Balance, Design, Products, Technology
August 20, 2010
By Cerentha Harris
This week on the web…
1. Jeffrey Scherer’s Blog: An Architect’s Musings Occasional postings from an articulate architect who also happens to be the designer behind The Design Yard here at Herman Miller. Where to Start: An interesting and thoughtful piece on the iPad.
2. Emdashes I had dinner last night with Clark Malcolm who has been a writer and editor at Herman Miller for a very long time. He embodies all of the things I really enjoy about this company – a keen intellect, a sense of humor and that rare ability to see big picture as well as drill down to fine details. He is also an absolute stickler for grammar and I know I horrify him at times. Emdashes is for him. The blog is a mix of personal musings, geeky grammar and lots of personality from journalist, founder and editorial director Emily Gordon. Where to start: The post titled “So You Love Punctuation?” I think Clark should have been the judge for that competition.
3. ArtPrize There’s a lot of buzz around Michigan’s ArtPrize competition this year and the final count shows over 1700 artists from around the world will be involved. You get to vote for the winner and the top prize is $250,000. You can read more about it on the ArtPrize blog. Herman Miller is one of the sponsors and we’re bringing out artist and architect Maya Lin. I’m a huge fan of her work and this lecture is free. It’s on Saturday, October 2 at 6:30 in the Grand Rapids Art Museum. Where to start: The incredibly cute baby sporting the new ArtPrize clothing range.
4. Five Books This is such a cool idea – every day the editorial team posts the best five books recommended by a leading writer, thinker or politician in their area of expertise. Where to start: Even if you don’t buy a single books the blog is a good read all by itself – start at the top.
5. Keiichi Matsuda There are times when I feel like the world of technology is rushing forward at breakneck speed and I will have to work very hard to catch up. And then I come across a designer and film-maker like Matsuda who manages to write a blog that clearly and concisely deals with new technology and thinking in a way I can actually relate to. Where to start: The only annoying aspect of his cleanly-designed Tumblr blog is you can’t link to individual stories. Find the August 3 post on technology – Disney-style.
Balance, Design, Products
August 20, 2010
By Amy Feezor
Here’s a Friday bonus: an extra playlist this week from Grain Edit founder (and Lifework contributor) Dave Cuzner. Start your weekend with the Oakland-based designer’s favorite tunes—a smart mix of jazz, old swing-y country, chill, and R&B/Soul (great with a glass of wine and dinner outside with friends).
What do you listen to while you work? I usually start the day off with an up-tempo bossa or funk cut. I need something with a thick groove to wake me up and get my day going. As I begin to dip into the day’s workload, I slow down the tempo and lower the volume. I’ll usually throw on a jazz album or listen to talk radio. At night, I log into Netflix and stream a movie while I answer emails.
How do you listen? Since I work from home, I can listen to my music out loud. I have a chubby little sub woofer and a speaker set plugged into my Macbook Pro. In the past I listened to records while I worked, but recently I find it too distracting to get up and flip the record each time it reaches the end of a side.
Do you have any favorite music websites/providers? Sure do. Here’s a few of my faves: Props radio, Soul Sides, KALX, and Quimsy’s Mumbo Jumbo.
DAVE’S PLAYLIST
Camino del Sol, Antena
InnerSpeaker (The whole darn album), Tame Impala
New Life, Sounds of Liberation
Egypt Strut, Salah Ragab & The Cairo Jazz Band
To Brother John, DJ Food
Lost Week-end, Wanda Jackson
Cloudy Shoes, Damien Jurado
Nothing But A Heartache, The Flirtations
Pearlie’s Swine, Monica Zetterlund
Buddah, Jazz Quintet
A Go Go, Dara Puspita
Opiniao, Zelia Barbosa
Nava, Lloyd Miller & The Heliocentrics
Images: Dave Cuzner
Design
August 19, 2010
By Cerentha Harris
On the way to my morning meeting at The Design Yard with the Herman Miller dot com team I couldn’t resist taking some shots. The building was designed by Jeff Scherer and having driven all over Holland, Zeeland and Grand Rapids for the last week I can see exactly where he was coming from with his design. The building, on a 40 acre rural site in Holland, holds architectural references to the rural landscape, barn architecture, and also the screened porch vernacular that informs so many of the homes I’ve seen in Holland (I got lost this morning so I saw A LOT of houses).
It was also nice to see the Girard silk screen for print that graces Lifework’s blog.
