’s team environment, and had become interested in the practical and financial side of design, as well as the creative process.

What I see eventually is building a collaborative, strategic, multidisciplinary group whose work is broader than any specific design area. There are so many opportunities to make meaningful contributions— I’d like to try my hand at them.

Michael Freimuth, 2008

In 2012, he did just that, and with Patrick Richardson he founded a collaborative multidisciplinary group, Franklyn. With offerings ranging from strategy, brand identity, illustration, packaging, digital, animation and environmental design, today Franklyn works with clients including Marz Community Brewing Co., Carewell, Humanscale and Brooklyn Brewery. Their work also supports causes the founders care about, such as World Parkinson’s Day and the National Network of Abortion Funds.

NVA helped motivate me to get out of my comfort zone and put my own work out into the world. It’s always worth trying to push yourself—you never know what’s possible unless you make yourself vulnerable.

Michael Freimuth, 2024

PRINT’s New Visual Artists competition is open for entries now through Aug. 20—and today is the deadline for the lowest rates to enter. Where will your creative dreams and career goals take you? We can’t wait to see.

The post Go From Career Dream to Career Reality With PRINT’s NVAs appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

If you’re not excited by designer Yinka Ilori, you’re simply not paying attention.

The British-Nigerian phenom is known for his signature use of bold color and pattern in his multi-disciplinary work, that’s infused with his cultural heritage. Vibrant, uplifting, and playful, his focus as an artist is on bringing people together through joyful design. Ilori helms Yinka Ilori Studio based in London, where he and his team of “color-obsessed architects and designers” strive to carry Ilori’s mission of spreading and creating happiness with each project.

This year, Ilori has continued to share his joyful gospel, while pushing himself in new directions as an artist and designer. In June, his stint as the headlining artist of ART on THE MART launched in Chicago, in which his immersive commission entitled Omi Okun is displayed on the facade of the Merchandising Mart along the Chicago Riverwalk. Omi Okun is a deeply personal project for Ilori, in which he used new and innovative technologies to reflect on his past. It will be on view through September 11.

Ilori also launched a collaboration with Momentum Textiles and Wallcoverings at NeoCon in Chicago last month, which features textiles and wallcoverings designed for commercial use in public spaces such as offices, hotels, and lobbies. But wait, there’s more! Ilori and his team also designed a pavilion for Haus der Kulturen der Welt’s festival in Berlin, Ballet of the Masses, About Football and Catharis. Entitled Reflection in Numbers, the pavilion invites visitors to embark on a critical and artistic journey that explores the complex themes of racism in sports and personal accountability.

Somehow in the midst of all of this, Ilori found time to chat with me about Omi Okun, his collaboration with Momentum, and the power of dreaming. Our conversation is below!

(This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.)

I’m a storyteller, and I’m always looking for new ways to tell stories within the work that I do.

Clearly you have a lot cooking in 2024! Is there an aspect of what you’re working on this year—a specific project, a theme, a technique—that you’re particularly excited about?

I’m super excited about a project I’ve been working on that will launch in June for ART on THE MART, it’s called Omi Okun. It’s my first time working with stop motion and AI, and it’s probably my most personal project to date. It’s looking at my family experiences of going to the seaside of Margate in the UK with my church congregation. We’d go every other Sunday to pray by the sea, connecting with nature and connecting with our community. I’m telling that story through AI and through this film, which will be debuting in June.

What was so nice about this project was I was able to use AI and a number of different techniques and processes to create my landscape across characters and sound. It’s a full 360 experience where it takes the audience on a journey inside my mind and my childhood. That’s an area I’m looking forward to because I’m a storyteller, and I’m always looking for new ways to tell stories within the work that I do.

Considering these technologies are a new frontier for you as an artist, was it a big adjustment exploring AI and digital world-building?

It was quite new for me as far as trusting a machine or a system to reimagine what I’m thinking or what’s in my head or what ideas I have on paper. I’m used to being in control of my process because it’s physical, and it’s me with a pen and paper. But it was a really exciting process to tell this story. I’ve been working with a really talented animator and 3D designer, Ted Le Sueur, and he’s been instrumental in helping me realize this story and narrative. 

