Sunday March 8 - And so the trip comes to an end.

It was an early morning wake up call to be ready for the arrival of our bus at 6:00am sharp. The troups arrived in the Clink 78 lobby at 5:45am - punctual as usual. We were tired, a bit happy to be going home and a bit sad to leave behind our great adventure. And so we waited.

At 6:05am we were still waiting. The Sunday morning streets of London were empty. And at 6:20am we started to get nervous. But the Seaward bus and our drive John finally arrived.

He drove us through the quiet streets of London to say one last good bye to our favorite spots and a final tip of the hat to Big Ben. Thank you for a smooth ride John!

We arrived at Heathrow a bit later than we expected, but the British run their

airport like a well oiled machine.

 

We had no problem getting through security and to our gate with time to spare for

a little coffee and breakfast.

Our plane was being spruced up which included a new tire - delaying our departure by 30 minutes.

But we were soon getting ready to board our flight.

On the plane with us was a mother traveling with her two infant twins. She came down the isles of our cabin and presented each of us with gifts from the babies. The package included candy, ear plugs and Tylenol. The note explained that as babies, they might cry and fuss. The candy and other goodies were their way of apologizing and thanking us for our patience. WHAT A GREAT IDEA.

Everyone was happy to accomodate this little family.

Here we are leaving the coast of Ireland

And here we are over Newfoundland or is it Albany?

After a seven hour flight which included a nice lunch, movies, games, lots of water breaks and snacks - we arrived at Newark International. Unlike the British, the American airport is not a well oiled machine and it took a while to get through Immigration, Customs and then back through security. 

By the time we found our final gate - everyone was feeling a bit tired.

It was a good long 5 hour wait for the last leg of the trip.

Our last plane ride was a very small propellor plane. We had a 5 seater right across the last row of the plane that was very cozy and noisy. We arrived back in Albany, NY at approximately 8:15pm safe and sound. We had a final group cheer to the CLINK! and found our way to our respective homes. And so the trip comes to an end.

Finally I would like to say a few thank you's - 

1. Thank you to Ann Breaznell and our wonderful students who were always on time, always of good cheer, and just all around good sports. They made the trip a fabulous adventure.

2. Thank you to Hardys Sweetshop. We spent a good deal of money there and want to particularly thank the patient young employees who wrapped so many sweet bags for us.

Who doesn't love the traditional mushroom and fried egg candies!

3. And finally - you have to thank the queen. Long live the queen!!!!!

CHEERS! - Jessica

Until next time.

Saturday March 7th

So today was our free day in London and boy oh boy did we utilize it. But... not until we rested just a little bit. So if you have been keeping up to date with us here in London, you know it has been pretty constant walking and doing, up early and bed late. So today after a night downtown we decided to sleep in a little bit. Four alarms later and a lot of groggy yelling, we stumbled out of our bed and into the streets of London. We went to eat breakfast at a lovely little corner restaurant. Relishing in the fact that we were not eating just toast and jam. After that we went out to see a few milestones, including Abbey Road, Arsenal Stadium and than we did a sunset ride on the London eye.

That being said, one of my personal favorite things is the vernacular that is spoken here. It is almost like an old english type of speaking but with a little bit of a cork to it. It even comes down to the announcements on the tube, with the "mind the gap", "mind your step", all of which come off very proper and respectful. The signage reflects that as well, its very dramatic and serious that it gets its point across. Over the loud speaker in the airport they announced that any unclaimed baggage would be taken and incinerated. But my absolute favorite is the way the people speak hear. It is not just their dialect and the way they pronounce things, its also the word choice. For example, some of my favorite ones were; bloody, wanker, till, take away, litter, toilet, cheers, mate, knackered, cheeky and rubbish, to name a few. The words are something that I think I will take away with me the most. It is quite honestly some of my favorite parts of this adventure.

The design element I chose was the logo for the Arsenal Football team.  I chose this one because honestly I liked it however I chose it mostly because it had an example of a lot of things we are told to never to do as designers. So I found it interesting that something so large and prominent in the UK featured what some would consider not the best design. The design features an outline type face as the header, which is something we have been taught to consider a little more on the tacky side and to avoid it unless it compliments the design. It also has a cannon as its main focal point for the logo. But both of its ends are bleeding into the edges of the shield, which again is something we are constantly taught to stray away from unless absolutely necessary or intentional. However something I did find interesting was that they constantly fluctuated with their advertising. Switching on and off between their black and white logo and their color one.

