Design Briefs

Color of the Year 2023

Pantone’s Color of the Year, Viva Magenta 18-1750, vibrates with vim and vigor. It is a shade rooted in nature descending from the red family and expressive of a new signal of strength. Viva Magenta is brave and fearless, and a pulsating color whose exuberance promotes a joyous and optimistic celebration, writing a new narrative.

This year’s Color of the Year is powerful and empowering. It is a new animated red that revels in pure joy, encouraging experimentation and self-expression without restraint, an electrifying, and a boundaryless shade that is manifesting as a stand-out statement. Viva Magenta welcomes anyone and everyone with the same verve for life and rebellious spirit. It is a color that is audacious, full of wit and inclusive of all.

Source: Pantone.com

Eames: Chic skateboards inspired by its classic designs

In celebration of Eames Office’s 80th anniversary, the design house teamed up with Australian skateboard hardware maker Globe to roll out a line of decks reflecting Eames’ esteemed history.

The boards in the Eames Silhouette Serie are crafted out of Canadian maple and walnut veneer wood, with abstract art inspired by the classic designs screen-printed on the skateboards. On the back, a story detailing each piece of work is laser-etched on.

Another board in the collection stands out from its more natural-paletted siblings as it is a colorful diamond-paterned deck reminiscent of the Eames Toy. This version is made from Rosewood and Resin-7 hard-rock maple.

In creating these boards, Globe employed the same steam bend to shape them derived from the Eames 1941 Kazam! Machine and which was used in many of Charles and Ray Eames’ plywood furniture. 

The choice is all yours if you’d like to hang these up on your wall and have a little bit of the Eames history showcased as skateboards or if you’d like to ride these works of art down at the half pipe.

Source: globebrand.com

Seven design books to look forward to in 2023

From a visual history of the guitar to a social justice guidebook on decolonizing design, 2023 will be a great year for design books. 

This list compiled by Elissaveta M. Brandon for Fast Company.

20th Century Alcohol & Tobacco Ads
Taschen, February 2023 release

Alchemy
Phaidon, April 2023 release

Guitar: The Shape of Sound
Phaidon, March 2023 release

The Art of Ruth E. Carter
Chronicle Books, May 2023 release

The Pandemic Effect
PA Press, January 2023 release

Making Camp
PA Press, May 2023 release

Decolonizing Design
Penguin Random House, February 2023 release

Additional information on all these books can be found at: tinyurl.com/ucda-seven-books

Source: Fast Company

The Smithsonian releases over 4 million free images from its collections online

Home to a collective of museums and educational and research institutions, the Smithsonian published 2.8 million digitized images of national treasures in 2020 for all to use at no cost. Now, the free-to-use collection has expanded to over 4.4 million assets. 

Everything in the Smithsonian Open Access bank—including both 2D and 3D digital items—comes under the Creative Commons Zero (CC0), also known as public domain, license. The selection combines the vast repositories of the Smithsonian’s 19 museums, the National Zoo, nine research centers, libraries, and archives. So whether you’re a wildlife enthusiast, a game designer, or an artist searching for inspiration from the past, there’ll be something for you.

Under the CC0 license, users are free to download, reuse, remix, and distribute images for personal and commercial use, no strings attached. There is no need to provide credit, either. However, the Smithsonian does disclaim that it cannot guarantee all content marked as CC0 isn’t tethered to other rights, “such as rights of publicity or privacy,” or if an image’s usage will be affected by the laws in your country.

The Smithsonian isn’t stopping at 4.4 million images—“many more” are to come, it teases. “What will you create?”

Source: Smithsonian (www.si.edu)