In celebration of World Pride, June Object of the Day posts highlight LGBTQ+ designers and design in the collection. Today’s blog post was originally published February 8th, 2015. A favored hangout among the early 1980s East Village art scene, the Fun Gallery became home to some of the New York City’s most notable artists, including...

Designers of all varieties—architects, graphic designers, painters—are aware of the importance and utility of sketchbooks in the creative process. The blank canvas of a sketchbook page allows the design process to occur in real time and encourages documentation of ideas that might otherwise be fleeting. The significance of sketchbooks as part of the creative process...

In this beautiful sidewall, layers of white, dark brown, and tan lines swirl into compositions reminiscent of chopped-up calligraphy. No words seem to be spelled out, and stylistically the calligraphy hovers between Arabic and Gothic scripts. The layering of the “words” in the paper causes us to see them primarily as ornamental forms, leading us...

Talk by Amy Peterson, cofounder and CEO, and Patricia Caldwell, production manager, of the Detroit-based jewelry design studio Rebel Nell. Conversation to follow with Cynthia E. Smith, Curator of Socially Responsible Design and curator of the exhibition By the People: Designing a Better America.

Amy Peterson, a Detroit lawyer, envisioned Rebel Nell—an enterprise that creates unique jewelry from scrap pieces of graffiti—after moving next to one of Detroit’s shelters. While walking her dog, she began talking to women she met, and after listening to their stories and challenges, Peterson started a social enterprise with a vision to help women...

It is easy to see why Nitty Gritty would be such a hit with the “younger generation.” It’s fun, it’s different, something not seen before in wallpaper designs. Nitty Gritty is formatted in a graffiti-style, with all the words and slogans written as they might appear in phone booths or lockers. Sayings like Sock it...

A favored hangout among the early 1980s East Village art scene, the Fun Gallery became home to some of the New York City’s most notable artists, including Keith Haring, Jean-Michel Basquiat and Kenny Scharf. This poster, designed by Haring in anticipation of his gallery debut in February 1983, exemplifies the artist’s unique ability to turn...