This lovely London day started off right with a traditional English breakfast. Much better than the jam and toast for every other day this week. I of course decided to order everything on the menu at once. This included your typical eggs, bacon, sausage, toast, and hash browns. But the surprising elements were fried tomatoes and mushrooms with something called black pudding. Black pudding is cooked pigs blood in a natural stomach casing. This part was only enjoyed by myself and my sister Eden. It had a slightly gritty texture that tasted metallic but overall was pretty tasty. It was all topped off with an english breakfast tea, fitting, yes I know. It was milder than most teas I was used to, with lots of milk, which in England, has no preservatives or added cultures, this made all their dairy products taste exceptional. Overall, the meal was to die for. In fact I had it a second time later that night for dinner.

I also went to Portabello market for a second time and continued a streak of many purchases that were not necessary but definitely awesome.

A rather curious note with many of the sinks in London, many of them have two faucets, one for hot and one for cold. This "Sophie's Choice" of a decision made washing your hands very difficult when there was no temperature that was "Just Right". I discovered a very interesting sign that was metal with unintelligible words laser cut into it with the letterforms bent out of shape. I thought the piece was an interesting technique and that having the letters seem to fall out of the sign gave it a lot of life.

Anyway thats all for now, cheers from Matt-stache and Matty Ramz.

Friday March 6th, 2015

FRIDAY MARCH 6^TH 2015

WE WOKE UP EARLY AGAIN TODAY BUT THIS TIME WE WERE ALL LOOKING FORWARD TO OUR ADVENTURE TO THE BRANDING MUSEAM WHICH WAS CONVENIENTLY LOCATED NEXT TO PORTOBELLO MARKET.

(The rest of this blog will be in normal caps) So on our way to the branding museum we strolled through Portobello market which was just starting to be set up, (like I said we were up early). We decided we would stop by all the shops on our way back after we were done with the museum. Although the museum was very overwhelming we did have an assignment to get done. We had to sketch about 6 different typefaces or logo’s we liked.

When our eyes got tired from viewing the massive collection of branding and packaging, we returned to Portobello Market to shop around. There were many interesting shops and people selling things on the street, one of everyones favorite was the guy that was selling movable type pieces. Almost everyone bought something from him. While we were walking around looking we got a little hungry decided to get lunch at the local Wafflemeister. Their waffles, delicious on there own, also came covered in a variety of extra sweet toppings. (seen below is the succulent deliciousness)

Since some of us wanted to check out the Sherlock Holmes museum we decided to take the Tube to 221B Baker Street. While we were in the tube we noticed how clean everything was and wondered why there wasn't anything on the ground or blowing in the wind. We decided to investigate and peered behind a couple map signs and to our surprise we found where all the garbage goes. This weird cultural difference we found was that instead of things being thrown in trash cans

They are wedged between things and in things. we can this krittering or a creative form of littering. (lol)

We finally arrived at the baker street tube station and to our delight we found curious signs that helped guide us to 221B Baker Street A.K.A. Sherlock Holmes. we were disappointed to learn that the museum charged 10 pounds for admission but the gift shop and the basement were well worth the trip.  we were even allowed to try on hats and take pictures with the guard out front. 

 Finally our Journey for the day ended with a much needed group/family dinner at an Italian restaurant, we have all been waiting for this so we dont have to use our own money for food. The food was quite delicious and is pictured below along with everyone around the table.

With another successful day under our belts we head out into our final few days and nights in this magnificent city. signing off,  D.J. and Will

Well, once again this morning we woke up to the garbage man outside our window… What had sounded like 3,700 mason jars falling through our ceiling to our floor for 15 minutes conveniently acted as our alarm clock. We continued with our regular morning routine and then headed down to eat our towers of toast and crunchy cereal, which may or may not be sand and pebbles from the Mojave.

Following our scrumptious breakfast we walked to All of Us. All of Us is an interaction design firm predominately focusing on connected software, multi-device interfaces, physical media and environments, and brand identity. The studio is part of McCann, a firm that is home to architectural firms, design firms, and other communication based businesses. McCann is international and also well known in the United States.

Jem Robinson, Creative Director at All of Us, gave our designers a wonderful presentation on how the studio was organized and what the content of their work was based upon. Their clients were impressive including, Nike, Playstation, The Tate Museum, Sony, Microsoft, and many others. This was by far the largest workspace and amount of employees we saw in London. Here they had around 26 or so employees working in all areas of design, including, motion graphics, digital design, illustration, and classic graphic design practices.