Are you enjoying these AI processes enough to keep working in that space, or did you get your fill from this project and want to return to the physical work you’re more accustomed to? 

I know you previously covered my Flamboyance of Flamingos playground, and I’m actually doing another playground which will be in the AI space. It’s with a well-known tech company brand, and will be launching later this year either at Frieze or the London Design Festival. We’re taking a project and turning it into an AI space so that people can access my playground around the world, and can build their own playground. It encourages people to play. I’m a big believer in play being a tool for people to come together and to play collaboratively. So that project will sit online, and you can access the playground all over the world.

The problem with the work that I do in the play space and product space, is that not everyone is able to access a playground or a slide or a swing. So the power of creating this online playground using AI, is it makes my work and my play space accessible. It allows me to engage with new audiences and people and make new friendships. I’ll also learn how people play around the world; the way we play in England might be very different from how kids play in America, or how kids play in Nigeria. I find it really interesting to see how different kids play in this AI space I’ve created.

I’m always obsessed with how kids play, how kids dream about playing, and what they do to facilitate that world of play.

It’s interesting to think about how the way children play has changed over the last decade or so. I’m sure how I played as a kid in the 90s is very different from how a kid in 2024 plays. Your work encourages play, but still embraces modern-day technology in doing so. 

I grew up in an era of playing Nintendo 64 and Super Nintendo and PlayStation, but also, I played outside; we played all sorts of outdoor ball games. The way we play now is always evolving and changing, and I’m always obsessed with how kids play, how kids dream about playing, and what they do to facilitate that world of play. 

Obviously Omi Okun is a departure from what you’ve typically created, but I’m curious if you can still identify a common throughline that’s present in all of your work, no matter the medium? 

The biggest theme throughout my work is this theme of dreams and dreaming. I will never stop emphasizing the power of dreams. With the world I’ve created and am still trying to build, it’s about making people understand the importance of dreaming, and how much it can change the world.

I will never stop emphasizing the power of dreams.

With the work I’m doing now, I’m very interested in looking at themes of mindfulness and peace and nature and being outdoors; reconnecting with the everyday things we might take for granted. The AI piece I did for ART on THE MART is very centralized around water and the sun and connecting with different people. The work I’ve been creating over the last decade is personal, but in the next few months you’re going to see a much more personal Yinka, with much more personal stories that people might not know about the work or me or my experiences in the past. I’m really looking forward to how people respond. 

What inspired you to go into this more personal direction with your recent work? 

I’ve spent the last few months traveling; I went back to Nigeria in January, and I hadn’t been since COVID. I was really inspired. I went to the beach, and I felt the most peaceful and appreciative of life and my presence of being there and for my loved ones. 

 I want to try to create work that people can feel connected to, individually but also as a collective.

When I sat down at the beach, I noticed all of the kids running around, people going into the sea. I looked at everyone, and everyone felt very at peace with themselves. That’s what water can offer. The biggest takeaway for me is that I want to try to create work that people can feel connected to, individually but also as a collective. 

It’s almost as if the more personal and vulnerable you are with your work, the more universal it becomes. Those might seem like opposite ideas on the surface but when an artist shows their unique humanity, it lets people in to really connect to them.

Growing up in my house, I was always encouraged to express my feelings and emotions. Especially with art, there are so many topics; sexuality, or conflict or war or identity. But the biggest thing for me right now that I think we’re all looking for in the world is peace, and that’s something that we all need. In the world but also in our personal lives, we’re looking for that inner-peace. That’s something I’m still trying to find and discuss within my work. The work I’m creating now, I’m ready to talk about some of these more personal things related to pain and joy and community. I want to give the audience something a bit deeper.

You also have a collaboration with Momentum Textiles and Wallcoverings at NeoCon 2024 in the works. Is designing textiles and wallcoverings a new avenue for you too? 

