This political season you are going to see a lot of buttons supporting various candidates. If you've ever been to a political rally you know how important these buttons are — they immediately identify who is friend and who is foe. Thanks to the guys at unconfessableideas.com we now can do the same with typefaces. They've done up some pin buttons for Serif and Sans-Serif. Now designer conferences are going to turn as heated as political rallies. Well, maybe not. Check out the pin buttons here and whole website full of clever objects (you might need to know a little Italian at times).

This past January, John Rambo (as portrayed by Sylvester Stallone), descended upon the borders of Myanmar to dole out “aid” in the form of explosions and plenty of collateral damage. Presently, that kind of “assistance” isn’t going to be of much benefit. Fortunately, the folks at Create/Reject have a more inventive, less violent idea for a way to assist the nation’s one million plus people still suffering from the effects of the May 2nd cyclone. Rather than relying on the use of force, they’re relying on the sale of fonts. Their simple response for the request for relief was to put together a book titled Fifty Designers Current Favorite Typefaces, featuring ideas from talents such as Stefan Sagmeister and Experimental Jetset. The best part of the whole deal is that all proceeds from the sale go directly to UNICEF. At the dirt cheap cost of nearly $6, it’s worth much more.

There is one sentence in the bio of Stefan Sagmeister that says both nothing and everything: "He has earned practically every important international design award." The bio does not continue on to list those awards, it just glides into other subject matter — much like a phrase your lawyer might insert to guard you from getting sued.

From a certain perspective, that statement is funny (because what more casual way to say you've kicked ass is there than to glaze over every accolade you've received), but in another way, it is potently telling. Stefan Sagmeister is an incredible designer — that much is clear — but his work and his lifestyle have made it abundantly clear where his heart is. It is in art, in simplicity, in communication and the universal nature of emotion. The last place it lives is a trophy shelf.

Design as religion (which is perhaps the most understandable way to describe Sagmeister's approach) is a far-fetched concept, but if you've stuck your face into his latest book, Things I Have Learned In My Life So Far, it is not as hard to imagine. Read on as we chat with Stefan about his studio, his opinions, and his willingness to depart from both from time to time in pursuit of a higher power.

READ MORE…

David Carvalho is up to more good. The Portugese artist and designer, also known as Karpa, wowed us back in December with his astonishing portfolio boasting works for clients such as Nike, Puma, and IdN magazine. We’re pleased to report that he’s come back with a bang thanks to a recent site update that gives us even more graphic wonders to swoon over. Visitors to Hello Karpa will be greeted with ten new works, including a billboard for Diesel and a spread for Japanese clothiers, Evisu. As if that weren’t enough, Carvalho is also offering up his ‘Divad’ typeface for download, allowing all of us to satisfy our need for sweet graphic design and typography in one fell swoop.

When it comes to getting some new sweet t-shirts, the folks at Progresswear know just the “type” you’re looking for. Known for producing shirts with political messages or as they like to say “meaningful messages for thinking people”, the socially conscious apparel brand has taken a bit of a departure from their usual aesthetic, releasing their first in their new line of shirts aimed at designers and typophiles alike. The Helvetica Neue Descending shirt is a redesign of Max Miedinger’s own classic 1957 work featuring one of our favorite fonts on a black t-shirt descending in weights ranging from Ultra Black 95 to Ultra Light 25. If you’re suffering from the same case of typophilia that we are, we recommend heading to their online store and grabbing one of these babies for yourself at the special pre-release price available until May 15th. A portion of the shirt sales will be donated to Design Education programs…sounds like the “type” of cause we could really get behind.

In July, we told you about the stunning visual imagery being created by Modern English team member Neil Duerden for a range of diverse clients including Nike, Vespa, Vivienne Westwood, D&G, and others. Well, a lot has happened since then; for instance, Aliens invaded the earth and then decided to leave it the way they found it, erasing everyone's memory of the entire event. Even through that dark time in world history the aforementioned UK-based graphic designer has continued to plug away with his special mix of organic imagery, vector designs and photography. The result of all of that hard work is on display at Neil's website which has just recently been updated with a new flash intro and a blog showcasing some of his latest eye-popping work for clients like Nickelodon and Medion. We recommend checking it out before the aliens come back and steal the rest of your memories...or better yet purchase a print for yourself.

It's been a long time coming for Crap Hound. Sean Tejaratchi's seminal clip-art zine has lay dormant for nine years since the release of Crap Hound #6. That's okay, he's been busy with other things like this Lightboxing project. While last time around Tejeratchi focused on a seemingly unconnected theme of death, telephone and scissors, his latest work seems to hone in on two topics that many people in the United States think should be unrelated. In an election year where religion and its role in government is always a hot topic, Tejeratchi's Crap Hound #7 takes aim at the theme of ‘Church and State’ with the help of his dazzling wit, as well as blunt images of Uncle Sam, Stars and stripes, and plenty of copyright free type faces. Pick up your copy today, because otherwise you might have to wait another nine years.

