Archive for the ‘Design’ Category

Typography Monday! The Braces »

Typography Monday! The Braces

These are mainly used in math, although people looking for a little decorative edge use them as well.

Typography Monday! The Ampersand »

Typography Monday! The Ampersand

This comes from the shorthand of a guy named Marcus Tullius Tiro who lived way back in the first century AD. It's a ligature for the Latin word et. Many use it to mean 'and' and it is also used in the names of companies. Like Barnum & Bailey.

Typography Monday! The At »

Typography Monday! The At

The at comes from a Latin preposition for ad. It represents the word 'at.'

Typography Monday! The Octothorp »

Typography Monday! The Octothorp

The octothorp, also called a hash or a pound sign, first was used in cartography. It was used to represent a village. Now it means 'number.'

Typography Monday! The Caret »

Typography Monday! The Caret

This is most commonly used when editing documents. It's a mark you use to signify that something needs to be added. It comes from the Latin phrase it needs.

You And I Will Change The World »

You And I Will Change The World

This is my favorite saying. It's actually from a Hebrew song that I just adore (I can hear the tumbling notes bobbing around in my head) and it's something I truly believe. This saying is so important to me that my husband and I had it written along two sides of our chuppah at our wedding.

Typography Monday! The æ »

Typography Monday! The æ

The æ can be pronounced ash. In English, it represents the greek alpha iota. In some European countries, it represents one of the a vowels.

Typography Monday! The Question Mark »

Typography Monday! The Question Mark

A question mark is a punctuation mark. It belongs at the end of interrogative sentences.

Typography Monday! The Comma »

Typography Monday! The Comma

The comma is used for separation. The Greek word komma means 'a short clause' hence where our comma comes from. The comma is used as a decimal point in many European countries.

Typography Monday! The Double Dagger »

Typography Monday! The Double Dagger

This mark is used in footnotes. People also call it a double obelus or a double obelisk and a diesis.

Typography Monday! The Pilcrow »

Typography Monday! The Pilcrow

This mark isn't used very often today. It marks the beginning of a section, or paragraph. You've probably seen it as an invisible character in Microsoft Word.

Vintage Find | Antique Musical Carousel »

Vintage Find | Antique Musical Carousel

If you don't already, go to your nearest thrift store on a regular basis. There are treasures to be had. Finds to discover. Trinkets to claim. Look at this. It's a carousel. Made of some metal of some sort...zinc maybe? No idea. It's certainly not a recent creation. Look at the details. Doesn't it just capture you? Pull you

Etegami From A Correspondent »

Etegami From A Correspondent

Lookie Lookie. This is an etegami done by Deborah Davidson, from Sapporo, Japan. I found her blog a few months ago and discovered this ancient Japanese art form called etegami. According to Debbie, "Etegami (e="picture" tegami="letter") are simple drawings accompanied by a few apt words, and they are usually done on postcards. They

Typography Monday! The Copyright »

Typography Monday! The Copyright

A symbol representing a person or group's exclusive right to reproduce, publish or sell his or her original work of authorship. Did you know that you're supposed to put it on the baseline? Not up top?

Typography Monday! The Dagger »

Typography Monday! The Dagger

The dagger is a reference mark used in footnotes and to mark the names of those who have died. You can also call this a diesis, an obelus, a cross or an obelisk.

Beautiful Beads »

Beautiful Beads

These photos were taken for a product catalog and I just had to share two of them. They just look cool. Both of these were not used in the final catalog, I think, but they were done for 'lifestyle' type images. Many of the beads were supposed to reflect the photographer. You can barely make out the photographer in the magnifying glass

Fortune Telling | An Old Book »

Fortune Telling | An Old Book

I found this book in a 200-year-old church turned into a hub-bub of an antique store in Metamora, Indiana. It was $2. And worth every penny. The cover was ripped off the book, so the title page is now the cover. This amazing book will tell you your horoscope, teach you how to tell fortunes, decode your dreams and explain palmistry to you.

Glyphs | The Asterisk »

Glyphs | The Asterisk

The asterisk. We all use it. Most of us use it to pretty-up a blog post or as an alternate bullet point. But, as with all glyphs, there's more to it than just that. The asterisk was first used in European typography as a special symbol to mark birth dates, and it's first use is traced back 5,000 years to Sumerian pictographs. Today, it's