One from us.

The cities listed in this piece are arranged in order of their population sizes.

The font size of each word is 0.01% of it's population size.

For example The city of Manchester holds 430,000 people, and therefore The font size for the word is 43.

London's font size is 700.

Painting with Music.

Take a look at this beast.

Music animation from Jul & Mat

Music Painting by JUL & MAT from JUL & MAT on Vimeo.

Doride Lamp

By Karim Rashid

INSIDE/OUT ANIMATION

inside/out from eranhill on Vimeo.

By Eranhill

Sufjan Stevens

Out in the sea of commercial blandness there stands one man flying the flag for originality and innovation whilst effortlessly keeping his music simple and true to its roots. This man is Sufjan Stevens. It is a testimony to his skills as a musician that it is almost impossible to class him under any one genre of music. His understated confidence can be seen with the release of several Christmas albums and a goal to make a concept album based on every one of the American states. Of the seven studio albums he has released to date, Illinois stands out as a classic. In this album he manages to incorporate an eclectic mix of song styles ranging from the epic Come on! Feel the Illinoise, which could have been performed by a small orchestra, to the deeply tragic and simple John Wayne Gacy JR.
Born in Detroit, Michigan, his childhood is narrated through many of his songs. Recurring themes of broken homes contrasted with the happy nostalgia of childhood can be seen with such quirkily titled tracks as The Predatory Wasp of the Pali and Decatur. Yet although his subject matters are sometimes deep he manages to narrate it in a way that make the songs listenable. Many of which, such as Casimir Pulaski Day, refer to several stories within. There are not many artists that have the talent to write a song about an obscure Polish American Civil War hero whilst simultaneously mourning the loss of a friend.
At 80 minutes long with a track list of 21 songs the album requires a lot of commitment and patience. There are several tracks such as the self-explanatory A Conjunction of Drones that could put people off listening. However, buried between these are classics that any music fan would love.


Come On! Feel The Illinoise!

I swear he didn't cheet.

Appropriately named designer Andrew Chase’s mechanical cheetah seems straight from Transformers. The whimsical cheetah seems poised to move above ground, and is a part of Chase’s ongoing Timmy project, which also features a giraffe and elephant. The fully-articulated cheetah is 61 cm (24 inches) high and 127 cm (50 inches) in length. The steampunked cheetah replicates the joint’s movements of its flesh and blood counterpart.

Watch it go.

Up and Coming and Coming Up.

One year on and it's back again, stronger than ever, trevor. For 24 years, New Designers has been bringing together the very best in UK graduate design, showcasing the work, energy and talent of the next generation of designers. It’s the freshest and most vibrant show of its kind.Its long-standing reputation continually attracts a prestigious design-conscious audience of over 18,000 professionals, public, media and education, all eager to see what’s new.

New Designers runs for two weeks and is divided into two parts incorporating 9 exciting design zones including two prestigious awards evenings which form an integral part of the event. Nowhere else is it possible to see such creativity across every major design discipline from architecture to animation, furniture to fashion, graphics to glass.
Part 1: 9-12 July 2009

Textiles, Fashion & Accessories
Contemporary Applied Arts
Ceramics & Glass
Jewellery & Precious Metalwork
One Year On

Part 2: 16-19 July 2009

Product Design
Furniture Design
Visual Communications (including Graphic Design and Illustration)
Spatial Design
One Year On

The Hundred&one team will be there on the 17th to see part two of the show, so if your about then give us a shout.

Join New Designers on Facebook here.

Dark was the night.

In celebration of the release of the "Dark Was the Night" compilation by 4AD and Red Hot, some of the musicians involved convened in Brooklyn for a special session captured by Vincent Moon.






"Dark Was the Night" was the brain-child of the Red Hot AIDS charity. The point of the party wasn’t the party itself, but to capture the performances on video; shot by a mad genius French filmmaker, Vincent Moon, who has been a pioneer in making low key on line live video under various names, most famously his “takeaway parties,” which have become the underground indie rock MTV unplugged for a generation reading blogs like Brooklyn Vegan, Pitchfork and Stereogum instead of Rolling Stone or Spin.

The album includes tracks form some huge names including: Arcade Fire, Sufjan Steavens, Jose Gonzalez, Bon Iver, Fiest, Cat Power and Anthony. As well as a few lesser known but highly credible acts like Dirty Projectors (above) ft. David Byrne.

DARK WAS THE NIGHT IS AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD NOW.

Show some Plug Love.

The Royal College of Art's graduate show has opened, and this year, the show-stopper was a plug. Min-Kyu Choi impressed every passer by with his neat, apparently market-ready plug that folds down to the width of an Apple MacBook Air. "The MacBook Air is the world's thinnest laptop ever. However, here in the UK, we still use the world's biggest three-pin plug," says Choi.Choi's plug is just 10mm wide when it is folded. To unfold it, the two live pins swivel 90 degrees, and the plastic surround folds back around the pins so the face of the plug looks the same as a standard UK plug. The idea produced a spin off, too. Choi created a multi-plug adaptor, a compact standard plug sized unit with space for three folded plugs to slot in, as well as one that charges USB devices.It's so plausible and so obvious a product that it should produce a few red faces; how many more years were we going to attach our palm sized mobiles and wafer thin laptops to an object that's barely been touched since its first design in 1946? Choi picked an everyday product that most other designers find too mundane to dabble with and drastically improved it - exactly the kind of thinking that we should be celebrating right now.

www.minkyu.co.uk