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Year 2010

Entries 5 Total

Vintage Lolita Covers

Feb 21, ’10 11:20 PM

The fabulous vintage design blog Words and Eggs posted a compelling collection of Lolita Covers.
Lolita Covers

From Greater Than:

The Second Pass recently linked to this gallery of covers to different editions of Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita (as well as to this competition for people to give it their own design).

It’s certainly not a book that’s been universally well-served by designers. There are some covers that want to suggest Humbert Humbert’s lascivious gaze but, to avoid straying into the same morally reprehensible territory as Humbert himself, they do so with an image of a full-grown woman rather than a pre-pubescent girl. Others just have illustrations of fairly inept nymphets (there are some real grotesques in there). And there’s also some good design (as you’d hope in a collection of slightly more than 150 images).

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The First Air to Ground Radio Message

Feb 19, ’10 7:35 AM

kiddo-vaniman.jpg‘Roy, come and get this goddamn cat’

2010 marks the centenary of a number of great events, including the first air to ground radio message.

Exactly 100 years ago, a gray tabby named Kiddo became the first cat to cross the Atlantic Ocean by dirigible. Kiddo belonged to one of the crew members of American explorer Walter Wellman’s airship America. In 1910 Wellman attempted to cross the ocean, leaving from Atlantic City, New Jersey on 15 October that year. Kiddo stowed away in one of the lifeboats, and was after his discovery turned out to be as big a pain as only an angry, claustrophobic cat can be, scratching, mewing, and howling and generally bugging the heck out of everybody on board. The America carried radio equipment — the first aircraft so equipped — and apparently the historic first, in-flight radio message, to a secretary back on land, read: ‘Roy, come and get this goddamn cat’

More information on this momentous event is here. Via BoingBoing.

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Say Uncle!

Feb 17, ’10 12:19 PM

You have met my baby nephew Bannack by now. Yesterday I ran to my sister and Chris’ house to pickup a copy of TurboTax thinking the errand would only take a moment. But look at this guy! I ended up ten minutes late for work because I stayed too long chatting up this little guy.

My sister recaps Bannack’s Valentine’s Day in a recent post.

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Valentine’s Date

Feb 15, ’10 9:06 PM

2010-02-15

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Book Designer David Pearson

Feb 15, ’10 8:56 PM

David Pearson is a London designer who while working at Penguin spearheaded the beautiful set of pocket classics that marked their 70th year. A rainbow of 70 small paperback volumes each with wildly different covers. After hearing me gush about them my sister found a way to buy a set through a London friend and get them to Montana.
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David Pearson gave an interview to design blog The Casual Optimist that is worth a look for the interested.

I was already an avid [Penguin book] collector and the idea for a design retrospective was one that I’d run past my Art Director before it was eventually tagged onto the company’s 70-year anniversary celebrations. I’d always wanted to get into the archives and have a really good poke around and fortunately for me, this gave me the perfect excuse. If I was unaware of the magnitude of the company’s past achievements they very quickly became apparent as I worked my way through the vast isles of books.

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