It felt like a natural progression for me. I’ve been working with textiles like swiss lace and vlisco and all of these fabrics I’d grown up with as a kid at my parents’ house in London. My mother was a fabric and textile dealer, so she would travel around the world and sell it to her friends and family for church services and weddings, anything exquisite and special, they would wear it.

I’ve always been obsessed with the power of cloth, and what it symbolizes in different communities. For me, it symbolizes identity, power, status, wealth, culture, community, integration. Being around that from such a young age, and then working with it within furniture and upholstery, I was like, This is a no-brainer, I have to create my own textiles.

I wanted to create a collection of textiles that celebrated the themes of community, joy, and affirmation. I always think of Joseph and his technicolor dreamcoat— textiles are like a super power to me. With these textiles, I’m hoping that they will be a tool to make people dream within the workspace and uplift their mood in the workspace. We spend a lot of time in our offices and we spend a lot of time thinking and dreaming. So I’m hoping that the textile collection can be a tool that can add to that experience when you’re in the office. 

You’ve said that this textile collection has an emphasis on community. In what ways do you think color and design have the power to bring people together and create community? 

I’ve seen it firsthand within my culture. When I look at my Nigerian community—let’s say that it’s somebody’s 50th birthday party—they would go to a market and buy fabrics, and 10 people would wear the same color and fabric to that party. There was this idea that in order to celebrate someone or something, you want to do it together. So I think that’s where the idea comes from for me; fabric can be a tool to tie people together. Within the workspace, what you find is that people search for a sense of belonging and community, and textiles offer that.

You’ve been so prolific and done so much in your career, how have you achieved this longevity as an artist? How do you maintain the momentum to keep creating without burnout? 

When I travel, I am the most creative. Travel feeds new ideas, new themes, and new places for research and points of reference. Being able to travel a lot and going into a country with no ego, opens my eyes to new themes and new ideas. I spent my whole life in London, but when I went to Morocco two weeks ago, I was so inspired by the culture and community, and then I went to Nigeria. Traveling keeps me going.  

In my studio right now, we’re also trying to be a lot more selective in the work that we take on, working with people who are really able to challenge me, and who are there to take risks and shake up the art and design industry.

The post Architect of Joy Yinka Ilori Will Never Stop Dreaming appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

WSJ, in partnership with the renowned agency Mother (New York & London), has launched an innovative brand platform “It’s Your Business.” This initiative reflects WSJ’s commitment to delivering in-depth business journalism that not only informs but also impacts the world, playing a vital role in people’s everyday lives.

“Business impacts everyone–whether they know it or not–and more people than ever are turning to The Journal to help them navigate the challenges thrown their way. “It’s Your Business” not only underpins our position as the trusted source for business news and information but it also appeals to new, untapped audiences and broadens awareness of who we are and what we do best.”

Sherry Weiss, Dow Jones and Wall Street Journal Chief Marketing Officer

Throughout the month, WSJ rolled out a series of contextual advertisements across New York City, making “It’s Your Business” a visible part of the urban landscape. These ads have appeared in diverse and unexpected locations, such as EV charger points, golf courses, gas pumps, delis, and even hot dog stands. This strategic placement illustrates the omnipresence of business in daily life, reinforcing the idea that wherever you go, business matters.

The campaign showcases a wide range of articles, each highlighting a different facet of WSJ’s comprehensive coverage. From in-depth pieces on renters’ rights and the growing trend of sleep divorce to explorations of everyday phenomena like your morning coffee, the Journal’s stories cater to their broad audience. This diverse range of topics demonstrates that business news isn’t just for industry insiders but is relevant and valuable to everyone.

By emphasizing “It’s Your Business,” WSJ aims to connect with readers more deeply, showcasing how its reporting covers everything from personal finance to lifestyle choices, making business journalism accessible and engaging for everyone.

Through its collaboration with Mother and a strategic campaign across New York City, WSJ is showing that business news is essential to everyone’s daily life. Whether in the boardroom or at the local coffee shop, WSJ’s wide-ranging coverage highlights its ongoing relevance and importance in today’s world—a bold move that reshapes how we see business journalism.

