an impossible task: designing wabi-sabi

Here is the definition of Wabi- Sabi from wikipedia :

Wabi-sabi represents a comprehensive Japanese world view or aesthetic centred on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent and incomplete". It is a concept derived from the Buddhist teaching.
Characteristics of the wabi-sabi aesthetic include asymmetry, asperity (roughness or irregularity), simplicity, economy, austerity, modesty, intimacy and appreciation of the ingenuous integrity of natural objects and processes.

Here are three wabi-sabi inspired projects:

'Facets' by Vincent Ow

Wabi-Sabi table calendar by Angela Cho

Those three projects are quite randomly selected from Behance, under the search of the word wabi-sabi. Now, do you feel a discomfort in all of them; irrelevant of their independent styles? What I mean, when you look for the imperfection and beauty in incompleteness, could you achieve this idea with a careful design and planning process? To put it differently,
can you plan the unplanned?

I think this question is the reason of my discomfort in all three projects since relating wabi-sabi to a careful design project is a very assertive task. Another point, design (in my understanding) tends to achieve many products. For instance a chair design can be send to mass production to produce 1000 identically same chair. If you repeat the so called 'unplanned' element in the design for 1000 times, apart from its very unplanned nature, the result chair would not be unique anymore. However in crafts, it is very different in method. Hand-made ceramic bowls for instance are created one by one, each carrying a randomness or lets say chance factor in it. There, wabi-sabi works perfectly.

Shortly, design is not the right place for wabi-sabi, I believe.

Paper lunch bag + deli gömleği(straitjacket)

1-Okey, irony disappears when it is referred to. (lately I realised this) But in order to explain following ideas, certain reference has to be made.

2-Can the structure of straitjacket or any sort of association of the jacket be implied on paper lunch bag?

3- Would this association be legible since in Turkey a very small minority use paper bags and except the ones who once lived abroad and the ones who watch American sitcoms, do we know the common usage of 'paper lunch bag'?

4-If yes, then an association between paper lunch bag and certain implication about straitjacket could be ironic.

5-Is it fair to say ironic or is it perhaps a very rude association?

6-If it is rude; this is a fictional company and the possible patients are also fictional as a result. So, I design my patients/ clients to be humorist !

PROBLEM SOLVED

Also, here are some very very (very) cool straitjacket inspired clothing designs. Clothes have a sense of constraint. Material is very interesting: walnut wood on a wool base. So beautiful.

packages for invisible products

This week we supposed to find an idea for package design for our fictional company. My company does not produce any tangible products but it sells services which can be called as psychological support or consultancy. We had couple of ideas for related products however I can not distinguish this project from our gift project since the packages we would design, may not have a direct relevance to what the company sells.

What I have in mind is an invisible service package. For instance a package for anger managment that doesn't contain anything in the package actually but the package itself would be so tricky that opening it would require certain calmness. (a very difficult task for angry people) Once you opened it, it would show that you are on the right track in anger management since you didn't (hopefully) torn the package apart.

Ofcourse, developing a tricky package structure may be way too difficult to complete in two weeks plus it resembles to newyear/ bayram gift designs in principle.

However it would be nice to work on packages for invisible products.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrap_rage

head-body match : funny or scary?

These days, images with animal heads attached to regular size human bodies capture my attention, somehow (!). I think, I began to realize them with the video clip of 'What does the fox say?' by Ylvis. There you see young people wearing costumes and also animal masks with a regular human outfit. Until this point there seems to be no strangeness. However when I saw the following CD cover designs for Danny Sanderson, I thought, "enough with humans carrying animal heads!" although I really liked the designs with the illustration quality, color contrast between the characters in front and the pale natural backgrounds. The typography of the Hebrew alphabet also matches the overall design I guess, although I am not at all familiar with the Hebrew-alphabet typography. Apart from that all, penguin-headed humans in old fashioned swimming suits are so funny! They create a similar feeling to the video clip of Ylvis, 'What does the fox say?' But why?

The idea of humans with animal heads, gives the feeling of nonsensicalness.(thanks Tureng) Humans differentiate from other creatures mostly because of the consciousness and maybe self-awareness they have. Okey, maybe animals also have self awareness but what I mean by that is the issue of being the thinking thing. The representative of this character of human beings is basically the head in our body. So, when you cut off the head from the human body and replace it with penguin or any sort of animal head, you lose the center of mind and sense and gain the feeling of nonsense. I believe that is why it is so funny; let's rip off the center of reason and be funny.

