Thursday, August 23, 2007

Hello, you - Our Ref: (KMM5896382I10596L0KM)

Judy Delin received an email with this title from Virgin Media about her cable TV account. A wonderful juxatposition of matey brand language and bureaucracy. You're not just a number. Well, you are.

The email welcomes her to her new provider, and concludes 'The whole adventure is just beginning'. Worrying, that phrase.

Saturday, August 04, 2007

Out of sight

I'm on holiday in Seattle, and just visited Peter Miller Books - he has a great stock of design and architecture books from small publishers as well as large. I've been there before and I always discover something I haven't seen before.

It's a stimulating and attractive shop to browse in. But you quickly discover that many of the books are out of reach - and out of sight, given the propensity of typographers to use tiny type on design books. Some of the shelves are, at a guess, over 3 metres tall. They look great - with their varying heights, they give the effect of a city skyline.

Peter says he puts the good stuff he doesn't want finger marks on there - books you have to know about and ask for. But I'm not so sure. It's also notable that there are no signs or labels to show how the shop is organised, and I think this reflects something wayfinding designers quickly learn about architects: it's mostly about how it looks and feels, and they hate signs.