The post WSJ’s ‘It’s Your Business’ Campaign by Mother Reveals the Ubiquity of Business in Everyday Life appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

In so many ways, we are squarely in the golden age of soccer jersey design. With every major tournament and new season, football fans, fashionistas, and football fan fashionistas eagerly welcome a new crop of kits into our cultural consciousness, dropping large chunks of change to rock the latest looks. From eye-catching shirts with a feminine flair, to awareness campaigns using jersey design to shed light on bigger societal issues, football kits have become an exciting and innovative site for design, fashion, and fandom. Alas, there is still one major aspect of jersey design that hasn’t progressed at the same speed as the rest: typography.

While logos, crests, and sponsors emblazon the front of jerseys, players’ numbers and last names are featured on the back. But all too often the type used on the backs of jerseys lacks legibility and the same level of thought and care incorporated into other aspects of the jersey’s design. Sports type designer and expert on the subject, Christoph Koeberlin, has fixated on this design deficiency, spending much of his career creating effective sports typography to fill the gap.

Koeberlin launched his website Sportsfonts almost a decade ago as part of his mission to bring better type options to sports jerseys, and raise awareness around this prevalent issue. With the 2024 European Championships currently underway in Germany, the Copa America playing out in the US, and the Olympics nearly upon us in Paris, the sea of soccer kits is overflowing, with examples of good and bad typography abound. I reached out to Koeberlin to take a deeper dive into this world he’s immersed himself in, and unpack some of the best and worst type on display in the major tournaments this summer.

Why do you think illegible and poorly designed type is so prevalent across football kits?

There are several reasons for this. At the major tournaments, we can currently observe that people still underestimate how much a characteristic font can contribute to the overall aesthetic impression and the recognizability of a team.

And even when this is taken into account, the focus is usually on style, often to the detriment of legibility. In addition, it is rarely type designers who create the typefaces, which means there is a lack of a professional eye.

It’s like Ferrari putting ugly stickers all over the car at the very end.

When did you first start noticing this consistent issue, and then begin calling it out and addressing it in your own design work?

Even as a child, I had a thing for both football and type. At some point, I realized that something was going wrong where the two came together. A lot of things are subjective; you either like it or you don’t. But sometimes you realize that something is wrong, and you can’t really put your finger on it. That’s why I founded Sportsfonts in 2016— to show what makes good and bad fonts, but also to offer professional sports fonts myself.

Why is speaking out about poorly designed football kit type important to you as a designer?

It’s simply incomprehensible why everything in this business is becoming more professional, except for one thing. Jerseys have long been fashion items, presented by models in front of historical backdrops. No detail is left to chance, everything is perfect. And then, after the shoot, there’s the cheap, bad typeface applied to it, which you can no longer read, especially when the player moves (which is supposed to happen!). 

It’s like Ferrari putting ugly stickers all over the car at the very end.

Can you point to an example of some of the worst type you’ve ever seen on a football jersey?

A current example is the new font on Manchester City’s shirts. Noel Gallagher “designed” it, and I understand the marketing idea behind it. But even if you come up with the idea of putting ugly handwriting (mine wouldn’t be any better, by the way) on the shirts, you can do it well. There are people out there who are capable of making something professional-looking even out of this concept. 

Can you point to an example of successful type on a football jersey?

I like it when the font fulfills three criteria: it should be unique, easy to read, and fit the team. Staying with national teams, I’m still a fan of Paul Barnes’s typeface for Puma at the 2010 Africa Cup of Nations.

What’s your favorite kit on display at the European Championships right now? How about the Copa America? 

Germany’s numerals are my clear favorites. Not because they are so good, but because with the shit storm over their SS look-a-like “4,” they have illustrated the importance of good type design better than I ever could. Otherwise, we see a mixture of retro and lack of inspiration at the EURO. It’s the same basic typeface for both Nike and Puma (for almost all of their teams), and the same retro 3D effect across kit suppliers for half of the participants.

One nice observation: The Netherlands have rediscovered their typeface by Wim Crouwel from 2014, and it still works great.

