Welcome to the Lavish Lounge

Tasty snippets from the Creative Services World, the Lavish world, the virtual world and even the real world.

Sunday 30 November 2008

Reasons to be Cheerful

A new book about the life of graphic designer Barney Bubbles is out now. Reasons To Be Cheerful: The Life and Work of Barney Bubbles, by Paul Gorman, is a celebration of the creative legacy of one of the most mysterious yet influential figures in graphic design. Barney Bubbles work influenced a generation of graphic designers, including Neville Brody, Malcolm Garrett and Peter Saville. Bubbles designed sleeves for The Rolling Stones, Billy Bragg, Ian Dury and Elvis Costello to name but a very few. Bubbles committed suicide in 1983, leaving a body of amazing graphic design work, including videos and product design. Reasons To Be Cheerful is available from 4 December online and book stores. The forward is written by Billy Bragg.

Saturday 29 November 2008

Common Craft videos.

I really like the work that the two guys at Common Craft are doing. Through the use of short, entertaining videos, they make really complex subjects easily understandable. All of the videos use a white board and paper style of production, and copies are available to share online. For commercial purposes you can license hi-res versions, or even commission Common Craft to make a bespoke video. I like their philosophy of keeping the company small and the quality high, and am looking forward to future productions.

Thursday 27 November 2008

Uamou and Boo

The latest addition to my Japanese toy collection. This is becoming an expensive hobby.

Saturday 22 November 2008

Goodness and Happiness

The one thing we all know from the credit crash is that the way we do business will change. When we come out of the other side of this financial crisis we will have a new breed of organisation and a new way for brands to operate and communicate. Many old, slow and lumbering business will fall by the wayside. In fact, we're already seeing that happen. This presentation by Neil Perkin really sums up for me how businesses that are more open and honest and even generous will have better interactions with their customers. In a hyper-connected world the next generation businesses have a unique opportunity to really interact with the world in a totally different way. neilperkin

Do schools kill creativity?

Why don't we get the best out of people? Sir Ken Robinson argues that it's because we've been educated to become good workers, rather than creative thinkers. Students with restless minds and bodies -- far from being cultivated for their energy and curiosity -- are ignored or even stigmatized, with terrible consequences. "We are educating people out of their creativity," Robinson says. Robinson's point is well-made, and difficult not to agree with. A visionary cultural leader, Sir Ken led the British government's 1998 advisory committee on creative and cultural education, a massive inquiry into the significance of creativity in the educational system and the economy, and was knighted in 2003 for his achievements. I saw this brilliant film yesterday. It's nearly 20 minutes long, so get comfortable and watch to the end - it is one of the most inspiring speeches I have ever seen. I'm sure you'll enjoy it as much as I did. You can download it to your desktop if you want it to run faster. Source: TED

Thursday 20 November 2008

Website launch

Today we launched the new website for Callender Howorth, an amazing firm of London-based interior designers. The HTML and Flash site features some stunning imagery from their interior design comissions. Callender Howorth

Cooliris

I've been experimenting this week with Cooliris. Cooliris transforms your browser into a lightening fast cinematic way to discover the web. It's a bit weird to get your head round at first. Essentially it could potentially change the whole way we look at websites, providing a virtual 3D window to shopping sites or a 3D wall to discover a whole range of media. As I understand it, websites need to incorporate Coliris code into their sites to enable it to be viewed in the platform. But I'm pretty sure more and more sites will cotton on to this in the coming months. Download Cooliris now and have a play. Let me know what you think! Cooliris

Friday 14 November 2008

Busy-ness as usual

The past few weeks A busy few weeks as usual at Lavish Towers. We’ve been doing some video and sound editing for the IWM. We delivered 16 bespoke typefaces and helped one of our clients with some artwork and print consultancy work for a product brochure. We delivered some roadshow materials for a major communications organisation and are part way through a Flash website for an interior design company. In the next few weeks we’ve got a heap of InDesign templates coming up, some more print work for Public Concern at Work and a website for an amazing creative concepting team. So pretty much business as usual for our studio. We never know from one day to the next what we might be asked to do. But it’s all in a days work for one of London’s leading creative services studios.

Tuesday 11 November 2008

Web 2.0 women

Only a quarter of those involved in computer and mathematical occupations are women. And yet, in the ever-evolving world of Web 2.0, women have often been pioneers, redefining the way we interact online. Fast Company magazine has tracked down the most influential of these innovators. The most influential women in web 2.0

Plug in to NOW

Cool widget wall. Now

Saturday 8 November 2008

Degrees of separation

Interesting article on John Caswell's Just Think blog about how social media is challenging the '6 degrees of separation' theory. "Is it time to revise the old saw that everyone in the world is connected by just six degrees of separation? A study from French mobile carrier O2 has found that strangers are more connected to each other than they ever have been. According to the study, the average person is now connected by just three degrees within a shared “interest” or social group instead of six. In fact, it found that people are usually a part of three main networks: family, friendship, and work. O2 asked adults across three different age groups — 18-25, 35-45, 55+ — to make contact with random strangers from areas all across the globe using only personal connections. By linking their shared interests, the participants were able to connect to that person in three person-to-person links. Stanley Milgram originally coined the term “six degrees of separation” in 1967 to show that everyone in the modern world was capable of connecting to another by linking people and interests. But in today’s world of social networking, links between strangers are closer than in Milgram’s day. According to Jeff Rodrigues, a social networking specialist that carried out the study, 97 percent of the participants said they felt more connected to people today than they ever have in the past and for older respondents, email and mobile phones were the key factors in reducing the degrees of separation. But for those in the younger generation, Facebook was the main factor. Text messaging was also mentioned as an important component in reducing degrees of separation. “What the study has brought to light is that the way we now interact means it’s never been easier to make connections and build networks of contacts,” Rodrigues said in an interview. It should be noted that the research is not the epitome of a real scientific study — O2 paid for it, after all. And anyone who has a LinkedIn account knows that it is still easy to find plenty of people who are more than three degrees away from you. But the study does underscore something we all know: more so than ever before, everyone is connected (even if it is only tangentially). Maybe it is time to revisit Milgram’s study in a more robust way. It could help silence the critics who believe Facebook and the rest are nothing more than places for kids to waste their time. Let’s face it – how often will you find one service or industry that can totally transform the way people are connected? Just Think

Friday 7 November 2008

Showcasing Australian Creativity

Australian Edge is a really nice independent site maintained by Clayton West and Tey Vandenberg. The idea is simple: to promote Australian creativity in all forms. There's some beautiful creative work on here, along with interviews with designers, directors, animators and others. It's a real mine of talent across all creative disciplines. Australian Edge

True to type

My pals over at Made by Many have spotted a great series of postcards based on typefaces, and the subliminal messages we send out by using them. As an old-fashioned lover of type, and a member of the Metrotwin team, this article definitely hits the spot for me. You'll know from previous posts that last month we had the dream brief to create 16 new typefaces for a client. We take our type very seriously here at Lavish. Oh, and did I mention the fact I'm on a personal, one-woman crusade to promote the banning of Comic Sans forever! How do you say London in type? .

Thursday 6 November 2008

Facebook facts

Interesting information on who's using Facebook, and the opportunities for marketing that Facebook offers, which was published on my friend Iain Millar's blog this week. Who's using Facebook? .