Now here at united Graphic design we rarely chicken out, however we do condone small amounts of chickening out when it’s for a good cause. And so I’ve been charged by the guys to Chicken out just enough to create a T-shirt design for Compassion in world farmings ‘Chicken out’ Campaign.

Now the brief is very short, simply design a t-shirt that spreads the message of free-range.

And this is my contribution:

What do you think?

Something I want to start doing with my blog posts is to introduce you to artists/ designers who are new to me and who I think rock.

So to kick it off we have Rebecca Clements who is an Australian illustrator and comicer, and she is just darling.

Look:

Her website is called Kinkofry and you need to go look at it now.

Cthulhu, originally from H.P Lovecraft’s short story “The Call of Cthulhu”, is a god of destruction that needs the energy from worlds to survive.

He also Loves to snuggle.

This has to be the cutest thing you’ve ever seen, it just has to!

Last night I was lucky enough to be invited to For The Bees a project by artists Fern Thomas and Owen Griffiths.

To highlight the plight of the honey bee they have had commissioned a piece of choral music to sing to two hives of honey bees that have been installed in the grounds of Swansea university.

The choir had been brought together from interested people (mostly amateur singers) and last night they gathered with an audience of around thirty folk, to perform the piece, composed in collaboration with Swansea’s Mial Watkins. This piece almost mirrors the sounds of the bees to create a sort of wave of well being – a message of warmth to the bees in the hope that they’ll hear it and understand.

Owen spoke to the BBC about the performance:

“The idea is that this coming together to sing to the bees really is a poetic gesture to the bees, to reconnect and engage people, to see that the bees are in trouble…It’s going to have a very haunting quality to it – it’s like a lament to the bees.”

I know that this all sounds a little ‘lah-de-dah’ but it does have basis in scientific fact: When an unhealthy hive has the sound of a healthy hive played to it, the hive improves.

The actual performance was incredible, the music sounding a little like a cross between a chant and a hymn, all hummed by the choir. This, enhanced by the surroundings and the quiet buzzing of the bees equated to a hushed and almost sacramental atmosphere. But maybe that was just me.

If you’re at all interested in this you can hear Owen talk about this project Here.

There’s an article by the BBC Here

And at some point footage will be broadcast on S4C, I’ll update this post when I have more details!

(All Images where taken from Here)

Now that dark days and rain are here again, I’m harking back to those glorious halcyon summer days of the festivals (although I’m off to Green Man in two weeks) By providing you with a list of my favorite summer camping gadgets and goodies! So let the fun begin!

Now understand that this isn’t necessarily going to be an affordable list, but rather a list of all the really nice stuff that’s out there right now.

1. Rolling Garden cooler

Yes, you’re right, it is a bit bulky for a festival. And at £250 steep is an understatement;, But picture the scene: The sun is shining, you can hear the sound of Laura Marling singing in the background, you pull up in your lime green VW Camper van Bring out your Rolling Garden cooler full of micro-brewery beer and you set yourself down in your…

2… Penguin Book Deck Chair

I need it. Although I definitely can’t afford it… Moving swiftly on.

3. Solar Lanterns.

These would look so pretty on strings surrounding your tent in the evening- Imagine having a post gig pint under these. Bliss.

4. The tent.

You Know by now that I love all things retro, and this just tops the lot. Yes I know brown isn’t everyone’s favorite, but it’s such a lovely ‘umptious’ colour. And you just know that this baby would stand out in a crowd!

And who needs wellies or a sleeping bag when you have these lovely things?

I have something new to show you, and It blows the shoes and the bracelet out of the water. Take a look at this beauty:

It’s a Lightsaber Umbrella! Ok, the store calls it a ‘Blade Runner Style Umbrella’.But I chose to ignore this and instead attach it to a far superior (well, the original three anyway) film franchise.

This Umbrella makes miracles happen, Look how this otherwise ignorable kid becomes Awesome when given this umbrella:

Oh, oh, and this one’s really cool too:

I can feel a recurring awesome umbrella feature coming on…

more later!

Kanye West has aired a preview of the video for his track ‘Power’ on MTV.

Sampling British prog rockers King Crimson’s ’21st Century Schizoid Man’, the accompanying video for ‘Power’ is equally unconventional for the Hip Hop genre. Directed by Marco Brambilla, Kanye has described it as more of an animated painting than a conventional music video (well, he tweeted ‘It’s not a video .. It’s a moving Painting!!!’) and as you can see below it’s an accurate description for the oddly hypnotic clip.

Ok, so Halloween is roughly three months away. However It’s never too early to get into the Halloween spirit! And so my faithful blog readers I give you the scariest thing I’ve seen all year. Yes sometimes designers do bad, bad, wrong, horrible things. Prepare yourself, and I hold no responsibility for unrestrained gagging.

Did you throw up a little?

Lauren’s Awesome List of Awesomeness part 2:

Blogs: Blogs are awesome, enough said. I follow around 30+ blogs at any one time some are design based some are artists personal blogs and some are just crazy. My favorite three at this particular moment in time are: Cake Wrecks (blogger Jen also owns Epbot, which is a bastion of nerdy cuteness) Hyperbole and a Half and It’s Nice That.

Webcomics: Yes I am that kind of person, I love Webcomics and Graphic novels. I have nothing more to say for myself, other than to let you know about LICD (which isn’t suitable for under 16’s) XKCD and Girls with Slingshots, which Really Isn’t suitable for kids…

More later!

As the only girl in the studio, I again feel the need to inject some femininity into the blog. So here we are, a beautiful, girly vintage background for you: