Day 10 - The End

Day 10 - The End

Our group met at 7:30am in the main lobby with dirty sheets and pillow cases in tow - as per the custom of hostel living (see white pile in left corner of the photo). We had a little scare when we learned that today was daylight savings time. But our cultural difference lesson for the day is that europe does not go to "Summer Time" until March 30th.

The Clink 78 motto on the lobby wall reads: "I came, I saw, I slept." We managed to accomplish the first two, but because we didn't accomplish a lot of the last motto, we left London with a few runny noses and sore throats. 

Luckily, our bus driver arrived 15 minutes early, so we "alighted" our bus and were off through the quiet early morning streets of London to Heathrow Airport with english promptness. 

We managed to get through check-in and security without a hitch and waited patiently for our gate to be announced. Needless to say - the time for sleep had finally come and our weary travelers started to crash.

I am adding my piece of design for the day. The Kangaroo Restaurant had a nice display of typography at their entrance. Colors, fonts and use of texture made this a memorable branding.

We were finally on our way at 12:00pm. The many British goodbyes displayed as we walked toward our gate and the "Way Out" - were a sad reminder that our trip was at an end.

Here is our Boeing 777 at Heathrow waiting for us to board.

Our trip from London to Dulles Airport, Washington DC was 7 hours and 12 minutes long. The movie options were many and varied. I caught up on my movie watching by viewing both Lincoln and Argo. My vote is for Lincoln - great cast. Otherwise the trip was uneventful.

We arrived in the USA at 3:52pm and are currently settled in the Dulles Airport waiting through our 5 hour layover. Lots of us are on the phone to friends and family - happily reconnecting. The group can take over and settle into a space with tremendous speed. Soon we will be making our way to Albany with many, many, stories to tell and memories to add to our life list of experiences.

It was a wonderful first trip abroad for our graphic design program. The students made the trip a success and we appreciate their energy and enthusiasm. I hope our future adventures abroad are as successful as our first.

Cheers,
Jessica Loy
Graphic Design, Faculty

Day 8: Notting Hill

The trip is coming to an end, and our second day of dealing with the British rain showers. We were set to start the day at 12:30pm so we could sleep in, but some of us choose to go with Anne and Jessica at 10:00am am to go over to the Portobello Road Market. You would think eight days in to the trip we would have the tube mastered, but we found ourselves switching trains and going in circles. Arriving at Notting Hill Gate we were all in the need of some caffeine just like every other day.  With coffee in hand we wandered the street peeking into the interesting shops filled with clothes, antiques, souvenirs, jewelry, and food. 

It was easy to get lost looking at the little trinkets and before we knew it it was times to head back to meet with the rest of the group. After just one hour of being out in the rain we were completely soaking wet. Back at the station we met up with the rest of the group and made our way to the Museum of Brands, Packaging, and Advertising. The Museum is a private personal collection of advertising from the Victorian Era all the way until current times.  Robert Opie started the collection at the age of 16.  

Making our way through the Museum it was exciting to see the evolution of brands we are familiar with such as, Kellogg's and Pepsi. The exhibition provided us with design inspiration. After the Museum the day was ours to explore.  

Tempted by the many shops that we didn’t get a chance to go in earlier, we stuck to Notting Hill. After visiting the the Type Museum we were really excited to find wood and lead type on the streets. We couldn’t resist looking at each letter and eventually buying a few letters. 

We couldn’t go to Notting Hill and not scope out some of the famous places from the movie Notting Hill! We stopped into the bookstore from the movie and even stalked Hugh Grant’s flat. 

We never thought we would see more cabs in one area than in New York City, but London has just about as many, they’re just not as bright. There are hundreds flying past us every day, and they don’t stop for anyone, which we all can attest to. One cab has stood out to us the entire trip and was actually designed by one the design firms we visited, The Partners. The cab is covered in all of the street names of London, laid out in the correct geographical locations as it would appear on a map. 

We finished out the night with a great group dinner at a restaurant down the street from our hostel, Mediterraneo. The food was good and the company was better. It was a great way to close out our time together in London.  

Looking forward to the last day in London!

-Maddie and Jen! 

Tea Time Thursday

Today's blog post is brought to you by Meg and J! 

(We are standing in front of the Victoria and Albert Museum logo designed by Pentagram.)