The comparison with the Copa is interesting: nothing of the omnipresent 3D retro on display in the EURO to be seen! Adidas has sent everyone into the race with their standard typeface, and Nike have supplied their teams with custom designs ranging from classic (USA) to ugly (Brazil) to refreshing (Uruguay).

The post Why is Soccer Jersey Typography so Bad? appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Ever since, I’ve had an appreciation for Hirschfeld and an affinity for his artistic style. The energy, emotion, and humor he elicits from a thin black line on a white background feels like a relic of a bygone cartoon era, and the figures he drew will forever have the honor of being interpreted and preserved through his unique lens.

The Al Hirschfeld Foundation is doing its part to keep Hirschfeld’s legacy alive by presenting an online archive of his work and curating virtual exhibitions. In celebration of Pride this past month, for example, they released the “Hirschfeld’s Drag Show,” an online catalog curated by author, playwright, and drag legend in his own right, Charles Busch. On view through their website until August 15, “Hirschfeld’s Drag Show” presents a collection of the greatest drag performances of stage and screen as seen through Hirschfeld’s eyes and, most importantly, his pen.

“Through Hirschfeld’s remarkable catalog, we’re able to chart the ways cross-dressing has been used as a theatrical tool over the past century,” says Busch via the Al Hirschfeld Foundation. “At first, it was often the only way closeted LGBT artists were able to express their voices. At other times, drag has been employed as a plot device, allowing society to articulate in a light-hearted manner its fear of the ‘other.’ In more recent decades, openly gay artists have taken drag into new realms, both dramatic and comic. With this collection of drawings, we chart the history of performers and shows that have used drag in a variety of creative strategies. Hirschfeld’s great gift in portraying the joy of theatrical self-expression gives all of these drawings a humanity along with their outrageous flamboyance.”

I can’t think of a subject better suited for Hirschfeld’s caricature style than drag performers, and this online exhibition is certainly proof of that! Enjoy it here.

The post The Al Hirschfeld Foundation Celebrates Pride with “Hirschfeld’s Drag Show” appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

Founded in 2020, Merch Aid is an award-winning social enterprise that collaborates with artists and designers to create fundraising merchandise for non-profit organizations. Initially launched as a relief response to the COVID-19 small business shutdowns, the murder of George Floyd expanded the organization’s vision, highlighting the need for expressive merchandise that resonates with current sentiments to provide a means for impact beyond the pandemic’s scope. Their BLM series raised nearly $50,000, and the AAPI series saw similar success. Merch Aid has raised over half a million dollars and has been featured in major publications, including Vogue and GQ.

As the Supreme Court revisits the contentious issue of trans rights, a group of leading trans designers and allies have united to launch a merch capsule to raise funds for the Transgender Law Center (TLC). This initiative follows the success of the Reproductive Rights capsule released earlier this month, which featured work by notable names such as Jessica Walsh, Debbie Millman, and Gail Anderson and raised funds for the National Network of Abortion Funds.

One of the most important aspects of the reproductive justice movement is the sanctity of every mother’s life. When I state that pro-choice is pro-life, I mean that pro-choice is the mother’s life, and I will always value that above all else.

Debbie Millman, writer, designer, educator, artist, brand consultant and host of the podcast Design Matters

Over 500 anti-trans laws were proposed in 2024 alone, and 53 were passed. The Supreme Court’s decision to review state bans on gender-affirming care for minors further underscores the urgency of this latest capsule collection. The Transgender collection will drop today, Thursday, June 27, at 6 PM EST and will feature artists Ren Rigby, Tea Uglow, Lena Gray, Brooklyn Bruja, Sophia Yeshi, and Doug Rodas.

Opinions don’t change identities, bills don’t change identities, politicians don’t change identities: let trans people be.

Ren Rigby, Chief Design Officer and Founder of Proto

Merch Aid’s initiative is part of a broader art as activism movement, allowing designers to address critical issues and enabling supporters to demonstrate their values visibly. All profits will go to the Transgender Law Center, the largest national trans-led organization advocating for the self-determination of all people. Since 2002, TLC has been organizing, assisting, informing, and empowering thousands of individuals, fostering a long-term, national, trans-led movement for liberation.

