“What do I even say?” I’ve been sitting here for an hour trying to think of how to start this week’s edition of TFIB. I figured, maybe the best way to start is to admit that it’s hard to find the right words because the last week has been unimaginably surreal? Every night this week I’ve found myself awake at 3am scrolling through a Twitter List updating in real-time the horrific Russian invasion of Ukraine. So now after sitting here for over 2 hours, I’ve decided to keep my thoughts brief. I can share my adventures from the last week in next week’s edition. Stay well and be safe!
✖️ — I love a heavy dose of maximalism when it comes to interior design, it’s how much of my apartment is designed. Minimalism can be lovely though I feel maximalism has a sense of homeyness and charm that can’t be beat. Studio Sam Buckley has taken this approach with this design for Bing Ting, a Chinese pancake and coffee shop. What I particularly love about this project is how this former 19th-century butcher’s shop was historically listed, so they had to integrate contemporary design elements into the existing touches. It creates this oddly wacky but inviting environment that feels old and new at the same time.
✖️ — I was recently introduced to Later, a desktop app that clears and restores your desktop with the touch of a button. It has a lot of customization which is nice, saves you from embarrassment when sharing your screen, and it’s on sale for $12 for the next day.
✖️ — Matthew Smith of Morning Type has started an extremely helpful resource with their Type Foundry Network, a curated index of type foundries. As he states, “this exists to better organize the foundries I’ve come to know, like, and/or find interesting while supplying the additional information that I look for when browsing foundries.” I’ve already found this list to be such a valuable resource, highly recommend browsing in Tile View if you’re a visual person like me.
✖️ — You know when someone does something with such quality that you can’t tell if it’s real or fake? That’s what happened to me when I found Jisu Kim’s redesign of the Chinati Foundation. Rebranding it as the Chinati Art Foundation, she’s taken a completely paired back approach which perfectly absorbs the concepts of Donald Judd’s incredible artwork and turns it into a flexible design language. The difference between the current branding and website and what Jisu is staggering. She perfectly captured exactly what the branding should be. And on a sidetone, if you’ve never visited Chinati or Marfa, I highly recommend doing so!
✖️ — A24 this week released a Song Reader for the film Minari, which contains 16 sewn booklets of sheet music and lyrics alongside original watercolor illustrations by Ping Zhu. I’m such a fan of Ping’s artwork and I wish I could hang their art from this collection on my walls, they’re stunning.
✖️ — If you love for your foods to be beautiful and delicious I’d recommend checking out the Veropop assortment from Italianavera. I spotted these over the weekend and couldn’t take my eyes of these patterned cans with their bold colors and shapes. I can’t tell you if they’re delicious though they’ll absolutely look fabulous on an open shelf in your kitchen.
✖️ — Japanese artist Ikeuchi Hiroto is having quite an impressive year. They popped into the spotlight thanks to a collaboration with Balenciaga on their ‘22 Spring Collection, which seamlessly combining mechanized outfits and masks with looks from the runway, creating a sensational cyberpunk vibe… but also, your grandpa who’s into cyberpunk. He also recently had a show at Sai Gallery in Tokyo which allowed folks to get up and close with his robotic artworks. It’s incredible that’s he’s able to bring to life the wild things you’d see in manga or anime, making it look like objects that could be used in our real life.
✖️ — One of the best branding projects I’ve seen lately is Hassan Rahim’s work for Dweller 3 (scroll down a bit to see a couple pieces) which for me is an absolute work of art. If you’re unfamiliar, “dweller, started in 2019, is an electronic music festival platforming black electronic artists and this is the derivative blog, started in 2020, centering black perspectives.” Hassan’s work gives me 90’s rave throwback LED/flip-dot display realness and it works so well, especially playing with the minimal palette.
The Trend Report™ by my partner, Kyle Raymond Fitzpatrick, is a sharp and insightful look at everything going on in the world, arriving every Sunday to your inbox. Highly recommended, obviously.