The Zoomable Map...

Quick post today. Here is a lovely and simple bit of design that makes a frustrating but useful object frustrating no more. Map² removes the need to unfold all the unnecessary parts of a giant, awkward, blowing in the wind, tearing down the folds map. Granted it's not quite as flexible as zooming in on an i-phone...or in fact at all useful unless you need to find your way around London...but ingenious nonetheless.


Head over to the website to check out a video of the map in action, see more photos and buy a London copy.

Songs for January...

What with it being a new decade and everything I should really be posting cutting edge music that will revolutionise the industry in the coming months. Alas, I do not have any. Instead then here are 3 songs that I have played more than any other in the last week or so.

Bon Iver - Skinny Love (buy it)
The massed voice of Justin Vernon over such a simple little melody comes together to make something that is, in the words of my good friend, a wonder. It's made a lot of people's Top Songs of 2009 lists, and for good reason.

Julie Doiron - When Brakes Get Wet (buy it)
I downloaded this little song as part of a big batch in December and at the time didn't give it the credit it deserved. I have now. It's only 1:47 long but is full to the brim with friendship and sentiment.

Yeasayer - Ambling Amp (buy it)
No one can ever have enough synthed up electro. Can they? No they can't. This dose even has a spectacularly unusual video, watch it here. (NB: nudity aplenty in the clip - NSFW)

I'm sure it won't be long before I have over listened to them and they are ruined for me forever...but for now...back on repeat!

Watch, Listen, Tell...again...

A few months ago I posted about the amazing You tube channel Watch Listen Tell and last month they posted their first new video for a while from a band called Golden Silvers. Shot as beautifully as ever outside RAK studios London, the song is called Magic Touch. Somehow it's got an almost Beach Boys feel to it, and I love the white decorators van driving past half way through. It almost makes me miss the UK. Almost...

Moleskine Daily...

To be able to dream up and put down a drawing a day as good as these by Maykel Nune is quite a feat...I think so anyway. His project is to fill a double page in his Moleskine with a new drawing everyday, and to boot each one is stylised perfectly around the background behind the journal. How delightful. Check out his Flickr page for more of the stream.

(through pikaland)

Home grown...

It's always nice to be able to post something New Zealand-y on here. It doesn't happen often, and certainly not often enough...although maybe that's partly my fault for not seeking out lovely kiwi ideas regularly. I should; I will.

Anyway, 'Yes Yes No' are, according to their website, an "interactive collective that specializes in the creation of engaging, magical installations that combine creativity, artistic vision and cutting edge R&D". Succinctly put I think. One of their most recent projects was an installation called Night Lights where they used body interaction on stages, hand interaction above a light table, and phone interaction with the tracking of waving phones to turn the Auckland Ferry building into an interactive playground. The video is kind of heart warming. Strange how the simplest of things, like making shadow puppets on a wall, can make so many people so happy.

(through the awesomer)

Oh yeah and its 2010...

January of a new decade has landed solidly on our laps and I rudely posted without wishing a very happy, hopeful and successful New Years to anyone that happens to stumble across these ramblings. The best of luck to you all...and all that...

Oh, the other thing I forgot to do was mention that the new banner font comes from designer and illustrator Grant Coghill who gave away some of his old fonts for free in the middle of December. Very Kind. The one proudly adorning the top of this blog is called cooked meat. Check the rest of them out on his website.

Book works...

I recently tried to make something for my friend by cutting out letters from the front covers of books and arranging them in a pattern to make a word. It turns out book covers are thick and tough and it ended up looking like it had been made by a five year old with his eyes closed...we can't even get it to stay on the wall its so heavy. Fail.

Anyway, a man named Robert The has a series of 'Book Works' and he's cut through the spines, covers and several hundred pages as if they were butter and in comparison has ended up with some amazingly detailed and characterful things. My favourites are the animals, they look like they could easily scuttle off the books that bore them.

(through design milk)