No matter what anyone’s personal beliefs are, they are PERSONAL beliefs and should not be projected onto others. The simple arrow pointing down under the belt (or sweatpants) is a reminder that’s what mine is mine. MINE.”

Gail Anderson, graphic designer, writer, typographer, and educator

As trans rights face renewed challenges, this merch capsule not only raises essential funds but also amplifies the voices and artistry of the transgender community, underscoring the power of unity and creativity in the fight for justice. Following this capsule, a series of drops by other renowned artists will continue leading up to the election, focusing on social issues such as bodily autonomy, trans rights, immigration, voting rights, and more.

Design has the power to create change, make people think differently, and mobilize people to action. I’m excited to team up with Merch Aid this year to bring more attention to reproductive freedom at such a critical time and election year. Together, by harnessing the power of design, we can raise awareness and inspire action to protect and advance reproductive rights.”

Jessica Walsh, founder of the creative agency &Walsh

Visit Merch Aid to learn more about their capsule drops and to showcase your values by getting your hands on some merch.

Imagery courtesy of Merch Aid.

The post Artivism for Social Justice: Merch Aid Drives Change with Their Latest Capsule appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

When I was 9 or so, I remember going on a drive with my father. … He pointed out a cross on top of a local church and said, ‘You see that up there? I did that.’ To this day, I still smile about it because I don’t know how true that is, but I like to believe that my father did do that. I remember looking up and seeing that cross as this blurred streak of white and red against the blue sky as we drove past—it really is a beautiful memory that I have of a turning point in my life that changed the way I saw the things that surround us. I never took notice of design until this very moment, and I was intrigued not just by the look and shapes of things around me, but this idea that someone created those things—that someone designed those things.

Back when I was the editor of the print version of PRINT, my favorite issue of the year to make, hands-down, was the New Visual Artists quarterly. Now, “New Visual Artists” was never the most … compelling or nuanced name for a design competition—and I can’t tell you who dubbed it that when it launched in 1998—but I can tell you what it became: one of the industry’s most well-known and well-respected “## under 30” lists, which today counts a legion of alumnus working at the forefront of the field. 

As anyone who has ever made a newsstand magazine could tell you, you get bogged down in the bottomless mire of deadlines. Veritable clown cars filled with publishers and consultants. Newsstand reports. Digital metrics. Ad sales and their impact on editorial space. And, notably, the often tricky egos of the more famous folks inside.

This is all to say: Every year, the New Visual Artists issue came out in the spring—and it was always, without fail, a wholly fresh reset. Perhaps not unlike Bojorquez in that car, it taught me to see—or at least reminded me how to every year. Interviews with the winners revealed young designers at their most raw, unrestrained, terrified, and optimistic—and the work that wound up on those pages often rivaled the best of the big egos. It was a celebration of hope, and it was inspiring—if not sobering. Working on those issues, you got the sense that you were looking at the future of the field. Looking back at them today largely confirms that assumption was correct.

Of course, it was also kind of terrible. Meaning: We combed through dozens upon dozens of portfolio submissions, and it was electrifying to see so much fresh work in one seismic download. What was subsequently deflating was narrowing the list down to just 15-20 designers. Some of the work left on the editorial floor still haunts me when I think back to that selection process.

But—it’s time to bid the ghosts adieu. Ever since the PRINT partners resurrected the brand as an independent media endeavor after it lay dormant for a year or so, I’ve been hoping they’d bring the NVAs back—and that’s what they’re now doing.

With a twist. (And a most welcome one.)

Sure, the core recognition element will still be there with the 15 Under 30 category. But this year, PRINT is adding a section for artists over 30 in their first five years of practice—recognizing that not everyone has the luxury of attending a design institution immediately following high school and jumping straight into the field afterward. PRINT is also democratizing the top honor by enabling the online community to vote on their favorite portfolio from among all of the featured artists. The NVAs will call upon the heritage of the original showcase while inviting in and reflecting a greater diversity of voices and perspectives.

