Tag Archives: design

New Look at a Classic: “I HEART NY”

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New to me are these regional spins on the iconic I HEART NY logo.  I saw them for the first time just recently, alongside even more takes in which the red image between the I and NY represented other aspects of the Empire State.

Though they obviously don’t use the words BUFFALO

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or SARATOGA,

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to my mind these two renditions can’t help but explicitly represent those cities, and as such, they had me dreaming of an “explicitly” Albany version that would feature the profile of the Capital City’s most iconic building, The Egg.

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Apologies to the New York State Tourism Bureau if this was already present somewhere on the very billboard where I saw the official buffalo and horse images above. And if it wasn’t: get cracking on production of the “I Egg NY” merch! FOOTNOTE to THE EGG: I can’t put a number on how many times I saw this building in my life before the day I stood before it on assignment to direct a short film about a football player from Albany. That day, for the first time ever to me, The Egg looked like a football:  virtually the top of the Lombardi Trophy itself, tipped slightly and blown up a lot.

In all that I-Hearting I came across this fabulous story of the original logo, the remarkable designer who created it, and the interesting life that both man and art have led.  Definitely worth a read and/or listen, via the podcast 99% Invisible.

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ROLLING LIKE THE BUS

In honor of consecutive stellar performances by Notre Dame to open the 2014 season, we’re dipping back into the archives to share the drawing below.  It was done back when I was merely a Tweedlet in Mrs. Davis’s 6th grade art class, and only years later, autographed by the subject, Jerome Bettis.  Long before he was nicknamed “The Bus” during his NFL career, Bettis was a bulldozing fullback in South Bend — though even his physical style might have met its match in the Irish defense on display the last two weeks.  Sure, the now departed Bob Diaco may have resembled Don Draper, but so far his defenses were mere impostors compared with Brian Van Gorder’s Van Goghs.  The first year Irish Defensive Coordinator has a name like a Dutch Master but through two games his group is pure Cohiba.

(Drawing by PaC - Autumn, 1992)

(Drawing by PaC – Autumn, 1992)

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STEALING FROM TIFFANY’S

Twelve years ago today, almost exactly to the moment this post goes up, my eyes gazed on this artwork for the first time.  Varying in size, color, and composition — from small and flat under mattes and polished glass, to movie-theater-lobby-esque large format, to three-dimensional shadow boxes in frames custom made of reconstituted desk drawers — it comprised the then little known passion project of America’s “King of the Football Movies.”  And like the montages he and his filmmaking brain trust popularized, the work resonated with my eyes and ears in such a way that I couldn’t help but imitate it — in part, in the poster below from 2003.

If you’re feeling generous call it flattery, and if you must, call it theft – but then only in consideration of that advice the King himself was known to impart, “If you’re going to steal, steal from Tiffany’s.”  I don’t recall what I had for breakfast twelve years ago today ; I can barely remember what I had today.  But June 3, 2002 — and how it changed the way I see the world — is a morning I won’t forget.

"Wilbury Poster Boys", created circa 2003. (Original poster and photo by PaC)

“Wilbury Po’ster Boys”, created circa 2003. (Original poster and photo by PaC)

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2003 – WHAT CHRISTMAS IS ALL ABOUT

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Vince Guaraldi’s piano stylings … Lucy pining for real estate … Charlie Brown dropping knowledge on the Peanuts, in spite of himself.  Lots of “kids stuff” gets better and more meaningful with age, but none more so than “A Charlie Brown Christmas”, the inspiration for the very cut-and-pasted second card ever.

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2004 – CATCH THE CLARK, HOLD THE GRISWOLD

                                                                                                                                                                                           

Proofs of the cover and inside of the ’04 edition, inspired — and autographed by — the great Walter Iooss, Jr.  If you never have, you really should catch him.