pelican

lovely.

Spinster

I took this in Bryant park in New York in the summer. I have no idea what was going on... was she looking for grooms in the park? Very odd...

This is one of the coolest beer mats ever! The brewery obviously made it, with a red arrow pointing out the brewery. The pub (presumably where the mat was stolen from) has added itself to the map as a bit of promo, and also to show just how local the local beer is!

Postcard book

All the postcards have notes about the trip on the back. Kind of like a lazy travel journal.

Little boy

My brother had his first baby this week. I haven't seen a photo yet (he's very far away - South Africa) but I am very excited to have a little nephew! I have 4 lovely nieces but it's exciting to have a little boy too! 

Screenprint

I found this in the scrap box in screen printing the other day. I know the type is by Isabel, I don't know who the illustration is by but I think they must have been printed over eachother by accident and then thrown away. Happy accident. 

beer...

...Mat. Lovely.

Arabic

These are some gorgeous arabic printers plates. These would have been used to advertise the borders and colours that that particular printer had. They are absolutely stunning! I have some more tucked away somewhere that I'll blog at some point. I'm beginning to get really into typography that's in other alphabets and letterforms that I can't understand. It makes you appreciate the letterform so much more if you can't attach a meaning to it I think. I'm toying with the idea of doing an intensive calligraphy course when I graduate so I'll post some examples of that soon.

Apologies for my lapse in the 'daily' element of this blog. I literally haven't had time. Even after my assessment I will be busy with new projects and my dissertation. It's all non stop!

Mail

I should be sick of the sight of stamps but I'm not. Over xmas I was doing a project to rebrand the Royal Mail, which was driving me insane! I've put it to the bottom of my massive to do list (my mid year assessment is next week and I have a million and one loose ends to tie up and projects to finish). Also, We didn't have post for a week or so because of the snow, so I am starting to get a couple of birthday presents and cards through the post, 2 weeks after my birthday so that's always fun.

more type

Presents

Sooo I've been to busy to blog until today when I find myself hungover and having an unproductive day. These are images from a book I got for my birthday called Type: v.1: A Visual History of Typefaces and Graphic Styles by Taschen. It is without doubt one of the most amazing and beautiful books I have ever seen! I will post much much more about it. Literally every page is full of something suitable beautiful and it feels heavy and expensive and fancy (lots of foil blocking - YUM). I will post up some images on my Flickr if anyone can be bothered to take a look. 

home again.

Where is home these days? I keep referring to Brighton as home, although I'll only be there for a few more months. I suppose Godalming is home, but it doesn't really feel like it any more. I feel old when I go into town because everything has changed so much and it feels odd. I'm contemplating where to make a new 'home' when I graduate. London is the most obvious option but once I get my American passport, the world is my oyster! I'm starting to check out my options for San Francisco and New York... those and London all seem to be beyond m budget at the moment. 

Holidays

What an awful and hectic christmas! My dad we taken seriously ill in hospital (although we got him back on christmas day). The weather has been miserable, there's been no internet until the other day and my dissertation is going very badly. And I have the flu or some sort of bug that I picked up in hospital. YUCK! so... several very good excuses for not posting anything. Today I am working like mad to get a big enough chunk of my dissertation done before going back to Brighton for New Years and my birthday. I have written too much and I think I've lost my direction, which is leaving me feeling a bit sick with the thought of having to re write a lot of my work. Trying to stay calm! All I really want to do is go back to the Christmases of days before deadlines, essays and Uni work. All christmas I would watch movies, draw, sew and read. Because it was too miserable to go outside and everyone else was with their families, I normally got 2 full weeks of doing what I wanted, I would kill for a holiday like that again! I would normally manage a dozen or so films, several books and quite a few drawings and sewing projects. I'm pining for  a simpler time! Having said that, I did manage to read all of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll and Perfume by Patrick Suskind in one day, and I didn't have to feel guilty because I had to read them for a Uni project. Still, going to the january sales tomorrow with my Christmas money, looking forward to buying lots of books! 

SNOW

It snowed heavily in Brighton last night, it was a full on blizzard! Terribly exciting. The fact that we tend to only get one day of snow per year here meant that I've just spent the morning having a snow day instead of doing work, and fair enough I think. You don't really get better excuses than snow. I went to the park which was full of kids trying to toboggan down the hill in all manner of things, from snowboards to tin trays to bin bags and even a door. And I didn't get attacked by chavs with snowballs like I did last time it snowed. I'm feeling all festive now, I'm sitting down to work with 'Winter Wonderland' (the Bing Crosby version) in my head, so I doubt I will be very productive. 

Bigger...

It looks like the original art work was screen printed. Isn't that great? I wish less book covers were created solely on the computer. 

Will I ever have enough books?

Well, no, I wont. EVER. Got these today, purely for the covers (I have no intention of reading either of them, not my thing at all). I had to justify the purchase to my parents, who came to visit today. I had mentioned to them earlier how I would love to work for Penguin or Chronicle books or something along those lines, then the best argument ever "Yeah I know I wont read it, but £1 is a small price to pay for a beautiful piece of design." SOLD. 

Blue

I've been wearing blue and white for 3 days in a row. Looking at my wardrobe, most of the things in it are blue. I just love it. It's also quite in keeping with my mood at the moment, I have winter and dissertation blues. At least it's sunny today and I get a few hours off because my family are coming to visit today and we're going christmas shopping : )

All alone...

All my housemates have gone home for christmas already and I'm all alone in the house until sunday : (

It should be a good opportunity to get my dissertation done, but I just hate sitting in a cold and empty house all day. GRR.

summer

It's freezing today, I literally can't feel my hands and I haven't even left the house. It's funny how summer seems like it was years ago, but it was only 4 months ago that I took this polaroid. It's funny how your perception of time is always a little off. 

Penrose Annual

More of the same.