Kusama Yayoi: Princess of Polka Dots trailer

A great video about Kusama Yayoi

yayoi kusama – dots and simplicity

 what an extraordinary form of art and design with the simple and basic form of dots but amazing mix of colors and composition.  Perhaps, I’m not the latest who discovered the brillant work of Japanese female artist, Yayoi kusama.  Her obsession toward dots result in art that leave distinctive impression on you.

Her works exemplify how such some simple dots produce bold art.  Yet, her keen eyes color combination and sophisticated design made her art not so simple.   Essentially, this is the secret and nuances of achieving simplicity.  John Maeda, an advocate in simplicity quoted MUJI’s philosophy; simplicity is achieved through a complexity of thought and design.  Yayoi Kusama’s art is playful, eye pleasing candy with added dimension that take you into a world of imagination like a kelidoscope.  

What a Dots Master!

lesportsac weekender design

dreaming away under full moon

As per chat on Sunday, life has been hectic.  Part of the reason for creating a number of designs with the theme of mooncake festival wato design a lesportsac weekwith the theme of HK.

Here is the creative statement:

Full moon and clear sky give a warm and touching feeling that calms you down and makes you feel loved (by friends, family or special someone).   Hong Kong is well known for the city of light with beautiful illuminating skyline at night.  Yet, no matter how

weekender design - dreaming away under full moon

amazing the artificial and ambient light arrangement that one can create, that still give way to the spontanenous natural beauty of moonlight – which is like a big street lamp brightening life and the dark corners in the city. 

I’m particularly fond of the mid-autumn festival when friends and family get together and celebrate for the fullness of life as the full moon brings.  In the city of concrete forest, high-rises stretch skyline out into space where the moon appears even higher.  The design portraits the happiness of family and friends gathering under the full moon where most would go out, look up the sky and dream away.  In the culture of text messaging in Hong Kong, the facial expressions are playfully illustrated using font types and emoticons.

mooncake festival

mooncake inspired design

This is the first blog in 2 months – what a shame. It was somewhat busy – traveling and stuff; we are slowly settling down and should get better posting more frequently again.

This weekend is mid-autumn festival. People in Hong Kong/China and maybe other of Asia celebrate for the this festival which i sometimes call it the mooncake festival since many eat the special-made sweet delicacy (note aside: this is probably a Chinese festival but other Asian countries might also celebrate as well). Regarding the graphic, it’s supposed to be a design for a purpose. Despite that, can you tell what the circles are all about? um.. let me know what you think, i’ll add my creative statement later; No it’s not mooncake, c’mon.

mooncake art

In any case, this is one of the few designs i came up with but i think it will remain in the “private” collection – or i’ll need to refine it even though i was originally pretty excited about the initial conception but am not so happy how it turns out… that’s part of the iterative design process I guess; There are a few designs; instead of the last piece, the third one turns out to be the best after all, so we decided to go with it – more on it later.

Happy mooncake festival!

delicious design

It’s been almost three weeks since my last post.  It’s because I have been on the road traveling.  I haven’t got the chance to update the blog and the site.  Traveling is a great way to get inspiration for design and ideas.  Stay tuned, more design and update to come.

Since last post is about cross-over design and macaron, I’d like to show you my latest discovery during the trip.  Similar to the macaron-shaped pendants, I found some very nice dessert and bakery shaped pendants – yum!  Those in the pictures are some of good quality and well-made.  Although they aren’t completely handmade, they still involve some skilled handcraft work.