Trendy Henry

I love a bit of history, although I'm not entirely capable of trotting-off a load of dates, or damned interesting historical bon mots. But a general knowledge or feel for it helps to inform and shape at least an idea of what On Earth we're doing here, where we came from, and how we kind-of fit into the human scale of things, if nothing else. That's got to be useful?

More specifically than a love of a "bit of history", I'm quite partial to "a bit of Henry". This is not noteworthy in any way whatsoever, Henry VIII is of course the Great White Shark, the Golden Eagle, the Lamborghini Countach (for any boy that grew up in the 80's) of English Kings. Or maybe you were a Ferrari Testarossa fan, no matter.

A while ago I spent a couple of hours in the Tower of London, having an afternoon spare, I grabbed the Nikon and prepared to feel about eleven again (around the age I had last visited, many years ago, with my father). It didn't disappoint. Wow. But I was struck by something in particular with my thirty-something-year-old eyes, which my eleven-year-old eyes wouldn't have. It was a design thing - "that suit of armour looks like it could have been created yesterday!" I exclaimed to myself silently. OK, not quite, but I was amazed not only at the sheer craftsmanship, but the contemporary lines, you could almost paint it white and stick it in a sci-fi movie. Sacrilege, but you know what I mean - it was made in the early 16th century! It's easy to think of ourselves, in the 21st century Western World, as the be-all and end-all, with our digital interweb mobile enabled 210mph existence. It was surprising, and very interesting, to be reminded of a few home truths by Trendy Henry's suit. He was 'the bomb', man.

Wit: Yes Please

My first blog entry, wow. Rather than continue to stress any further about making "the first one, a good one", I'm just going to choose something I love. That is, 'witty thinking in graphic design', as exemplified by a bible of a book - A Smile in the Mind, and more specifically Paul Rand (1914-1996), a hugely influential American designer.

In said book, Rand says: "I have two goals. The first is that everything I do as a designer must have an idea: it cannot just look nice. The second is, it has to look nice." Just brilliant. He goes on to talk more about the way he went about using humour in design, which I won't regurgitate here, but for this one piece of work (pictured).

Rand comments: "A well known example is my identity for United Parcels Service: to take an escutcheon - a medieval symbol which inevitably seems pompous today - then stick a package on top of it, that is funny". He designed his UPS logo in 1961.

Unfortunately UPS have since ditched the Rand design, in favour of relative eye candy. It retains some elements but not the whole story, so the idea is lost. Wit in design - more please, not less.