Technology
August 19, 2010
By Cerentha Harris
“When you’re putting together your home office, especially if you are a mobile warrior and work off your laptop most of the time, it’s really nice to have a big monitor at home so that you can use your laptop more like a desktop. In the past, docking stations were a must, but nowadays, mobile users just need a decent-sized keyboard, and a mouse so that they are ready to go coupled with a good monitor.
The most important thing about a monitor is its general size, which is measured from diagonally in inches from one corner to the other. Anything under 20″ is definitely too small for most users. The other thing that important is the screen resolution. Most computer monitors have great resolution, which is still better than HDTV resolution, so it’s important to get as high of a resolution as you can. The thing is that you can always select a smaller resolution when setting up your computer, or simply use the zoom feature of many apps.
Refresh-rate is also a particularly important feature. This will cut down on the flicker rate that can be perceptible to some users. The latest monitors use LEDs, which offer great brightness. It’s almost shocking when you put an older LCD next to a new LED screen and compare them. LEDs are the way to go, even if they are slightly more expensive.
A brand that I trust is Viewsonic. My last two computer monitors have been from Viewsonic and I’ve had no complaints. My latest is a Viewsonic 22-inch screen. There are almost no dead pixels and the resolution is good at 1680 × 1050. I always trump the largest size possible, within a certain budget. When I upgrade, I’ll go for a 27-inch screen.
Dell also makes some good screens as does Sceptre. You can get a 27-inch monitor for around $500 and you can easily spend up to $1,000 on it if you go with Dell. The new Apple Cinema Display will also cost a lot more. The 30-inch used to cost $1,800. The 24-inch LED LCD from Apple is sometimes available on special for $599. Check out our full review of this monitor here.
By Range.”
This story appears in partnership with Unplggd, a site for people who embrace technology and design in their home.
Balance, Design
August 18, 2010
By Cerentha Harris
There are bees at Herman Miller. Lots of them. I’d read about the them and watched the video. It wasn’t until yesterday, after a long afternoon in archives that I decided to traipse out and see them for myself. First, forget the bees, I’ve never seen so many crickets in my life. The wide mown path that leads to the hives was home to probably 50,000 of the critters who scattered (I hope) at my every step. The yellow and white wooden hives are neatly arranged in a field across from the GreenHouse (the place where, among other things, Aeron chairs are assembled and my boss works). The award-winning building was designed by William McDonough + Partners in 1995. Part of the design includes the open meadow and wetland around the building that processes and purifies the building’s stormwater. The meadow also means there’s less lawn to water, mow and less need for herbicides and pesticides. You can see from the pictures this certainly makes a very nice environment for a bee.
Design, Products
August 18, 2010
By Cerentha Harris
Susan Huls, the new editor of our sister blog Discover, has put together a very nice post on the new Eames Select Hang-It-All. I know I want one (we wrote about them back in July). I may have to wait for my birthday next June. Although, it’s a limited edition piece so if you want one too you’ll have to move on it before February.
Here’s what Susan had to say “This year, Herman Miller’s Select program is offering a classic interpretation of the multicolored Eames Hang-It-All. Sophisticated touches to the already eye-catching design include a black steel frame and solid walnut hooks.
The Hang-It-All was inspired by the Eameses’ love for playful furniture and children’s toys. Introduced in 1953, it was designed to hold an assortment of children’s belongings—mittens, scarves, jackets, dolls, slingshots, skates, and knapsacks, according to Eames Design.
It was available from Tigrett Enterprises’ Playhouse Division until the company went out of business in 1961. Herman Miller reintroduced it in 1994.
Herman Miller’s Gregg Vander Kooi chose to feature the Hang-It-All as this year’s Select item because of its whimsical appeal.
“Plus,” he adds, “walnut is a fairly neutral wood that fits with almost any décor.”
The Select Hang-It-All carries a minimum advertised price of $249. It will be available from the company’s global network of dealerships and retailers.
Hurry! It’s only available until February 15, 2011, or while supplies last.”
Balance, Design, Products, Technology
August 18, 2010
By Amy Feezor
Take just one look at the logos, typefaces, and typographic illustrations by Seb Lester and you’ll be able instantly to tell that his passion lies in letterforms. The London-based designer, whose clients include Apple, Nike, Intel, The New York Times, and The 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, gave us a peek inside his playlist while working on pieces for a possible solo show in London in 2011.
What do you listen to while you work? There aren’t really many genres of music I won’t listen to and I listen to music all the time. Looking through my “Recently Played” list in iTunes there’s The Smiths, Grieg, The Sixteen, some Medieval music, Gorillaz, Dean Martin, and lots of electronica by people like Noisia, Broken Note, Klute, and Calibre.