Ultimately, it’s all about new designers. New ideas. And a collective new creative future.

I’m personally excited that PRINT is relaunching this ode to the emerging artists among us—because as the NVAs have always proved, the best creativity often resides at the start.

As Bojorquez said back in 2015: “Out of nothing you can create everything.”

About PRINT New Visual Artists

We’re on a mission to find tomorrow’s design leaders today—and it’s a mission we’ve been on for more than two decades. Originally launched in 1998 as PRINT’s 20 Under 30 shortlist, the NVA alumni roster is now a veritable who’s who of design innovation and leadership, from Eddie Opara and Alan Dye to Jessica Hische and Zipeng Zhu.

It doesn’t matter what you create, where you went to school, or where you’re employed. A brilliant portfolio wins the day—and at the end of the day, we bring your work to a massive global audience of art directors, hiring managers, conference organizers, and all manner of decision-makers in between. We’ve seen the real-world impact that the NVA program has had on careers, and it’s a program we deeply believe in. Which is why we’re bringing it back—and in all-new ways.

New Visual Artists 2024 is now open for entries. We look forward to celebrating design’s next generation.

Early Bird Deadline for New Visual Artists Ends July 9

The post PRINT New Visual Artists: Looking Back & Looking Ahead appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

I sort of envy anyone who subscribes to McSweeney’s who thinks they’re subscribing to a magazine, and winds up getting something like this in mail.

Beloved publisher darling McSweeney’s has never been one to shy away from pushing the boundaries of the printed form, and they surely aren’t going to start anytime soon. The creative minds behind the nonprofit, including founder Dave Eggers, are keen to continue innovating their offerings even further. Their most recent foray into genre-defying publications, for example, takes the shape of a magazine issue in a tin lunchbox.

To celebrate the 25th anniversary (its 74th issue) of McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, McSweeney’s developed, designed, and produced a retro tin lunchbox with a “cover” illustrated by Art Spiegelman (author of the graphic novel Maus). The tin is filled with “author baseball cards,” among other thoughtfully designed trinkets.

The author baseball cards feature a lineup of literary giants, including Sheila Heti, Hanif Abdurraqib, George Saunders, Sarah Vowell, Michael Chabon, Eileen Myles, and more. The pencils feature original pieces by Lydia Davis, Catherine Lacey, and David Horvitz printed on them, with meaning designed to change as you use the pencil. Additional art rounds out the 25th-anniversary issue, in which Art Spiegelman teases out images from random watercolor inkblots.

Suffice it to say, this Quarterly Concern issue reimagines what a magazine can be on the most fundamental level. I asked McSweeney’s art director, Sunra Thompson, a few questions to learn more about the ideation process that resulted in this lunchbox concept. His illuminating responses are below!

How did your team land on a lunchbox as the main structure for this issue?

It started with the author baseball cards that come with the issue. Before we knew what the issue would be, we had this idea to make author baseball cards, with stats on the back and trivia from the authors, packed in real, tearaway baseball card packaging.

We knew we wanted to include them with an issue of McSweeney’s, but it wasn’t obvious how we’d package them with a book in a way that would make sense. We had a meeting at a certain point, and I mentioned tin as a material, mostly because I’d been trying for years to make a book cover out of tin. An editor said something about how tin always reminded them of special-edition DVDs from the ‘90s— apparently, tin was briefly trendy in DVD packaging for a while. That observation led directly to Dave Eggers saying, almost immediately, “Let’s put the issue in a lunchbox.” At least, that’s how I remember it.

Soon after that, we asked Art Spiegelman if he would create the art for the lunchbox, and astonishingly, he agreed.

What was the rest of the ideation phase like for this concept? How did you decide on each of the items inside the lunchbox?

Once we had the lunchbox idea, everything else flowed from there. We packaged the book of stories like an old Norton Anthology of Literature, which anyone who’s taken a senior high-school English class in the US will probably recognize.