Of course maybe those CD designs or video clips are funny just because the animals are cute. (One does not have to make a further analysis.) We don't see a penguin everyday and putting a penguin head to human body is an unusual match for us. But why the mythological character Centaur is not funny at all then? It is also an unusual match; a horse body with a human head. Centaur is very frightening for me I mean, who would laugh at this very serious and aggressive creature? So, back to the second paragraph, there must be a relation with this idea, the head as a source of seriousness and boredom (reason). Centaur has an animal body and human head; the presence of the human head as the source of sense, avoids Centaur to be funny.

Humans with animal heads: A CD cover design

Humans with animal masks from the video clip of 'What Does The Fox Say?'

mythological creature Centaur, not funny at all.

Negativity burst: poetic interrupted with tree man disease

Having a dining table with a section for plants must be nice. Nice like haiku poems. But I find this table design more disturbing than it is nice for one reason: rough trunks/branches of the tree used as table legs remind me of tree-man disease.

Even if I didn't know about the tree-man disease, I would still think that the table is over-designed. Sharing a meal time with plants is a good idea but this design screams artificial green. Those table legs are results of a taste which is very similar to the taste that puts artificial flowers in living room. Artificial flowers are very attractive, clean but very depressing.
I think the problem with this design could be solved if the table could decide what it is. Is it a non-living object or a creepy alien which sadly has tree-man disease?

O Tannenbaum!

Surprisingly, this post is not about glasses; it is the story of a wooden box.

For Marko Paşa gift package, my mission was to find a very simple wooden box... So on internet there were very promising offers but for wholesale. No one wanted to make only 3 boxes of course and they suggested mdf (Medium Density Fiberboard;enlightenment) boxes that wood painters use for non-wholesale. Mdf boxes are good in size, variety however they have this dishonest color and character. They are basically used for painting over, actually now I feel kind of sympathy for mdf since they remind me of goalkeepers waiting for an attack made by them. It would be nice to show a mdf without hiding it with paint but I am off the topic right now, mdf boxes are not alive and although it is sad that they will never be exhibited without painting over, it is a school project and I need actual wood,not the medium density.

In search of a simple wooden box which is not mdf, I went to Çemberlitaş to see a carpenter. I said to the guy there that my uncle suggested this place as it was the case. The owner of the carpenter's shop did not remember my uncle and this caused a discomfort in him I guess. (why am I having this Jane Austen language?!) So he offered me a cup of fine tea with milk while the clocks were showing 5, kidding, but he actually ordered regular tea in incebelli and said the price. I immediately left the place while the clocks were showing 5.05...It was expensive. So I called my mom (I'm 22) and a friend to see what can be done. Mom said come back home and the friend gave his father's number. Coşkun Amca was ready to make the simple wooden box. It was good luck but I wanted to step by to Tahtakale since it was on my way. However sad mdf's were all over the place.A guy suggested Şarkhan. Şarkhan had everything except my simple wooden box. This place was like a center for Derya Baykals and they had overdecorated overcoloured over everything. So on my way back home which was including a second pass from Tahtakale to the port, something super happened. The answer was right in front of my face and it was already on my blog.

This place was called as the gate for time-travel in my previous post about Tahtakale. A carpenter with a very narrow entrance made my wish come true. They had the very simple wooden box which is not mdf and for good price I guess. We shook hands while my warm tears were wetting the narrow entrance of this magical carpenter.

Although the final of the story is that I found the box, what one can infer from the story is countless. (ibretlik bir hikaye)

First, being VACD student is like living in the huge gap between Derya Baykalling and mass production. Simple wooden boxes are available for the ones who can order 100 and for the hobby establishers, mdf's are waiting to be painted over with sailboats. (sorry hobby owners, it was an over-generalisation)

Second, as a Sabanci University student, I learned that Tannenbaum (pinetree) is not only a Christmas Carroll lyric but it is the material of my box. What this means, we live in such a theoretic and spurious environment in campus that Tahtakale again showed the realities of needs and production. As a design student I decided to have more teas with carpenters in incebelli rather than only admiring scandinavian behance parades.

typographic glasses

I think designers like accessories very much. I see an increasing number in retro-glasses, cool and simple watches, beautiful leather bags and such things around me. I even have a cousin who is studying arts and wearing glasses without the actual glass. What is the thing that enables us to those little ornaments nowadays more and more? Is it our need for solidity in a very digital field? I call them ornaments because glasses are used more for decorative purposes than their function or wristwatches are somewhat like table calendars(hello teacher!) for many of us; more for beauty, less for function.

Following products are brilliant for many reasons. They are very elegant, they fill a very obvious gap in design field because typography lovers were out of typographic T-Shirts. (Ok we get it, you love typography) And my cousin may take the glass out of windows, I believe.

