Even The Greats Goof

 Washing dishes today, I scrubbed at the cookie jar we keep on the top of the cabinets.  Being architects, our cookie jar is, of course, an architectural one... a white china replica of Andrea Palladio's Villa Rotunda.

I'd never noticed before - not while studying the drawings, not while visiting the building in Italy - but Palladio couldn't quiiiiite get enough headroom for his spiral stairs under his perfectly 4-way symmetrical roof design.  He had to cheat a bit.  

Look at the cookie jar roof!

Proof!  Proof, I tell you!  Even a genius struggles with getting the roof to  work!

Villa Rotunda cookie jar / model - with Fallen-Over Tower of Pisa beyond

I find it heartening to know that.

(Not that you can see his little oopsie in real life... and that's all that matters.  Remember that!)

Color Wheel

Going through some old files, I found this sketch for a class on interior design that I taught ages ago...

Cool

A fascinating explanation about creating coooool....

The MAYA design theory by Raymond Loewy at The Atlantic HERE.

car design by Raymond Loewy - public domain from the Library of Congress

Dream Dilemma

Classic designer thing - go to bed thinking of problem / wake up with solution.

This was what my muse handed me this morning:

I'm asserting copyright on this one - Clare Floyd DeVries 2017

(My avatar is the kid screaming over her bowl of orange sherbet.  While the others are foolishly oblivious to the hazard of asphyxia inherent in running a motor boat inside a tunnel/canal completely blocked by more orange sherbet.  I mean, come on!  Everyone knows about this danger.  I'm sure there are pamphlets explaining it.)

Hmmm...  Not quite sure how to apply this to the problem at hand.

Been Busy

Sorry, it's been hectic here at Scenic Central, so no posting.

But as a making-up-gift, how about some beautiful floors?  See them here:

Barcelona Floors
Venetian Floors
Parisian Floors

Photographer Sebastian Erras looks underfoot and discovers Treasures!  Beauties!  Marvels!

Photograph by Sebastian Erras from "Barcelona Floors" - CC - ND copyright

first seen at Designyoutrust

So what's been going on that's been keeping me so busy?

Mainstage Irving - Los Colinas' production of Kind Lady is teching this weekend, so I've been painting and fabric shopping etc.  I've been designing, redesigning, and modifying (not necessarily in that order) Under the Skin for Circle Theatre.  And creating construction drawings and starting the furniture hunt for End of the Rainbow at Uptown Players.

Phew!  Busy.

ADDENDUM:  How'd I miss these floors? Tile Addiction on Instagram by  Jose' Jo'vena and Elisabet Martinez HERE.

Public Domain Treasure

The Interwebs just get more interesting all the time: today's special is a new-to-me site for public domain book illustrations.  Wonderful Stuff!

OldBookIllustrations.com

A 12th century half timber house drawn by Viollet-le-Duc

at www.oldbookillustrations.com

The treasure trove of public domain material easy to access via the computer on your desk - or on your lap, or in your hand - is becoming a wellspring of inspiration...  I just wish countries would stop extending and/or enlarging copyright protections to unreasonable limits.  The UK is heading toward a redefinition of copyright that would make it illegal to stick a photo of your (English) sofa on Craig's List.  (Is there Craig's List in the UK?  Maybe not for long!)  HERE's an article on that silliness at BoingBoing.

I'm all for copyright - I copyright stuff myself after all - the rules just need to be fair and sensible.  A family snapshot sitting on its own sofa ought not to be illegal, huh?  Or that for-sale photo either.

(For more on copyright issues, look in my Set Design Archive under, um, "Copyright.")

PS.  That house pictured above?  Torn down.  Like Kitchen Dog Theater's home of 20 years will be.  Don't forget our new-home fund raiser - see blog post below.  
The Deadline Approacheth!

Design Quotes

I like quotes.

Little nuggets of thoughts to turn over and examine.

These often lead to long monologues as you decide what you yourself think about the topic or to further reading, to research, and to then figuring out what you yourself think on the topic.  (Simply making the quote into a coffee mug or bumper-sticker rather short circuits that process, yes?)

Today's quotes...

From a webcast of the story "Edge of Your Seat" on the radio show 99% Invisible  this quote from architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, "A chair is a difficult object.  A skyscraper is almost easier."