We had a rough start this morning! It was a little bleary, but we kept our hopes high for another adventurous day in London. Many of us got a little bit of sleep and we had some doubt because of the weather. Today was the first day that it rained on our trip.

We left the Clink at 9:30 for Pentagram from the King's Cross Station. We got a little bewildered by the neighborhood, but we found our way to the studio. 

We were greeted by Pentagram partner, Domenic Lippa who has been working there for six years. He showed us a slideshow of Pentagram's work, past and present, as well as a little bit of the history of the design firm. He sung the praises of working with designers of Pentagram, especially Paula Scher. He also showed us his own work and gave us insight about the projects.  

He gave us some advice to follow as we enter the field:

1. Work with people you like.

2. Keep things simple.

3. Experiment with things.

4. 

5. Work with people whose design you respect. 

Domenic held a Q&A session after the talk. I (Meg) asked him what inspires him and he said  that it was "the eternal search for better ideas and solutions." He also aspires to work on his own, and he admires smaller agencies because they have more control over projects.

After the Q&A, we were allowed to walk through the studio and see the way the office was set up and how Pentagram works in small design groups led by one of the partners. 

Next, we took a group photo and left, but did not forget the Pentagram swag! We got a book of Domenic's portfolio as well as a book that had cowboy poetry and a christmas card designed by the firm. We headed back towards the train station to go to Spin, another design studio. On our way, we got spanakopita and Orangina for lunch at a patisserie. On the way to the next train and lunch, we saw a piece of Banksy's street art, a karma car, and a lovely neighborhood to boot!

On the Tube, we saw and heard some musicians that hopped on at the Embankment Station. They played Johnny Cash!

We made it to Spin by 2:00, and they briefly told us about their work and showed us examples of the books that they published. The books were on topics within Graphic Design and artists in the field such as Herb Lubalin. The studio is about 22 years old and they mostly focus on art books, packaging, advertising and front-end web and mobile design. 

One of the many projects they are currently working on is a package for a high-end watch designed by furniture designer, Matthew Hilton. We can't show you the design, but here is the company's logo, designed by the Spin team, which is really freaking DOPE.

Here is a picture of me (Meg) infront of an Armin Hofmann poster and triangles at Spin!

Anne and Jessica invited us to afternoon tea with them at the Crypt Cafe at St. Martin at the Fields Cathedral. We had Cornish cream tea and cakes. 

Afterwards, my (Meg) knee started hurting because of all of the walking and wandering, so we found a Boots pharmacy near Charing Cross to get a knee brace. We hobbled back to the Clink and called it a night. 

Would you like some dessert?

After a long night of karaoke and poor dancing, we awoke bright and early to begin our day at the Design Museum. After getting dressed and picking up a quick breakfast, we met with part of our group and were on our way across town. We crossed the London Bridge and arrived at the museum around eleven thirty.

The museum was relatively small but had a lot of interesting work. We even got to design our own typefaces and hang them up on the wall. It was like Graphic Design II all over again, except we had to crank them out in a half hour to move on to our appointment with The Partners.

Around 1:45 we met with the rest of our group at Farringdon to walk over to the studio. The Partners is one of the UK’s most successful design firms. They worked with a lot of really big name clients. One of our favorite portions of the visit was when the presenters, Lizzie Clubb and Brinley Clark, passed around one of their process notebooks. They stressed the importance of stepping away from the computer in order to find inspiration for projects. We noticed that in their book, most of their research seemed to come from things they found in the outside world. 

After we left, we ventured to the other side of town to revisit some of London’s most famous monuments. We walked through Green Park in order to see Buckingham Palace and the monument commemorating the Queen. Then, after a few small detours including a run in with a couple of drunk lads singing Baby Got Back by Sir-Mix-A-Lot, we arrived at Westminster Abbey to take in the beautiful architecture of St. Margaret’s Church and Parliament Square. We really enjoyed the fact that, although we were surrounded by such enormous buildings, this particular area of the city felt very open. We didn’t feel the typical sense of congestion associated with big cities.

We have been seeing a lot of beautiful typography around London. One thing that caught our eye was a logo for the M & S food stores. We responded to the texture on the lettering and we felt that the style of the bird symbol worked really well with both the bolder text and the secondary scripted type.

