Studio Notes #49

Hello, my friends. Here's issue #49 of Studio Notes™—quick bits delivered to you each Friday.

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I'm about to place an order for these ceramic versions of the famous New York City "Anthora" coffee cup. The iconic paper cup "...was first introduced to New Yorkers in the early 1960s when Greek immigrants were at the helm of the City's coffee shop and diner industry". I've always loved the blue and white Greek patterns and have associated vintage NYC with that color combo. That specific blue and white seems to be ubiquitous with classic coffee shops, diners, delis, etc.

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Maybe this moment is actually the perfect time to put a Charming Little Wooden Figure That Sways with Magnetic Expressions on the dashboard of your car. Honestly, we need more excuses for amusement to get us through the day. Why not this little guy.

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Growing up in Vermont, I had a deep appreciation for Ben & Jerry's. I mean, their ice cream was amazing of course, but it was also the brand: The iconic Woody Jackson art, chunky-and-friendly serif typography, the two hippies on the lid and their commitment of donating a portion of profits to social justice and environmental causes. I'd always admired the way they operated, and have a lot of fond memories of visiting their first shop in a converted gas station in Burlington, VT. Their interview on How I Built This is a great one, by the way.

Ben and Jerry are now trying to convince Unilever, the current owners, to "free" the company and have it operate independently again so that it can resume its original mission that's been stifled by corporate and political pressure. I'm here for it. And the ice cream. They also need to bring back my favorite flavor they no longer make: White Russian. Anyone remember that one?

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Robin Yayla combines cartoon illustration with landmark and architecture photography and it's another tiny thing making me smile today.

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What are you working on?

An ampersand from the WIP typeface currently on the workbench. I'm thinking of calling it, Clothbound, as the stressed sans has a "foil-stamped on clothbound books" vibe to it. Amazingly, it doesn't look like there's already a typeface called Clothbound, which would break my "intentional-misspelling to skirt around previous names" streak. Perhaps I should just call it Clawthbound for consistency? ;-)

I hope your weekend is peaceful. God knows we could all use that.

Cheers,