And I reveal the real reason why I made this post. Sorry but it was my idea; Marko Pasa logo contains glasses which is made of letters for a Freudian look... (or a Jungian; you'll not be forgotten) My glasses' font is Collaborate Thin. And I will try to make the actual glasses too for company's gift package which is getting more and more suicidal by the end of the break.

http://type.gs/

package design

I didn't understand very much the function of the balancing blocks. Also what is the chart for? It says:

SVBSCRIPTION is a luxury service for men that delivers a thoughtfully curated collection of objects to subscribers’ doorsteps. Based on a new theme each quarter, SVBSCRIPTION packages include items geared towards individuals who have an appreciation for design, culture and quality. For their V3 parcel they explored the notion of leisure, encouraging subscribers to take full advantage of their time off the clock with objects to entertain and inspire. Designed to emphasize states of leisure in both daytime and evening.

Ok, but how do they work? Apart from that, I liked the simplicity of the wooden box, the blue ink stamp logo, the material with geometric pattern and the balancing blocks. They are all very pleasing to eye.

I am also thinking a set of wooden blocks for Marko Paşa gift with the idea of 'we complete the missing wooden blocks/sticks' (eksik tahtaları tamamlarız)

selective perception

I'm just happy that I'm not doing Murat's project in Turkey(moustache land). But he can be happy too, for not living in 1980-90's.

混乱*

My visit to Tahtakale was a surreal experience with huge plush animal toys, illegal tobacco benches, vigorously dancing Santas, real meat smells, some shops which can be dated around 1960's. My eyes got so tired at some point from this over-exposed, exaggerated world with such different, sometimes weird components. You may hear that your heart beats but it was like I was in my heart or I had to eat my heart. (Ok, sorry) After I got used to the situation, my senses got so sharp that afterwards, when I got out of the labyrinthic market, I felt somehow desaturated with less vibrant colors with less action and with less components to see. Now, I may be exaggerating of course but this is the result of Tahtakale, the world of overness. (Tahtakaleye giren bir tahta vermeden çıkamaz, Sorry again!)

It is now quite hard to resolve a such a degree complexity. Think of it in this way, you read the word complexity letter by letter to word make a sense. What if the word complexity is in Chinese? (By the way I'm still looking for a Chinese reader: remember my post on  22th of October; Minor Crises)  Could you resolve the word without knowing the language which is in this case, Chinese?

Tahtakale is a place where the word is not only written in Chinese but also in other languages and perhaps this over composition is for now, over-over too difficult to break into letters;pieces.

I definetely need to make more visits to Tahtakale. I liked the place a lot.

a true name for a shop, reminded me of 'etme bulma dünyası' or 'kurtlar sofrası'

a gateway for timetravelling

sorry for the crappy photos, I took them with iphone because I didn't want to be the tourist-looking guy in this intimate place. 

*confusion in Chinese.

a phase

I don't want to make a comment about the video regarding the typography or style but here are some words for the content:

I felt somewhat relaxed after seeing this, I think most of us, vcd students, consider the taste we have as at least "above the average." I know that many of us are not satisfied with the work we've done, after seeing so many good pieces. A few of us think that it is something temporal, therefore I dedicate this (can I dedicate something even though the work doesn't belong to me?) video to my classmates who have constant insecurity for their work-including myself. 

something similar to Marko Paşa (I hope)

I found this while I was looking at Penguin Book covers. I would like to do something similar for my Marko Paşa Psikolojik Danışmanlık Hizmetleri branding project. I am also thinking of a bright red among various grey tones and black. 

Placement of the glasses is a nice reference to the title of the book since it is cropped as if the right corner has just left. It reminded me also the end of a line, glasses works as dash symbol. 

It is such a classy design.

making designs on a very exciting topic

Editorial design for the topic of synesthesia carries the danger of being lost in the content itself. Cross-sensation, intermingled perceptions and dense feeling of every sensory experience may confuse the designer therefore it is a very very exciting subject. What I liked about the following designs is that the designer was able to control him/herself so that the design is not over the content.

One could initially imagine a design with vivid or even perhaps psychedelic colours and interrelations such as a sudden irrelevant image in the work. (For instance a pink rabbit staring from the corner of the cover or so) Such emotional designs could be attractive but they would probably overshadow the content by leaving no room for the words.

That is why I liked this project a lot. It didn't fall into trap of over-design. Selected colours are more than enough; yellowish red, black and the off-white are very pleasing to the eye. The Æ detail is smart and refers to the cross sensory of synesthesia in a very neat way. Two layered cover is also a very incisive decision for the topic. It contributes the content but does not overshadow it. This project for me is about knowing where to stop in design process.

For the information about synesthesia : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia

lettertalk

An advertisement series for Penguin Books captured my attention for several reasons. First, I liked the idea of the letters expressing themselves. The letter-talks have (self)references since the short texts are taken from some of the published books although I couldn't find which books they are. Secondly, they are funny, but not in a way "It's funny, so better you laugh!"(here could come two more !'s but it's irritating for me to see three !'s side by side) They are funny in a very subtle way.(hello Mr. Aksel)
The designs also carry a great consistency with the slogan on the top right, next to the logo of Penguin Books, saying "There is life in a book." I understood from this: If only two letters can talk this much, imagine a whole book.  That is why I find this advertisements witty, subtle and complete, exactly like a book which I would like to read.

organ-ic, geo-metric

After I saw this quote, and after our table discussion with family members on what organic is, I decided to look up the meanings and word roots of 'organic' and 'geometric' in dictionary. (It is a killing process to decide whether it's worth to look up or not thanks to my 'explorer' soul.) Anyway, what I've found is interesting

geometric-geo means earth, ground in Ancient Greek. Metric means measurement. Geometric derives from the mother nature itself: the measurement of earth. So, it is not as we (or perhaps only me and Donald Judo) have understood that geometry is not related to pure natural forms and is more abstract and perfect but geometry and 'geometric' are indeed about the earth itself.

organic- organ means device, means, tool. Up to now, I had an image of chubby dirty hens and amorph cucumbers when someone says 'organic'. But this definition changed my mind. That is why Donald my friend,
although I find following designs refreshing and nice, integrating organic and geometric is not a discovery since they are already fused to one another.







(I think it's a postbox)

Last words: will you be amazed as well with the following words?
earth- die Erde- Arzın merkezine yolculuk- Ardında bırak
eng    -   german - sanskrit                          -arabic

Minor crises: Drawing tree branches and plant scape

Drawing tree branches has always been an issue for me. I remember when I was a kiddo it was one of the most difficult part of the drawing. Today, whenever I want to draw a nice tree branch, I get horrified. What is problematic cannot be easily translated into language. Something doesn’t go well. Something is very disturbing with drawing tree branches. This would not be a problem if I only found my branch drawings in that way- somehow deficient, but it goes so most of the time with other’s works too.

Lately I've encountered a catalogue of Chinese drawings by a nameless (for Chinese alphabet non-readers) artist. What I find interesting in these drawings is that none of the tree branches seemed flawed, amiss or awkward to me. Somehow they don’t disturb me at all and they even give a great visual pleasure. When I was taking the Major Works of Eastern Art class, the professor had mentioned that in Chinese art, the artist goes on long spiritual journeys in which he(perhaps she too?) observes the nature for years but does not directly reflect the things seen on paper. Rather he waits for years until the nature becomes a part of him so that he can draw or paint the things he saw for years with an-so to say- internal eye.

I would like to think of these following works in that way too.

Also, there are Chinese letters on page and also stamp looking signatures indicating different owners of the work.  The placements of the text as well as the signatures compose a very beautiful interacting designed work together. I wonder the moment when the first owner is about to put the red signature: ‘where should I sign?’ Or is he putting them around without thinking a lot?

If anyone knows how to read Chinese and would like to help me, I'll put his name as well.

rectangular sheep

We have been told to question our taste all the time and to re-re-reconsider our thoughts on a project.Also not to leave the first glance alone however isn't it that first look which gives the feeling of like or dislike most of the time? When I saw the following branding project, I immediately liked it:  there are harmonized (this word scares me as if I am on the edge of a lame poetry) colors, beautiful typography, tasty papers etc. But are they the first/main reasons why I liked it? Certainly not, the rectangular sheep, you caught my eye! I'm kind of worried these days; whether my taste focuses more on the content(the subject) than the device(design)

company names

This week we talked about different company names which could be kind of funny. Not haha funny but like smiling inside ones. So, here are my suggestions:

Karambol Hukuk Müşavirliği

Demir Leblebi Danışmanlık

Baldırıçıplak Genç Giyim

Cadı Kazanı Medya Takip

Marko Paşa Psikolojik Destek Hizmetleri

Efendime Söyliyeyim Gazetesi- I think I'll make one for my own anyway.

Bi' tur Ulaşım Hizmetleri (car renting but this reminds me of gnctrkcll's slimy advertisement language)

Med-Cezir Sağlık 

Anasının Gözü Çocuk Yuvası. (and that was again for me)

simplistic corporate identity

Hello,

I've never had a blog of my own. ( I had a shared blog for two months) It is a little bit scary to announce what you like or don't, because when you remain silent, you always have the chance to say, "Ooov, if you knew what I have in mind..." But now, it is a total decipher for me.

So, here we go:

Something simple, decent-a word which we used a lot last year-, and classy. Ok, it is also a little boring.