“It’s about lack of complication. You can try to put everything into a design, or you can try to leave out everything but the absolute essentials. In the words of Mies van der Rohe “less is more”. You pare a design down by first doing it wrong in every conceivable way. I’d like to have only good ideas, but in reality I have to work through the bad ones first.”

See a digital version of the Nation Trust magazine here

As part of my creative goals to myself this year, I’ve recently taken on the 365 challenge – to take a photo every day and upload it online to my Flickr account.

The photos are taken using my iPhone and the recently updated Flickr App (the old one was, lets face it, a complete dog!) For someone who loves to shoot film as a hobby, I chose the iPhone because of the obvious immediacy of the medium & also because it ties in with one of my lesser creative goals – to carry a camera with me almost everywhere I go.

Why not do it with the uber-popular Instagram, I hear you cry! Well after giving it a bit of thought – and after a nudge from an article in the February issue of Creative Review Magazine which made me reconsider online social loyalties, I ditched Instagram in favour of Flickr. Partly because I was never really convinced or committed to it – the enforced ‘make-everything-look-pseudo-retro-medium-format’ aesthetic does not appeal to me or the way I like to work; And also because I’ve long been more loyal to my Flickr account & for me, that’s where I share my photos online.

So, I’m now a week into the project and so far, it’s going well. It’s great to have a little creative goal to go after everyday & makes you see the world in a more interesting way. I’ve already found myself going out of my way in search of more interesting images! No doubt it will get difficult at times – life is always busy, the repetition of the day job is limiting and creativity doesn’t always flow freely! I don’t quite go in for the daily themes thing that many people do, but I might set myself weekly themes from time to time – suggestions welcome! On an either weekly or monthly basis I’ll blog an update on my results and maybe some favourites.

Photos will be posted to my iOS 365 Set on Flickr & a link posted on Twitter, too if you’d like to follow my progress.

Wish me luck!

The last couple of years have been a real rollercoaster and has meant putting a lot of things on hold for a long time. Finally it’s beginning to feel like we can pick ourselves up again and perhaps start working towards some of the things we’d like to do.

Whilst many possibilities spring to mind, I think I’ve boiled my personal goals down to three things.

1) Officially launch our Herb Design portfolio online.
2) Commit to more Critical reading, thinking and writing (or blogging at least!)
3) learn to play Blues Harmonica properly.

These are all things I’ve been hoping to do for quite a while and I think will be enough to keep me busy and challenged creatively and intellectually! Sharp mind n’ all that!

Some of my progress, research and results will be published on this blog (the design of which still needs finalising…) while portfolio work & final writings on Design etc will be launched on a new folio site (yet to be completed) In the mean time, happy new year to all & lets see what else the new year brings….