Mies's Barcelona chair - Public domain image from Wikimedia

And from the book, Bambi vs. Godzilla: on the Nature, Practice, and Purpose of the Movie Business a snippet, a definition only, by David Mamet, "...entertainment, which is to say tincture of art..."

Tincture of art = art extracted by alcohol.

Lovely.

Not completely true, of course, but plenty truthy enough for any entertainment-artist's coffee mug.

Jealousy

I just read a very interesting blog post by writer Patricia C. Wrede titled "Six Things I Wish I'd Known."  As I've discovered before, writers writing about the act of writing have a knack of hitting on issues that apply to any other creative field.  (And they're so darn articulate about it too!)

In this case it was the element of jealousy.

Of other writers, designers, creators.  Theater is famously rife with this green-eyed problem.  Actors, poor dears, are so bad at pretending they're not envious.

Ha!  Designers feel the exact same poisonous stew of envy and competition.  There's always someone else who gets the show you wanted or the award you think you should have won or - equally unsettling -  you suspect that you don't deserve the show or award as much as they do.  It really can be a poisonous snake.

Public domain image

The only thing to do is to do your very best work and then to mutter your mantra to your snakey self.  For me it's, "I'm in this for the design."  (Not the rewards, fame, popularity, whatever.)  "I'm in this for the design."  Perhaps others are in it for the poor pay or long hours, but I find the reminder that what I want is just the work to be very soothing.

Do it for the work.

Read Ms. Wrede's thoughtful post HERE.

Designers' Revenge

Any designer in any field has heard their share of, um... unhelpful... direction from certain clients.  Sometimes all you can do is smile until they go away and then you can beat your head on the wall to make the pain stop.

(And don't get me started on that rattlesnake rattle of a phrase, "I'm open to other ideas, but..."  Run.  just run.)

Anyway.

In this amusing post, Irish graphic designers actually illustrate - for charity - some of their more memorable client feedback.

I laughed.  But, to tell the truth, some of the satirized client comments sound kinda understandable points of view to me... I mean don't we all want warmer snow?  And this poster, well, you have to ask yourself if the client doesn't have a real point here:

From Sharpsuits.net (thanks themarysue.com for pointing me to this) 

I believe this is fair use as I'm only sampling, attributing it properly, and all for a more-or-less review.  

If the image's owner objects to this use, please let me know and I'll remove it.

Would the banana chip be capable of driving the chocolate submarine?  Really?  Bananas have a, well, slimy character; a raisin, on the other hand, would seem much more mature to me.  A nut?  That'd be crazy.  Hey! wouldn't it make more sense if the banana were the submarine and a chocolate chip were...?

(If you think this is silly, you haven't sat in on enough production meetings.  I have personally debated the airworthiness of Santa's plane ("Oh no Santa!  We're gonna crash!) and taken part in lively discussions about lobster-phones, egg-suits, and the exact texture of baby-flesh.  Which do you think is closer to the proper onstage "chew": portobella mushroom or tofu?)

The site highlights a bunch of classic client howlers - most designers will recognize their own clients.  (Does, "Just like this... but different," ring any bells?)  See more at sharpsuits.net

Gotta get back to my own banana-boat...

Obsessed

Kinda ironic that my last post was on clearing your design thoughts...  (Last post HERE.)

Because for me that spring-cleaning "fresh idea" thing worked almost too well.

Ever since that refreshing little break I've been completely buried deep into a new design for a project I really just don't have time for right now.  It wasn't on the schedule.  Nevertheless...  I've been drawing like a fiend!   Obsessed.

Now I've exhausted that spurt of creative thought and need to rest again.

Back up on the roof?

Photo from publicdomainpictures.net

Up on the Roof

Spring Cleaning: lets fresh air in... in every way.

Yesterday was a beautiful spring day.  A day to open up the house to the breeze.

A day to clean up the garden.  Mostly pruning.  Clipping low stuff, weeds and escaping vines, pruning middle-height shrubs, and even hacking at the high stuff: out came the tree saw on its long wobbly pole and, inevitably, the ladder.  Soon I was up on the roof for overhanging tree branches, but also vigorously scrubbing at the greenhouse roof over part of my studio with the hose and a broom.  Water everywhere.

I'd forgotten how wonderful it feels to be up on the roof!

Looking down on new-leafy trees; the scent of lime blossoms carried by the spring breeze up over the roof ridge; the bird's perch view!  Seeing the neighborhood - more like toy houses from here - laid out in a secret-map of interlocking yards.  An eagle's view.

