Helvetica, The Film!

In an earlier post, I wrote about Helvetica's 50th birthday. I'm not a major Helvetica fan (it's hard for me to be faithful to one typeface), but I surely do love words and design, so how could I not get just a tiny bit excited about the announcement of H's half-centennial. But wait, there's more! First-time director Gary Hustwit has made an independent film, Helvetica, about "typography, graphic design and global visual culture," which is now on a worldwide tour. Leaving aside the good reviews, I tend to trust Hustwit, who produced the excellent documentary about the band Wilco: I Am Trying to Break Your Heart (order it on NetFlix now). (Here's Hustwit's film blog, by the way.)

I already know I'm going to love this film. In fact, I'm going to suggest it to our local art film/indie film/welcome-option-to-schlock film house. I recognize that it's a long shot (even this good film venue may not consider this a likely revenue-generating proposition), but then again, how could you not be interested in a film that Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune, in his review, describes thus:

"...the film says a great deal without raising its voice, lending wit and grace to an inquiry regarding the way a medium, a squiggle or the precise space between two letters affects a million different messages and a billion different eyeballs.

"The real achievement of the picture, though, is the way it sharpens your eye in general and makes connections between form and content, and between art and life. By rounding up a great group of eloquent obsessives eager to explain their feelings about a font, Hustwit has come up with 80 unexpectedly blissful minutes."

Be still my heart.

Helvetica, by the way, is Latin for "Switzerland." Who knew?

More Studio Pix

My studio started out as an office, and it still serves that purpose as needed, but with the introduction of wireless communication into our home, my office is pretty much anywhere I want it to be. And since Steven's work requires him to keep a slew of computers going at all times, that equipment is available to me as well when I need it. So after moving some files to another part of the house, adding my worktable, and reconfiguring the space, the room now functions primarily as a studio.

We built it as an addition off our bedroom, approximately 15' long by 11' wide. Formerly, our bedroom opened onto a deck, overlooking our back yard and the moutains in the distance. We chopped off that portion of the deck, kept the double-doorway (but not the doors) to help keep the new space separate. Directly underneath is the addition to Steven's office, which originally followed the footprint of our bedroom.

I'm one of those people whose mood is affected in a major way by physical environment, so I wanted the space to be pleasing to my eye (which almost immediately makes it feel comfortable) and to be bright and airy. Having grown up in Florida, the one thing I need above all things is lots of light, so tall windows, which I keep open as much as possible, run the length of one wall. Another wall has a glassed double door that opens onto our deck -- since my worktable is up against, it functions primarily as a window. The ceiling is gabled and high, and we installed a large ceiling fan, since we get the afternoon sun straight on. I wanted a calming space, so the walls are painted a very pale violet, as is the ceiling (the color of the walls in our bedroom is a touch deeper). The floors are inexpensive wood painted off-white. The curtains are simple sheer cotton/linen and affixed to curtain rods with those easy clip thingies, so no sewing was involved. (I'm convinced that those clip thingies were invented just for me. Why didn't I invent those?)

I feel a sense of well-being just walking into this room, which is exactly what I'd hoped for as I was planning the space. So, I have no excuse not to create; it's all up to me (yikes!).

When we first added on the room, I designed this cabinet with drawers and shelves as a built-in. The shallow drawers hold papers up to a certain size, the other drawers are for supplies and such, and the shelves contain books and other supplies. To the right, on the small teal table, is a set of drawers I bought at Ikea, which I'm in the process of painting. They're great for all kinds of odds and ends.

This desk holds all my electronic equipment: printers, copier, and docking station for my laptop. There's a scanner on a small cart with wheels underneath the desk. The shelf to the right used to be in our bedroom and I keep a small stereo and CDs here. Half the time I listen to music while I'm working; the rest of the time I'm tuned in to books-on-tape/CD).

On the table to the right is my "get-up-and-go" supply tote (I love this thing!). It's always stocked and ready for a class or for a visit to a friend's studio. Behind it is the sewing machine that I have yet to use. I bought it a few years ago so that my mother could use it when she visits us for a month in the summer (I've gotten some great sofa pillows and a beautiful shower curtain out of the deal). Recently I decided that I wanted to start doing stitching on paper, so I dusted it off and put it in my studio as a reminder. I have some rubber stamps that I used to keep in a drawer. About a year ago, I took a class at Random Arts (Jane Powell and her husband Paul's fabulous store) and loved her system of putting stamps out on the equivalent of tiny shelves (pieces of wood about two inches deep) screwed into the wall. It's a good way to see what you have, and provides a bit of visual interest.
I built a giant, free-standing bulletin board (about 7 feet high) to which I tack images that inspire me or simply make me happy. The surface is made of cushy ceiling tiles. I stretched rows of seven different vintage fabrics around the front and stapled them to the back of the tiles, then a friend built a frame around the whole thing. There's a small desk here that I placed on bricks to bring it up to the height of my worktable. It holds supplies that I use often and some work-in-progress. You can hardly see it at top left, but I hung a small candle chandelier that I found at a salvage shop. I sanded off the rust and painted it the same color of the floor and the cabinet, and added some tall violet candles (it's a shame, of couse, but for safety's sake it's never lit).
This is the main view from my studio. The trees are at their lushest in the summer, so I see the mountains only through the windows of the trees. Fall is my favorite season; the leaves begin to fall, giving me a better long-distance view, and I get to enjoy the amazing canvas of fall colors on the mountains.

Book Arts Cheer

I've been feeling a bit under the weather for the last couple of days. Maybe my last post did me in after all. Now, what never fails to brighten my spirits? My worktable, naturellement! I've written about my love affair with this table before, including its design (here and here) and its unqualified beauty (here). So I took my first pix of THE table and my studio. Any bookmaker who's worked at a standard-height desk or table knows what a joy it is to work on a surface whose height is geared to book work. And, oh, the bliss of having one whose height was tailor-made for moi!

But there are other features that make me swoon at the sight of my table. Although I have a built-in cabinet with some large, shallow drawers in which I store paper, the largest sheets of both decorative papers and text papers spent their lives rolled up in a box. Now they lay comfortably on one of the table's two shelves.

The work surface is formica, which makes it easy to clean; it's large enough that I can have separate areas for cutting and gluing; and it's wide enough that I can keep supplies close at hand but not in my way. Oh, and did I mention that it's on casters? What more could a BookGirl possibly want!?

Photos of the table today, more photos of the studio later.

NOTE: In my previous posts, I mentioned the wonderful craftsmanship and service of Bill Bennert, who made and helped design my table (he also built the tables for BookWorks, Asheville's excellent book arts learning center. Bill doesn't have a web site, but if you are interested in his contact information, please leave a comment and I'll get back to you.

Christening the Table

My worktable arrived yesterday morning, and Bill Bennert, who delivered it himself, re-assembled it in my studio. He'd taken off the top and the casters, figuring that the assembled table wouldn't make it around the corners, and through the doorways, into my studio. Smart move.

What can I say: it's Gorgeous! Bill's craftmanship really stands out. I spent a few afternoon hours moving things around again into what seems a good, functional arrangement (different from what I had before), and sorting my text and cover papers and arranging them on the table's shelves. I no longer have to roll up larger decorative papers and can stop keeping my Velata paper in its original box, leaning it against whatever's handy. That in itself made a big difference in how the space looks. An old counter stool that was stored in the garage turns out to be the perfect height for the table, for those times when I'm doing close work other than tearing and gluing. I "christened" the table this morning by starting a new book.

Designing A Worktable

It's time to give up whatever illusions I might have had about using my standard desk as a worktable for bookmaking, and spring for a proper table. After an afternoon of cutting paper for signatures, and/or folding, and/or gluing covers, my lower back is begging for mercy. I've tracked down the name of the carpenter who constructed the tables for BookWorks. After speaking with him and hearing that "it wouldn't be fair to quote me a price until he had a better idea of what I needed" (no doubt true, but always anxiety-inducing), I made some notes and a drawing and faxed them off to him yesterday.

I'd invited a friend to come by to help me think through my needs and how best to configure the space in my small studio (approximateloy 14 x 11 1/2 feet). It was time well spent. We agreed that the best place for the table would be against a wall that has glass doors, which I never use, to our back deck. At right angles to the worktable will be my old desk, raised to approximately the same height as the table. Thirty-eight inches seems to be the optimum height for me (I'm about 5' 5" tall). We decided the table should be 6 feet long and 3 feet wide, which will give me enough room for separate cutting and gluing stations. Like the tables at BookWorks, it will have a Formica top, which makes for a tough and an easy-clean surface. There will be two shelves below the surface that I can use for paper storage and to store some supplies (I have a cabinet with deep, wide shelves that already houses some of my decorative and text papers).

To start the process -- once I have an idea, I like to get going as soon as possible -- I headed to my local Lowe's (North Carolina-based -- as opposed to Home Depot -- for those to whom such things matter) to check out their Formica and learned that white Formica is pretty much always in stock, but other colors have to be special ordered, which drives up the cost. I would have preferred 'Mission White,' a creamy off-white that would match my desk, but white it is. I also picked up some large pavers. I needed them to be either eight inches, since my desk is 30" high. I couldn't find bricks or anything similar of that height, so I ended up with 4"-high pavers, which I'll stack, 2 under each leg of the desk. I'm actually thinking of covering them in felt or canvas or some other strong rough fabric, which should be a fairly painless task. With 8 of those babies in the trunk of my small two-seater, I felt as low to the ground as I've ever felt in that car.

Bill, the man who's going to make my table (I hope), had some questions and suggestions. Although I'll usually be standing at the table, I may sit from time to time, so he suggested that we make the table surface larger than the table base. Six inches is the standard overhang for that purpose, so the table surface will now be 42". Since it will be against the wall, he will put supports on the back, which will keep him from having to include legs in the center. Also because of the table's position, the overhang will be only on the front of the table (rather than on all four sides, as would be the case if, for example, several people would be sitting around it). The table will have casters, so that I can move it fairly easily if needed, and he tells me that the locks on the casters will keep the table immobile when I want it to be. The 38" height will, of course, include the casters. I won't need the metal devices that the BookWorks tables have to adjust their height, because mine will stay permanently at 38".

He tells me that the tabletop will be very heavy. This is not because of the Formica, which is fairly light, but because of the substrate (?) to which the Formica is affixed: two layes of MDF. Bill says that I will have lots of material left over for shelving, should I need it, since the construction for the table is, I think he said, "inherently inefficient" (gee, that's encouraging). He did a great job of answering my questions and walking me through what's entailed. He obviously knows what he's doing, and has been a pleasure to deal with. My sense is that I'll be happy working with him and he'll deliver a quality product on time. Nevertheless, my heart sank a bit when he closed our conversation by saying: "I hope you won't have sticker shock when I call you with the quote."