Thinkcage

I found these great vintage Christmas cards in some things my dad sent me when he moved out of his house in Wisconsin.

They are in a neat decorative box, complete with envelopes. The set features a few different designs of wintry scenes in a watercolor style complete with a shiny gold stripe at the bottom. The message inside wishes the recipient an “old fashioned Merry Christmas…”. I think it’s cool that these were meant to look old fashioned years ago when they were made.

I’m going to try to convince Holly to let us sent some of these out next Christmas — I think they’re wonderful.

I love the look going on over at Mix Turtle. A neat logotype is really taken up a notch by the clever illustration of one tough looking turtle.

The service seems to be bombarded with traffic right now, but I’m anxious to give it a try.

I have been de-cluttering my office and found some old design magazines that some of you might be interested in.

First up is Dustin Amery Hostetler’s (Upso) amazing art and design ’zine, Faesthetic. I have issues #1, #2, and #3 available. These are sold-out, limited, numbered editions — issue one is one of 250 only! Upso is a great artist and this is a fun magazine.

Some of you may remember Emigre magazine which was pretty progressive in the design world once upon a time. Almost all of these are sold out and unavailable directly from Emigre (and the ones that are go for $50). I have two auctions:

Issues 46-59 + catalogs

Issues 60-64 (the CD ones)

On of the really great things the surprised me at SXSW this year was the renewed art of note taking. Each of the keynotes featured two information designers drawing beautiful graphic versions of the presentations on huge pages. I snapped this image of one of them.

Today after returning home, I see this link to Mike Rohde’s gorgeous notes from the conference.

My design professor in college was adamant that we keep a sketchbook (and I do, to this day) and she stressed that your sketchbook should be more than sloppy notes, but should look as if an “artist had been there”. These exemplify that idea.

This morning I will be once again making the trip south to Austin, TX for the 2008 South by Southwest Interactive conference. 

SXSW is actually three conferences in one, covering Interactive, Music, and Film during SXSW Week, March 7 - 16, 2008. SXSW Interactive is really the premier event for people working in the web industry. The conference features nearly five full days and offers panels, keynotes, a trade show, and other events featuring the top minds in the field. SXSW covers a wide range of topics from business development on the web to social networking to technology, design, and even tactical topics like HTML and CSS. In years past, SXSW has been a favorite launching point for new “Web 2.0″ applications. Nearly anyone working on the web can benefit from something at this conference, even if it is only for the opportunities to network. And like many conferences, some of the best information is found in the form of meeting and sharing ideas with the smart people you meet throughout the week.

I’m looking forward to panels on design, social networking, CMS systems, and web startups. Speakers include: Jason Fried, Jim Coudal, Jason Santa Maria, Kathy Sierra, Jeffrey Zeldman, and Jimmy Wales with keynotes by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, community artist Frank Warren, and futurist Jane McGonigal.

This year, I’ll be heading down to SXSW with Element Fusion senior designer, Dustin Evans. While in Austin, we’ll be looking to line-up meetings with customers, partners, and new friends. If you’d like to meet us at SXSW, you can find us in the online registrant directory. Or leave your contact information below and we can provide email, phone, twitter, or other ways to reach us while at the conference. Hope to see you there!

Oh and did I metion that Mashable rocks?

Just a quick reminder that I will be presenting at tonight’s Refresh OKC meeting. The topic is Typography Techniques for the Web, A practical guide to tips, tricks, and best practices for achieving elegant type in HTML and CSS.

The meet-up is this evening, August 21st, 2007 at 6:30pm. We meet at the downtown library in Oklahoma City. If you’re in the area please stop in — it’s a great little meet-up and refreshments will be served. More info at www.refreshokc.org.

Hope to see you there!