Wonderfully refreshing - blows away mental cobwebs.

Need a break in your routine?  Feel stale and need to freshen your designing?  Try up on the roof.

Public domain image from publicdomainpicture.net

James Taylor singing "Up on the Roof  HERE.

It's nice to have a cleaner skylight again.  I get a better view of the sky now  (and also of the under-carriages of birds and squirrels).

(ADDENDUM:  A follow-up post HERE.)

Proportions

Ah!  The Golden Rectangle.  The Golden Triangle.  All the classic - and intensely elegant - proportions designers have used since Antiquity... and before then even.

Da Vinci's drawing of the Vitruvian Man - public domain

Leonado Da Vinci made that famous sketch of Man Justifying the Square and Circle - good ol' classics of composition.  There's something very satisfying and complete about a square or a circle.

But of these theories about proportion, all these guides to beauty in composition, one of the most fractally lovely is the Fibonacci Series, that spiraling shape that Nature uses as Design Guideline for Nautilus shells and, yes, hurricanes...

Creative Commons image by Jim Leftwich, from Boing Boing 

In this overlay of the Fibonacci diagram over a satellite photo, you can see the beauty of nature... even in the destructiveness of Hurricane Sandy.  

(Thank you Jim Leftwich for sharing this image.  Creative Commons and Public Domain are gifts to us all.)

Design Quote

"Indifference towards people and the reality in which they live is actually the one and only cardinal sin in design"


– Dieter Rams

Inspirational Photos

Sometimes when you're trying to find a design idea it helps to look around...

For some weeks now I've been trying to come up with a schematic design for Smokey Joe's Cafe, a sort of '50s musical revue(ish), or rather, an evening made up entirely of music - no book - that seems to be more unified than a typical random revue, yet has no strong story-line either.  Scenicly, it has a strong sense of Time, but not so much of Place.  Specific settings change, as they tend to in a collection of songs.  Ambiance, maybe, is what this show demands.

I find musical reviews difficult, since sound isn't my leading sense (I favor words and pictures) and my imagination tends to fasten on stories and specificity...

So I've been struggling.

The plan?  Oh, the plan was easy - I had it half sketched before I left the initial meeting with the director.  But the "look"... really tough.  All that came to my mind were '50s cliches not worth drawing up.  The only thing that seemed hopeful was the lovely name of the show: "Smokey Joe's."  There seemed promise, though in fact all I developed from that was badly doodled smoke curlicues on the edges of all my notes made in other shows' meetings.

So I've spent a while flipping through books or the Internet, researching, looking for a hint.

And on the morning I absolutely HAD TO FINISH, I finally found my inspirational photo:

Believed public domain photo - from Imprint

I won't include the sketch yet (if you can, please go see the set itself!  at WaterTower Theater), but the secret was the circle.  Smoke rings gave me the design nudge I needed for a good set for Smokey Joe's Cafe.

What else is up lately?  Busy, busy.  Lots of emailing on various shows; lots of shopping mostly for Boeing, Boeing at WaterTower which opens soon; and several hours painting on Ruth at Kitchen Dog which also Techs this weekend and opens soonest.

Yet More Variations

The latest latest on Sweeney Todd:

The Sweeney to combine all Sweeneys.

This is the second weekend morning I've woken Too Early because I needed to sketch an idea.  Earlier Todds HERE.

Monday Mornings

I've gotten in the habit of checking my calendar last thing Sunday night, just so I know about any hand-grenades on Monday's schedule.  Today it was "1:00 mtg. Contemp."

A theater meeting for which I promised schematic design drawings.  Which sounded easy enough to have done... waaaay back last week.  The rest of today's to-do list looks kinda scary too:

My scribble list - here! have it Public Domain

I can't over-stress the importance of list-making among a designer's skills.  Half the job is getting the right thing done at the right time.

Studio Organization

I've meant to show you the results of my studio reorganization - reworking all my drawing storage.  (And storage for papers used in collage art too, as well as art supplies, etc. etc. etc.)  But I was deterred by the immediate mess that working creates - for me anyway.  Until, finally I gave up and just settled for photographing real life.

Here are the pics:

This was taken on a gray, cloudy day, but you can see how light and open the room feels.  The view from the other direction is greener, but there are squirrels to watch in every direction.

