I haven’t posted anything about the upcoming holiday season thus far but expect some festive entries on the horizon as December knocks on the door (tomorrow? eek!). On the topic of colour and the holidays, I wrote a piece on Rena Tom’s website today pondering the many unique colour palettes and swatches beyond the famous holiday pairing of red and green. From icy vintage to bright yellow to neon details, there are endless modern possibilities. Please take a look here if you are interested in the colours of the festive season. Do you have a favourite holiday colour scheme? I would love to hear…

(photographs via rifle paper co., shop sweet lulu, martha stewart, emmas designblogg, hey look, 101woonideeen, the sweetest occasion and emmas designblogg)

Fogal is a Swiss fashion brand most famous for their high-end hosiery. Created in 1921 and now with stores around the world, the company’s legwear division features wildly diverse and fashion-forward styles and textures in over 70 colours. I’ve heard they make a great product but frankly, it’s the packaging I have loved for quite some time. The 1950′s/60′s feeling typography, vintage style and original logo are all fantastic but the colour palettes just make me giddy. A gorgeously vibrant collection of hues, the palette feels vintage but not stuffy. I especially love the borders of contrasting or complimentary colours. Yep, I wouldn’t mind keeping the entire collection on my desk as a perfect example of creating a big yet cohesive brand colour palette. Oh those colours would look just incredible in one big stack!

(photographs via the dieline and greedy girl)

I was poking around the website of Norwegian-American artist Brit Hammer and became more than a little intrigued by the close-up shots of frescos she creates in cement. I want to reach into the screen and touch the beautiful texture. Doesn’t it feel like you are on the surface of a planet covered in icy, colourful grooves and craters? To create her vibrant frescos, Brit uses cement mortar powder, water and pigments which forces her to work quickly as the materials are fast drying (unlike traditional plaster frescos). I’m thinking Brit could start a side business of selling detail photographs of her beautiful work. Maybe even add some tiny space figures to the shots? I’m picturing a vintage silver astronaut. Hmmm…

I have posted about the work of Elisa Strozyk before or, to be more specific, gushed about her incredible talent for wood design with a fabric-like soul. I was visiting her website a couple of days ago and spied these spectacular Coloured Wooden Rugs. Elisa attaches dyed wood to a fabric base and the result is a dreamy wooden textile. These beauties have only fueled my daydreams that Elisa will one day open a shop of her work. I would be more than happy to camp out for a few days in order to nab one of these gorgeous carpets…

(photographs via elisa strozyk)

Lately it feels like FedEx is leading the way in making clever and effective ads with a handmade sensibility. Remember the parcel via windows one I posted about a few months ago? The latest effort is this advertisement for less urgent shipping between Canada and the US created by BBDO Toronto. We travel between Montreal and Miami via a route of toppling domino-like FedEx boxes and spot many landmarks and geographical features on our journey. The craftsmanship of the set and all of its purple details is fantastic. I can’t even imagine how much work this set-up required nor the terror of having what appears to be one take to do it in. It also warms my heart when a company embraces the creative possibilities of their brand colour the way FedEx has here. The ad is exploded in their signature purple. I’m not sure why a Canadian goose needs to mail a puppy a hockey stick but when the results are this good, who cares why! Both purple offices are fabulously designed from purple dog bones to the purple bow tie-clad goose’s desk photos of his wife and the man at the park who feeds him. How about his poster with the fitting quote “C’est la V”? I love this ad because it not only shows how a brand colour can be explored but it highlights that any company, from tiny to insanely large like FedEx, can make make a unique and truly creative advertisement.

I think I just found a new sculpture to add to the top of my “art I would kill to have” list. Created by Canadian designer Miya Kondo, ‘Composition Light‘ is a light sculpture comprised of five different shapes of light with five different frames of colour. Each piece can stand alone as well as be grouped together in an infinite number of combinations. In addition to the beautiful use of light and colour frames, I love the use of bright cords and wiring. Rather than simply make those technical elements white or hidden, they are pops of colour that add to the entire piece and remind the viewer of what is powering the sculpture as a whole. I’m hoping there will be a home version of Composition Light one day. The only other thing needed is a big loft with industrial beams to showcase it in….

(photographs via miya kondo; spotted on via designboom)

Milan’s Cinema Manzoni was one of the most important film venues in Italy for over fifty years before it closed to the public in 2006. In her show ‘Parasimpatico‘, Swiss artist Pipilotti Rist took over the historic space and covered every surface with “a new skin of imagery” resulting in gorgeous and ethereal light, sound and movement installations. Those photographs of rooms lit by coloured gels make me want to hop a flight to Milan and be immersed in hues. How beautiful is that top image of magenta and blue floors with a dash of red light? I also love the ornate Italian details covered in modern colour (including that intriguing chandelier that acts like a screen for projected imagery). If you happen to be in Milan, the show is on until December 18th. See more about the installations here.