Printing stories on pencils seemed like a gimme. Art Spiegelman graciously put together a portfolio of pareidolia art he’s been experimenting with—where he teases out images from random watercolor shapes—and we printed them in a booklet. And then the baseball cards—perhaps the centerpiece of the issue and the whole reason we decided to make a lunchbox in the first place—suddenly made sense bundled with a book of stories.

What was the most exciting aspect of this project for you? Is there an element of the finished product that you’re proudest of? 

The art Spiegelman created for the lunchbox is astounding— the lunchbox really does look like nothing else. Working with a material we’ve never used before is also exciting, especially when it complements the issue’s theme. I’d wanted to work with tin for a while and got to do it in a way that didn’t feel too gratuitous. The baseball card packaging is also a highlight, particularly the silver packaging.

What sort of experience do you hope “readers” of this issue have when they engage with it?

I sort of envy anyone who subscribes to McSweeney’s who thinks they’re subscribing to a magazine and winds up getting something like this in the mail. I like to imagine someone being a little confused when this lunchbox lands on their doorstep, with the name of a literary journal they subscribed to a few months ago printed on the lid. That feeling of mild confusion, followed by surprise, awe, and joy, is nice to imagine.

McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern will be available to purchase for $35 starting June 27.

The post McSweeney’s Celebrates 25 Years with an Issue in the Form of a Lunchbox appeared first on PRINT Magazine.

A brand whose signature slogan is “Taste the Rainbow” is particularly suited for a Pride campaign that feels genuine to its existing brand identity. Beloved sugar candy SKITTLES has rolled out a spin on their iconic tagline for June, “See the Rainbow,” as part of their year-long initiative in partnership with Meetup to connect members of the LGBTQIA+ community.

The SKITTLES LGBTQ+ Directory, powered by Meetup, consists of many LGBTQ+ groups, events, resources, and more to help people across the country find their community. Like-minded gamers, pickleball players, yogis, bookworms, birders, and much more can use the directory to find local community groups and events aligned with their passions and interests year-round. As part of this commitment to connecting queer community members, SKITTLES is sponsoring five local LGBTQ+ groups across the United States to help shine a light on their organizations, members, and missions. These groups include:

The Queer Big Apple Corps: New York City’s premiere symphonic and marching band provides a supportive and friendly environment for musical and artistic expression for the LGBTQ+ community and allies.

Reeling Film Festival: The Chicago LGBTQ+ International Film Festival recognizes the important contributions that LGBTQ+ filmmakers have made to society, shines a light on the community’s struggles, and uplifts the community’s history.

Urban Bird Collective: Birdwatchers and stewards of nature, the Minneapolis-based group creates safe spaces for the BIPOC and LGBTQ+ communities to enjoy the natural environment while building birdwatching skills.

Bay Area Derby: An LGBTQ+ friendly Bay Area derby league whose mission includes providing inclusive amateur athletic entertainment and competitive roller derby at all levels.

Las Vegas Gaymers: Las Vegas’ premiere gaming group that focuses on providing a safe community for queer and LGBTQ+ gamers.

SKITTLES’s classic packaging has also received a Pride revamp for the month. The company released its annual limited edition “Pride Pack,” designed in partnership with the female and minority-owned production company NERD Productions. SKITTLES is donating $1 of every Pride pack sold (up to $100,000) to GLAAD to support their ongoing efforts to work through media to increase visibility for the LGBTQ+ community.

SKITTLES and GLAAD have joined forces for a Pride Month Donor Matching Campaign. GLAAD donors can receive a limited-edition fanny pack featuring the signature 2024 SKITTLES Pride Pack design. SKITTLES will match all donations up to $25,000, in which the first 500 donors to make a matched gift of $75 or more will receive the fanny pack filled with SKITTLES and patches.

The corporate chokehold on Pride is here to stay, but it’s refreshing to see brands like SKITTLES tapping in with nuance and care.

The post SKITTLES Celebrates Pride by Helping Queer Community Connect appeared first on PRINT Magazine.