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5 concepts for the Melbourne Minimalism Festival

Minimalissimo reader Stijn tipped us about the work that designer Jess McGeachin did for the Melbourne Minimalism Festival 2009. A festival on minimalism! Yay!

After some digging, I learned that the MMF was actually an imaginary festival, part of a university project for RMIT students in Melbourne. Their assignment: to create the festival’s visual identity.

I stumbled upon some amazing concepts, made by those students. I’ve compiled them here for your enjoyment.

Cornelius Smith

Cornelius Smith created a logotype and a series of spread for the festival’s catalogue.

Jess McGeachin

Melbourne based graphic designer Jess McGeachin also created a logotype, and two different promotional items.

Every application of the logo was hand screen-printed in white to compliment the minimalist design. The only other color used in the project was a bold red paper stock.

Sam Ziino

Let’s not forget the work of our very own Samantha Ziino, who joined Minimalissimo’s blogging team since the beginning of 2010.

She also designed a visual identity, and used it for a booklet.

Vita Mak

The last set comes from Vita Mak. Vita was born in 1986 in Hong Kong, but went to collega at RMIT in Melbourne.

Vita created a visual identity and translated it to a poster, a set of flyers and a t-shirt.

Linnéa Ekström

And last but not least, Linnéa Ekström went for black in her visual identity, and made a poster and some promotional items.

Please comment!

Which of the above has your preference? We’d love to hear!

The Invisibles

A chair you can’t see, isn’t that minimalist? Japanese designer Tokujin Yoshioka has created a collection of ‘invisible’ furniture pieces for Kartell, employing their pioneering polycarbonate technology.

Yoshioka explains: In the last few years I have been thinking about a design that would include natural phenomena and invisible elements such as senses, wind and light. The ‘Invisibles’, a special collection launched from Kartell, only leaves the sense as if seating in the air. The presence of the object is eradicated and it will create a scenery of a sitter floating in the air. It is as if the physical presence of the object has been uprooted and gives life to a ‘floating’ scenario. Even the installation itself gives visitors that extraordinary sensation of entering an unreal world.

The Invisibles collection encompasses tables, occasional tables, sofas, armchairs and benches which will be on show during Milan Design week 2010 at the Kartell flagstore. To be continued…

Moon

Moon – a simple and magical lamp, designed by Davide Groppi of Italian design studio Davide Groppi attracted my eye.

Designed already a few years back – 2005 – but nevertheless a great piece of lightening I wanted to share with you.

A miniature version of the ‘big brother’ out there in the dark sky of the night … Hand made of pure Japanese paper, in a 60 centimeter sphere, the light is softly muted, showing the great texture and overlays of the material.

In the spirit of occasional full disclosure, here is my current...

In the spirit of occasional full disclosure, here is my current desktop. Some notes:

• Desktop Picture from Fifty Foot Shadows.
• Non-system items in the menubar are Tweetie, Dropbox, Droplr, Pastebot, and Fastscripts.
• Date/Time and iCal Events displayed using GeekTool with iCalBuddy.

Jordan's Minutiae ⨂Asking for a deal

Jordan’s Minutiae ⨂Asking for a deal:

That’s why I like bundles: they’re impulse buys. I get lots of applications I’ll never use but a few I might and one I know I will use. Yes, it increases the number of license textfiles I maintain in Simplenote. I don’t download the ones I know I won’t use, so there’s no impact on my machine. But I’ve contributed something to the developers whose applications I think are “kind of neat” but wouldn’t purchase on their own. Everyone wins.

Jordan not only responds to my “It’s not a bargain if you don’t need it” post, he actually takes on and tries my suggestion of asking the developers to cut a deal directly. I really don’t want to spoil it so click through to read his post.

Since we are on the topic, I would like to take this opportunity to clarify a few things regarding my post:

• I have nothing at all against Mac bundle sales. In fact, I have bought a couple myself when there were a majority of apps I really felt I would get value from. That said, I remain steadfast in my argument that if the majority of apps in such a bundle are things you do not need then you are wasting your money (replenishable), time, and attention (extremely finite).
• The developers participate of their own free will and I have a tremendous amount of respect for them and the choices they make to market their products. The most recent well known bundle deal included an app by some folks I consider some of my closest friends.
• Does it really surprise anyone that, the curator of a site who’s sole mission is to rally against things you don’t need would write a post arguing against buying something if you don’t need it?

Good Desktop Picture (Wallpaper) Sources

I was recently asked on Twitter about good places to find desktop pictures, especially photos (which I prefer myself). While I am no definitive source on the subject, i do have some places I go looking and ones I have found just by curating this little juke joint. Therefore, here is the list I gave on the Twitter:

• Mandolux – This guy does great work, especially in his output of shots for dual and triple monitor setups. Been a big fan for years.

• Fifty Foot Shadows – Here is one that I came across from doing Minimal Mac and I remain grateful. Fantastic shots that are full of interest without distracting.

• DJHuber on Flickr – Many great shots that are perfect for Desktop Pictures. A truly talented photographer.

Of course, like I said, there are tons of individual ones I have linked to here that are equally fantastic. Doing a search for Desktop Picture or Wallpaper will bring up most of them.

There are my picks, do any of you have any you want to share with the group?