Plants in the spotlight

Like every year I visited the graduation exposition of the HKU, Utrecht school of Arts, design department. It reminded me of my own graduation at Artemis; long hours of hard work, lots of black coffee and many visits to the copyshop. While I graduated in 2009 with a trendbook for Laura Ashley on the animals being the new heroes, Romanimal, some things have changed.

Now in several disciplines like interior, illustration and productdesign there's a theme to be discovered. Plants in the spotlight! 

website student Sanne Vos

website HKU Exposure

Medieval Pantone

Recently a Dutch book historian, Erik Kwakkel, did a stunning discovery in the archives of a library in Aix-en-Provence.

A mysterious Dutch crafstman, named A. Boogert made an encyclopedic book of colour charts,

intended to be an instructional guide to painting in watercolour. 

'Klaer lightende Spiegel der Verfkonst' dates from the year 1692 and contains nearly 800 pages with all different shades of colours, all mixed and painted by hand. Each colour is named in an enormous index. Even in the 17th century they were described by poetic names such as ‘grapevine black’.

The irony is the fact that only very few people will have seen this work of art live, while it must have been one of the most comprehensive guides to paint and color of its time.Fortunately the entire book can now be seen here :

digital library

Source:

Erik Kwakkel

Reference: 

Food Film Festival

Yesterday I visited the Food Film Festival in Amsterdam, which combines two wonderful ingredients: films and food! 

I saw an animation in a two-person photobooth cinema, discovered trends in You Tube food video's (apperently in Korea you can earn a living by eating in front of a webcam) and tested the special brew festivalbeer Lekkerbek! And obviously had some great food from one of the foodtrucks. Maybe one day I'll start organising my own FFF!

Food Film Festival website

Ladies and Gentlemen

Ladies and Gentlemen, after months of hard work I'm very proud to present my brand new logo. My graphic designer Tessa Kwee and I developed a clear corporate identity. We produced the (business)cards and tags ourselves at Kapitaal in Utrecht. I didn't now screen printing is such heavy work! After a long day of very physical labour the result is stunning, such deep colours can never be obtained with digital prints. So, now I'm ready to promote Studio West Styling! 

Tessa Kwee Graphic Design

Kapitaal Utrecht

Summerdays

This year during our summer holidays my boyfriend and I decided to have a photo-contest to see who

made the best picture. 

The judges haven't decided yet but I think this one, featuring a rice-pudding (!) flavoured icecream in Mundaka, is pretty close to winning the game!

From here to there

In the north of Amsterdam there's the industrial area of the NDSM wharf. 

Every summer there's a great theatre festival, Over t Ij.

Various performances in raw surroundings, with a view on the docks.

My favorite one was 'Van hier naar daar' (from here to there), in a cargo container. You were asked to write a letter about a memory, in a lovely post-office setting. On beautiful paper and with a fountain pen. Today I received on my doormat someone else's memory!

Flowerbar

Last saturday I visited the graduation exposition of HKU (School of the Arts). 

Like every year I've seen some very interesting projects in various fields of design; interior, fashion, product and illustration.  

But the coolest project by far was 'Een vergeten taal' (a forgotten language) from graphic designer Deborah van Mourik.

She invented a so called 'flowerbar' to revaluate the symbolic language of flowers. Just choose some of your personal characteristics which you file on the 'karakterkaart' and she handpicks the seeds of the flower who carries these features. Plant them and you get the most original bouquet!

more info on website HKU - graduation