Jem Robinson herself was very impressive in that at a young age and 11 years after graduating, has become the creative director due to her hard work and contributions to All of Us as well as previously teaching illustration. However, we found it interesting that as an illustrator she is working in a digital design studio focused on web and technology. This goes to show that processes in the creative fields are similar and that as students we can go anywhere after graduation based on the conceptual thought process we are taught during our four years in school.

In Robinson’s presentation she showed us digital work the studio did for Hooply, Work Club, Yota Phone 2, Heart Health Platform, and the British Museum. The work done for the British Museum was very helpful to the space surrounding the mummy exhibit. They designed an interactive, digital experience to allow people at the museum to explore the eight mummies showcased in the space. The interaction allows for the visitors to reveal what is inside the wrapping of the mummies that you can’t be seen when looking at the exhibit otherwise. Collectively this shows that the bodies are one, in the wrapping, and two, that each mummy was buried with different jewels and precious belongings.

Another interesting project developed by the studio was the formatting they did for the Yota Phone 2. This phone is currently available and most popular in China and uses both sides of the phones as screens in which the user can interact with. The front side was something similar to our standard LCD IPhone screen and the back was black and white like a kindle. The back was used for simple tasks including, date, time, weather, and anything else you would need in a more convenient form. All of Us was asked to set up the way the user would experience and navigate through the phone and its complex abilities so that it would be easier to use.

           

After this innovative and inspiring lecture from All Of Us, we were set loose for the afternoon. We spent some time in the market outside of King’s Cross Station drooling at the sight of fresh cheeses, meats, and homemade pastries. At this point we had to get our fix and got some tasty sandwiches.

One observation made while here in London is that there is a higher priority in design for all companies. We were particularly intrigued by the packaging design for our lunch by Kiosk. The take away bag with simplistic sans serif type accompanied by the light blue background create a sophisticated and light hearted atmosphere. We found that by having this packaging after purchasing, we felt content and satisfied with our lunch.

Conveniently enough the British Library was just a hop, skip, and jump away. This library had quite the collection holding nearly 15 million books. However, the most impressive aspect to this selection was the Sir John Ritblat Treasures Gallery. This display contained wondrous original musical works from Mozart, Debussy, Bach, The Beatles, and even Handel’s Messiah! In addition, there was Beowulf - the unique manuscript in Old English, writings from Leonardo da Vinci’s notebook, and Shakespeare's First Folio. However, as designers the most exciting work in the gallery was Johannes Gutenberg’s Bible of 1455. Once again we found ourselves drooling in awe of this groundbreaking text right in front of our very eyes. This had to be my (Josh) favorite part of the day. It was truly a humbling experience to stand there and not only see history but also see what is the reason why we are able to practice what we do. Therefore, the work ethic and discipline of these scribes completely blew my mind and put a lot of things into perspective.

From there, we took the tube to the National Gallery located at Trafalgar Square. Within the museum we saw great works by Claude Monet and Georges Seurat. Between these two artists, it was interesting to see similar impressionist styles creating different emotions due to color choice and content.

Another piece of information we found interesting all week long was the currency. The currency here is different from the States in that here in London they use a system called the pound and pence. Their bills start at five pounds and continue in order to ten, twenty, and fifty. However the coins include, one pence, two pence, five pence, ten pence, twenty pence, fifty pence, one pound, and two pounds coins. Here are the images of both the coins and the bills.

The design of the bills are better then that of the States because they are more involved in the patterning, layering, and colors of the security marks which allows for the currency to not be easily recreated. The system of the coins though are very similar in that Queen Elizabeth is showcased on every coin. We realize that this keeps every piece unified but at the same time it makes things confusing. The colors of the bills are great because it deciphers between the bills without having to identify the numbers on the bills. All in all we see similar traits in the new versions of the American currency and think this could be influenced from the pound here in England.

Of course when we first got here it was a confusing situation when we were trying to cross the street. With the cars driving on the left side of the road, we tended to get confused which way to look when we were to cross the road. Conveniently not only do the streets tell you which way to look but the cross walks with white dashed lines the cars will stop for pedestrians. However, they will not for cross walks with crossing lights. 

From London Town to the U.S.,

Cheers from your lads, Greg & Josh