(spotted on and photographs via designboom)

Pie charts, colour wheels, bright stickers – I love them all. These Rainbow Dot Stickers by Poketo are not only vibrant but translucent so you can bring a little happiness to envelopes, packages, maps and whatever else tickles your fancy. I’m thinking they could really spruce up a boring bill or text book…

I love the way Crown Paint displayed their colour trends for 2011. The combination of still life objects and interior images is inspiring but it’s the groupings of swatches that I really love. The palettes are beautiful and they feel more tangible than paper chips photographed together. It makes all the difference to have swatches in different sizes and depths as the resulting shadows and shapes reflect how colour is used in a home – in different weights and ratios via pieces of furniture, wall colour and decor objects. Overall, a fantastic example of styling and colour theory. I wouldn’t mind having that top purple palette as a piece of wall art…

(spotted on trendland)

You know those round nonpareil sprinkles that are liberally tossed about during holiday cookie decorating? Imagine meticulously placing 221,184 of them by hand using jewellery tweezers and a pixelating computer program. Are your eyes burning from that thought? Mine are! Canadian artist Joel Brochu was inspired by a previous project he created exploring the pointillism technique of applying small dots of colour to create a larger image and decided to re-create a photograph with sprinkles. Using a photograph of a beagle by Shingo Uchiyama, Joel needed just six colours of sprinkles (red, orange, green, blue, black and white) to create a surprisingly large spectrum of hues. It’s amazing how colour can be suggested and created with the right combinations and placement. Nonpareils are just 1/16 inch thick so 221,184 of them were needed to re-create the 4′ by 1.5′ photograph. Crazy, painstaking work that makes me wonder what Joel could do with a dozen cupcakes…

(spotted on my modern met)

‘Blinking City’ is a project investigating how traditional maps for cities can never accurately reflect the speed of urban growth nor the rate at which things change. In other words, “as soon as the map is done, the city it describes has already gone”. Created by artists Marcella Campa & Stefano Avesani of instant hutong, the chalk pastel piece is a collage of several Hutong neighbourhoods of Beijing and was stenciled onto a wall of a dilapidated courtyard house in the Xianyukou district of the city. The colours were also assigned meaning to illustrated some of the ever-changing events that occur in a big city every day (see the legend here).

(thank you jorge!)
(photographs via instant hutong)

Lines by Millimeter Milligram are simple but handsome notebooks. The front pattern matches the line style inside so you never have to worry about grabbing the wrong book. Don’t they look fantastic on a bright coloured desk?

I love these photographs by London-based author, stylist and designer Sania Pell that explore a contrast of neon paint and real sprigs of berries and hydrangeas. The palette of dark and light natural hues mixed with vibrant artificial neon is stunning. These are just “photo sketches” at the moment so I can only dream of where the idea will lead Sania…

(photographs via sania pell)

Bottles, bags, crazy foil envelopes – there are a million types of packages and even more reasons to love their niche of design. Now more than ever, companies and designers are using minimal packaging so how do you get your brand across in an impactful and creative way? I wrote an article for Rena Tom’s site on that very topic so please take a look if you are interested. There are plenty of inspiring images if you are looking to brand your product or yourself!

(image via miss design and retail design blog)

behind the scenes

A second Kate Spade post this week because their holiday collection is just that good. I love “Give Colourfully”, the Holiday 2011 campaign video. It is bursting with bright colour, pattern, design supplies, paper and all things devoted to the season of festive wrap. It’s quite impressive how much Christmas comes across without relying on traditional colours, snow scenes, winter clichés, etc. Continuing with the theme, the front page of their website animates colourful presents you can “unwrap”. A larger Kate Spade post will pop up one of these days as their design team and brand as a whole is one of my true ‘colour heros’. Check out the behind-the-scenes video too. The team used 1,000 yards of coloured tape, 15,000 square feet of tissue paper and 400 yards of paper ribbon to create the mini-film (including wrap a 1965 VW beetle!)

Helmo is a great design studio from France and I recently came across some work they did in 2009 for the Sonorama Music Festival in Besancon, France. Th CMYK typography is fantastic and the black and white illustrations are playful yet modern. What a mix! I love the program and its rainbow of one-colour photographs. The wayfinding is my favourite though as it brings so much life to the streets and grey weather. If I had been at the festival, I probably would have walked away with all of the merchandise (and an illegally procured bus shelter or wayfinding poster!)