How do you listen? I work long hours, so I listen on headphones when it’s late but mostly via computer speakers via iTunes.
Do you have any favorite music websites/providers? I use the BBC iPlayer a lot. For electronic music, I visit my friends at Knowledge.
Does music influence your work? Music does inspire me and fuel my work. I find myself listening to different music depending on what I’m designing. If I’m designing a book jacket for a book of medieval poetry, I find listening to Anthrax doesn’t really help me get inside the head of what a 15th-century monk might be thinking. Some aspects of my work are somewhat drawn out, repetitive, and technical—though Anthrax might be more appropriate listening in terms of keeping me awake late at night as I battle a deadline. Letterforms are like music in that they can be very expressive and convey moods and emotions, albeit in a more muted way.
Where do you find music recommendations? Who influences your musical taste? I guess friends and specific DJs on stations like Radio 1 and Classic FM. Obviously websites are clever now with their “People who bought this also bought this” trickery, so I have been known to find out about other artists that way.
If your work was a song or a musician, what or who would it be? Very difficult because I try to keep my work as diverse as my taste in music. Whether it happens or not, the musician I’d like to best represent my work one day would be someone who could turn his hand to any style and do it at the highest level.
SEB’S PLAYLIST
Swing Me a Swing Song, Benny Goodman
Split the Atom, Noisia
Danse Royale, St George’s Canzona
Officium Defunctorum, The Sixteen
On Melancholy Hill, Gorillaz
When You’re Smiling, Dean Martin
Less Los Ablos, Calibre
Penny Serenade, Guy Lombardo
Smokin’ Mountain, Alex Dolby
Reason to Believe, Bobby Darin
Images: Seb Lester
Technology
August 17, 2010
By Cerentha Harris
“There are so many options, and so many different antivirus software available right now, that it can get really confusing on what to buy or download for your computer. Every computer needs an antivirus scanner, even if you have a Mac. That being said, here are our picks.
1. Kaspersky Antivirus and Internet Security
My preferred antivirus, malware, and internet security software. It can be set to be harsh toward viruses and other malware. The scans can also be set deep to root out any deeply encrusted viruses. Of all of the antivirus software I’ve tried, this one helped me resolve some major viruses and malware. It was the only one that would run on my computer, since the viruses would stop the other scanners from completing their scans.
2. Avast Antivirus
Avast is free to use and its ease of use makes it definitely the one antivirus that most computer users should use, no matter what their expertise level. The free version is very basic but gets the job done. You’ll come to love when the software says “Virus database has been updated”.
3. AVG Free Antivirus
AVG is another antivirus that is available in a free edition. I’ve found that it has more features than Avast and I prefer it to the previous one, but Avast is just so easy to use, so this is why Avast ranks higher than AVG.
4. Panda Security
One of the antivirus scanners that we like and that’s pretty easy to use. It’s available from their website for $40.
5. McAfee
Out of the bigger antivirus software companies, I prefer McAfee. It works well, has a bunch of features and is quite reliable.
I used Norton a few years ago, but there was a problem with it and I almost lost a full hard drive filled with movies, music, and other stuff. Although I can only relate what happened to me, not what generally happens with Norton, it was enough to ward me off any Symantec products.
MORE PC TIPS
Uninstalling Software to Free Up HD Space In Windows 7
Automated Diagnostics That You Should Run On Your PC
By Range.”
This story appears in partnership with Unplggd, a site for people who embrace technology and design in their home.
Balance, Design, Products
August 17, 2010
By Amy Feezor
1. Eames Hang-It-All – Select Edition Nearly six decades ago, Charles and Ray Eames designed the much-loved Hang-It-All. And as of August 15, a new version is available with solid walnut hooks instead of colorful balls. Could we be more excited? Get it: Herman Miller
2. Symbol Coat Rack, $410 During the summer, this rack by Desu Design looks lovely with vibrant anodized hooks that lay flat. But come fall, the hooks pull out to hang cozy coats, scarves, and hats. Get it: Horne
3. Hang On Wall Hanger, €67 The disorderly look of clothes carelessly thrown in piles inspired British designer Jade Barnes-Richardson’s coat-hanger creation. Get it: Normann Copenhagen
4. Coat Range, $195 This functional snow-capped landscape by Brave Space leaves little impact on the real frontier—it’s made from excess material from the Brooklyn-based furniture company’s cut sheets. Get it: Supermarket
5. Sticks Coat Hanger, £164 This unique space-saving rack from Scandinavian designer Stina Sandwallis was created to evoke the feel of a Swedish forest. Get it: Funktion Alley