We trekked back to Trafalgar Square where we spotted the Sherlock Holmes Pub. It was a nice and cozy atmosphere but the waitress was a huge bully. She wouldn’t let Mackenzie order anything from the sandwich menu or starters menu, only a main course. Then she tried forcing us into getting dessert. Instead, we opted to get dessert elsewhere and in our pursuit of cake, accidentally crashed a private party. Whoops...

We continued walking through the downtown area, which is a completely different place after dark. There were tons of night clubs and casinos and movie theaters. We even located the London M&M Store, which is way bigger and better than the New York Store. Overall downtown was very festive and if we have the opportunity, we would like to go back down there some night before we leave.

Some cultural differences we noticed were that on Jess’s orange juice bottle, it says “bits” or “no bits” instead of “pulp” or “no pulp”  which is kind of cute. We have noticed throughout our time here that there are many slight differences in language choice and we are starting to pick up on the London slang. Mackenzie ordered a coffee to “take-away.” Mackenzie recovered from a slight mishap yesterday when she accidentally put salt in her coffee instead of sugar, because apparently salt packets in London look awfully similar to splenda..

Following our Hearts Through London

Today we visited our first design firm, which was called All of Us. The firm is a small but globally successful agency that specializes in interactive design through the focus of how the viewer engages with the work. They take a user-experience approach to design and are interested in the latest and greatest technology. The space itself was so inviting, and the design team clearly treated one another like family. It seemed like a really awesome place to work. We all got to see a presentation, put together by their staff, which explained for us the mission and process of the firm. Examples of their past work was, also, included. In particular, we both thought that their work on Mishkat Visitor Centre (everyone look that up immediately after reading this post) was very innovative. Needless to say, everyone was incredibly inspired by the presentation.

Kim and I pretty much fell in love with the woman who talked to us today. She had on a really cute outfit and was a great speaker. She made a lot of witty jokes during the presentation, which made it really interesting. We’ve deemed perfect outfits that we see in London “the London Look” and we both agreed she totally had it!

After we saw the agency, we had the rest of the day free, but because we were close to the British Museum most people started their afternoon off there. The museum is home to a huge collection of pieces that the British stole from other countries so the Egyptian and Greek art collections there are pretty impressive. Some notable artifacts that we saw at the museum were the Rosetta Stone and Egyptian mummies, including Cleopatra’s.

Next on the agenda was some wandering around. We’ve been really lucky with the London weather since we’ve been here (40s or 50s everyday and no rain) and today was our best day yet. It was very sunny and warm, which made a perfect day for strolling down whichever road we felt like. Because the tube is so easy to navigate it’s fun to lose ourselves in the city like this. We never know what we’ll discover and all we have to do to get back is to find the nearest tube station.  Because of this the motto of the day was to just “follow our hearts”. It hasn’t steered us wrong yet.

Along the way we discovered some perfectly dressed London locals that also fit our definition of “the London Look”.

We stumbled upon Primrose bakery, which is home to some fantastic treats. One of our friends studied abroad last semester here and she had raved about it and told us it was a must-eat. We completely understand now. I had a salted caramel cupcake that had a surprise caramel chocolate baked in the center. Lesia had a rose one. Both were so delicious and we’ll most likely be back there again to have another cupcake or three. 

The other day when we went to the National Gallery Lesia had discovered a pub called The Hand and Racquet on Orange Street. Since that was a combination of two of my favorite things (tennis and the color orange), and I wasn’t with her to see it, I knew we had to find it again. Unfortunately we were unable to get lunch there considering Lesia had left out a pretty important detail…

Since The Head and Racquet was a no-go we stopped in a different pub instead. We both had some delicious fish and chips. At this point of the trip we’re starting to become connoisseurs on the dish. Every place we’ve had them have slight variations of the plate making it impossible to pick a favorite. One thing is always the same though and that’s the fish being served alongside chips and peas.

To end our day we spent the rest of our time in various stores in Soho. We found some awesome local stores that were very unique to London. We also found some great examples of typography that we thought were interesting. Like the city itself, the design in London is an interesting and eclectic mix of old and new, radical and tradition.

I love the clean look of the vending machine in the hostel. It’s unique from America in that it doesn’t show branding and has cooler photography. I like that.

We’d like to part with these wise words… follow your heart, and it will lead you to cupcakes!

Love,

Lesia and Kim