I’ve been spending a lot of time on Posts lately, a social app that still feels like a cute little community of creative folks. I’ve been able to find some interesting folks to follow, such as designer and illustrator Hannah Lee. She recently announced her upcoming 2024 calendar (it’s available for pre-order) which features a super clean design paired with her very charming illustrations. I love how they come as loose sheets so that you can hang up as she has photographed, it looks so wonderful.
OlssønBarbieri, one of my favorite design studios working in food and drink branding, sat down with the team at Two Times Elliott to speak about their beliefs, their process and their work. Always interesting to hear about how beautiful work is made, certainly worth an hour of your time.
Coming up in the world of blogging and Tumblrs and all that it’s awesome to see that Justin Saunders has found such success with JJJJound. Started as a mood board of items and objects, it’s over the years become one of the most sought after clothing and accessory brands. Noah Johnson went deep on the JJJJound world for GQ, profiling Justin and his crew about the work they do, the whats and whys, and how it all works.
The line below was really what I found to be most impactful, Johnson speaking about the path he’s taken, as well as the roads he has yet to travel.
“But the true brilliance of JJJJound might be something that no one saw coming, not even Saunders. JJJJound was an education for the internet. It was a visual guide to the rules and patterns of good design that Saunders has lately been employing with the products he’s developed. He spent years building a customer base, drawing them into his world with images long before he ever thought about making clothes. And now he sits at another pivotal moment. There are a number of ways he might grow the brand, including expanding JJJJound’s distribution channels in Europe, where demand is high. Retail stores might also be on the horizon. “I’ve never gotten to this level of the video game,” he tells me. The blog worked without words, but the brand now has a story to tell. “With my approach to things, how do we communicate that the product’s good?” he says. “I’m not very forthcoming. I’m kind of a shy individual, more private. But a lot of people want to know more.””
Stumbled across Kamakura Rokusho, a small boutique florist located in Kamakura in the Kanagawa prefecture. What caught my eye was the way they mixed both flowers with wildflowers and grasses to create a more natural and pleasing combination. I also like how much greenery they use in their arrangements. They feel more like something you could have magically found in nature, rather than a gaudy, over-the-top mix of blooms. Plus their use of balance and wabi sabi principles are clear throughout. I wish I could find a cute florist doing arrangements like these in my neigborhood.
I’ve been following the career of Kustaa Saksi for more than a decade now, and it’s astonishing to see how far his work has evolved and transformed over the years. Saksi is a Finnish artist who describes his work as “specialising in graphic storytelling through patterns, textile art and installation.” It’s a fair statement as his work transcends a lot of typical descriptions, containing an alchemical mix of graphic design and weaving.
Most recently, he opened a new exhibit at the Helsinki Design Museum titled In the Borderlands, which includes a wide selection of his textile art works, created with jacquard weaving technique between 2013 and 2023. His work now feels like the intersection between organic fractal pattern making and traditional weaving and tapestries, things you don’t naturally put together, and that’s what makes them exciting. I’m absolutely certain these have to be incredible to see up close in person.
How does one design a brand to emphasize it as a perfect summer retreat? Greek design firm k2 design has employed their vision for a new hotel simply called HOM, highlighting its one-of-a-kind charm which sets it apart from the typical honeymoon hotel vibe that saturates Santorini.
With a nod to the simplistic beauty of Greek design, they’ve incorporated elements like handmade pottery and vibrant colors that evoke the carefree spirit of summer living. The tones they’ve chosen are gorgeous, they feel so rich and lively, and the hand-drawn illustrations bring such a familiar, human touch to the overall brand. Overall, there’s this really nice interplay between the simplicity of the typography and the character of the textures and colors used throughout.
For a very long time I’ve leaned toward more neutral colors for my duvet, in the hopes it would create a very serene, calming space. Then I moved to Barcelona, became mildly obsessed with Tekla, and now my bed is covered in red bedsheets. So in the same vein of spicing up the bedroom, I came across this vibrantly colored duvet from Garza Marfa, which I think is gorgeous. The way I see it, as fall starts to arrive next month, and winter around the corner, it’s always nice to have pops of color to offset the grey skies.
I get a lot of joy in finding nice versions of everyday objects. I’m thinking of items like a keychain, or maybe a nice bag, belongings that feel special when you use them. Even small objects that heighten the comfort of your home. How about a small fish? Yes, a sardine incense holder can be magical to me. Made by Spiritual Objects in Los Angeles, it’s cast out of solid bronze, and features two different sized holes to fit most incense sticks from around the world. I’ve really gorwn fond of sardines as decorative objects. Perhaps it’s living in Spain and my constant exposure to sardines?
The Bee Home project is a free and open-source design that allows anyone to support their local pollinators and contribute to preserving biodiversity. The project, developed by SPACE10 in collaboration with Tanita Klein and Bakken & Bæck, aims to raise awareness about the importance of bees and their role in shaping the natural environment.
The Bee Home project is designed with the needs of bees in mind, with holes for each bee to store food and provide shelter for the eggs they lay. The project is parametrically customizable, allowing people to design their own unique Bee Home, and doesn’t require tools of any kind, making it easy to assemble and dismantle. To create a Bee Home, visit beehome.design and design your own Bee Home based on the predefined parameters. Once satisfied with your design, you can download the design files and forward them to your local makerspace to have them made locally and on demand. The final step is to place your Bee Home, plant some flowers, and let nature do the rest. Personally, I think they look super cool, like tiny bee cities that live in a garden. It would be great to see cities also take this concept and run with it, for the betterment of our public spaces.