Favorite JS booksmith/art publisher Viction:ary has a few new titles that you won’t find at your local Barnes & Noble, which are well worth your cash/credit spendage:

• Simply Material is a visual compendium of media to use as your canvas. Can you liberate the art from concrete or harness the awesome potential of epoxy resin?
• Fashion Wonderland sounds like a fairly pretentious theme park, but contents of this book are pretty arresting. Tons of designers have contributed the illustrations and art they take their aesthetic cues from.
• Illustration - Play puts the spotlight on 23 international artists and their unique illo medium. Paper cutting, stitchery, hand knit, fabric piecing, origami, patchwork, and more are represented.
• Type Addicted is a thorough read for the font aficionado; see how real typographical artists slice up the Roman alphabet.

Related: Viction:ary Archive

If you feel that Helvetica isn’t living up to its potential (cough, heathen, cough) and there’s nothing new about Times New, typographical design site Reserves could be the graphic tool you’re looking for. The site is the brainchild of Mike Jarboe, who uses his aesthetic brand to influence the companies like DC Skate, Globe, Nixon, 686, Transworld Snow and Skateboarding…well, a lot of board sport culture. In keeping with their urban influenced typeface and stock art, Reserve has launched a few new elements: concrete surface texture stock images, an Atari-style pixel type called Scheme, and vector art-based silhouettes of Street Style.

Most pillows are there to make you more comfortable...or for someone to hit you in the face with. We prefer the former and it seems that Jack Crossing does, too. The pillow design, created by the third year graphic and communication design student, is part of a chair made of stained wood oak, and tells you exactly what it's there for. The words "Seat Down" imply the user to fasten their backside to the cushion while boasting a pretty sweet pattern of chair related images along with terrific typographical samples. Crossing's stellar seat logo is also featured on a variety of other products, which can be seen here.

The visually-conscious (or sometimes visually obsessive) among us see it everywhere: bad color combos, heinous spacing, over-sized logos, and — eww — excessive use of bad typefaces.

Now the design-minded have the means to take control... if taking control means slapping a sticker on a poster and running back to the Mac. Design Police's downloadable Visual Enforcement Kit gives you a series of offense-marking stickers to gleefully place on bad kerning and other layout tragedies whenever you see fit. These five comprehensive pages of design-geek glory cover the gamut of offenses from ‘Do not use clip art!’ to ‘turn off the CAPS LOCK.’ My personal fave is ‘Hire a copywriter.’ Amen.

If this is making any sense to you so far you're probably a design geek, maybe even that particular sub-species: the typophile. If you're curious as to your own design/font geek status then here's an easy litmus test — if you find the ‘Comic Sans is illegal’ sticker amusing, then congratulations. Now get to stickering.

Via notcot

Seb Lester isn't just another pretty face in the typography world...he made the "scene." Or, at least that's the name of one the several typefaces he designed; Lester's also responsible for crafting the Neo Sans and Soho fonts. The type designer's work is in high demand with companies like the Intel Corporation, Dell, American Airlines, The New York Times, and GQ all clamoring for the U.K. based type designers font work.

In addition to his type designing talent, Lester also has a knack for 3D animation. His ‘Moving Type’ animation was featured in the Typophile Film Festival, Computer Arts, and 3D World; his combination of gifts also landed him some typo-illustration work for Red Bull.

Curious to see what's got all of those megahuge corporations in such a typeface tizzy? Perhaps, you should hop on down to Seb Lester so you can believe the hype.

Typography is one of those intensely underappreciated areas of web design that, used correctly, it can make your site jump off the screen and embed itself in your viewers long after they’ve departed — in fact, I just read a presentation not too long ago about how good typography can positively effect your website. Case in point, and perhaps the uber-demonstration of that thought, is the website of Takashi Okada. His flash-animated (I presume) typographic illustrations and typography are downright breathtaking. Just don’t click on his site unless you have a good fifteen minutes to sit and stare at the screen. Because thats exactly what you’ll end up doing. Okada is based in Tokyo and has done web and design work for clients around the world — you should definitely take a few minutes to explore his site(s).

WSDIA, also known as We Should Do it All, is a Brooklyn-based graphic, architectural and interactive studio, founded on the exact principle that their name implies. Based around the beliefs that no professional should feel constrained to their singular expertise, and that the best way to problem solve is to be immersed in several different avenues of creativity, WSDIA approaches design from an open-eyed perspective, refusing nothing and testing everything. As one of this year’s five Young Gun honorees (and judging by their work — which includes this awesome identity work for POD) it’s apparent that WSDIA’s philosophy is creating an excellent environment for arty genius. Well, it’s that or the Skittles, but either way, it’s working (which is funny, because judging by their multi-disciplinary skills, it could be that they all have severe cases of ADD, which, assuming they eat skittles all day, means that this could be one fun place to work). Get your very own sugar high here.

Audree Lapierre is a 2004 graduate of Vieux-Montreal college’s design program, and is currently completing a degree in graphic design at UQAM. Having already accumulated several prestigious awards and an impressive client list, Audree is well on her way to becoming another example of alluring new talent, having done quite a bit of nice work for well regarded companies like Surface Jalouse. Check out her portfolio to see Audree’s latest, including some beautiful hand-drawn wallpapers, typographic posters, innovative packaging, and an outstanding map designed for Flora Festival.