In the foreground is the computer / writing area.  That splash of red is a beautifully embroidered Indian dress found at a thrift store (which hides the to-maybe-do-someday pile).  In the background is the designing / drafting area.

Here's a closer view of the design area with its (messy) drafting board.  I'd just finished coloring a pencil and ink rendering for a theater show, so those pencil drawers are still stacked on the board.

And here are the lovely, lovely (too expensive) boxes to store 11" x 17" drawings and collage papers, nested into custom cabinets a theater carpenter friend built me.  You can see how I pull out the boxes I need as I need them.  Above the lay-out counter are smaller wood box / drawers to hold misc. art and craft supplies: glue, wire, paperclips, index cards... all the small, sometimes weird, stuff I use.  One drawer is labeled "Bits and Bobs" which gives you an idea.

I cannot over-stress how much it helps to have an organized work space in a room you enjoy.

Here are earlier posts on studio or workspace issues, earliest first: Office Environment, Aaaand Spring Cleaning, External Factors, Reorganizing the Studio

Taste in Design

I found an essay on good taste in design - Taste for Makers by Paul Graham.  I agree with much of what he writes... and would love to debate the parts I don't fully agree with.  (A great lunch conversation.)  This is an important but little-discussed subject on which Graham writes eloquently:

"Good Design is Suggestive.  Jane Austen's novels contain almost no description; instead of telling you how everything looks, she tells her story so well that you envision the scene for yourself.  Likewise, a painting that suggests is usually more engaging than one that tells.  Everyone makes up their own story about the Mona Lisa. 

In architecture and design, this principle means that a building or object should let you use it how you want: a good building, for example, will serve as a backdrop for whatever life people want to lead in it, instead of making them live as if they were executing a program written by the architect."

Right on!

Here are Graham's principles:

1)  Good design is simple.
2)  Good design is timeless
3)  Good design solves the right problem.
4)  Good design is suggestive
5)  Good design is often slightly funny.
6)  Good design is hard.
7)  Good design looks easy.
8)  Good design uses symmetry.
9)  Good design resembles nature.
10) Good design is redesign.
11) Good design can copy.
12) Good design is often strange.
13) Good design happens in chunks.
14) Good design is often daring.

Read it the entire essay HERE.

Costumes as Design

There's a new exhibit here at Wichta's Art Museum: costumes of the famous musical group The Supremes, from the Mary Wilson collection.

Wilson was a member of the group from its start as a group of Chicago  neighborhood girlfriends, who made their first costumes with skills learned at school home-ec classes.  (I wish one of those dresses had been part of the exhibit!) The gowns on display come from a bit later in the Supremes' career, including couture by famous designers like Bob Mackie.

Overall, the effect is of fabulous '60s and '70s glamour.  "Fabulous" is the word.  The lines of the gowns are usually simple, lean, even severe, but the materials are rich and often heavily encrusted with beads or sequins and the colors strong, so that even on a mannequin they seem to want to shimmy and shimmer...  These aren't evening gowns - though that's the look - but performance costumes.  They want to move!  I wish there were video clips to show this fashion in action.

Photo borrowed from The Supremes Lyrics

And here's a video clip on You Tube: The Supremes at the Hollywood palace 

Translation

Designers sometimes hear the phrase, "I'm/he's/she's so visual!"

This, I've discovered, usually translates to a designer as: "No you/he/she aren't."

This misleading statement is, I think, due to a difference in definition.  "Visual" to a Designer means you think visuals are important, you value them, and you can see them in your head because you can imagine what something will look like.  To the Non-Designer I think (it's a foreign tongue so I'm guessing), "visual" seems to mean that you literally have to SEE it - for real, in all full physical reality - to understand it.

Kinda the opposite, huh?

I suspect there is a misunderstanding - because I've worked with a few "so visual!" directors.  I've even acted out scenery for them with the help of several people, boxes, sticks, and spike tape at full scale... and this was after the model, the perspective drawings, the construction drawings, the sketches, and a fair amount of hand-waving.

Just a heads-up, Fellow Designers.  "So visual!" can be so misleading.

As for the REAL directoral rattlesnake-warning phrase, it's "I'm open to other ideas."

image courtesy of clkr.com

There's a pretty funny (mildly insulting!) report on the architectural versions of these warning rattles at Life of an Architect.