Designer Things

I used to think graffiti was just vandalism until I spent three months photographing tagged subway cars in Brooklyn. Turns out, the whole argument about

I used to think bank logos were just blue rectangles with serif fonts, and honestly, I wasn’t entirely wrong. But here’s the thing—the visual

I used to think typography was just about picking fonts that looked nice. Turns out, the whole history is messier than that—like, significantly messier.

I used to think beadwork was just decoration. Then I spent an afternoon in a museum storage room in upstate New York, surrounded by boxes of Iroquois beaded

I used to think chocolate packaging was just about looking expensive. Then I spent three months photographing premium chocolate bars in boutique shops

I stood in the Nevada desert last year, watching a land artist trace a 200-foot spiral into the alkali flats, and I couldn’t stop thinking about the Nazca.

I used to think CBD labels were just about slapping a logo on a bottle and calling it a day. Turns out, there’s this whole visual language happening

I used to think colonial charters were just boring legal documents—until I started looking at the actual paper. The thing is, when European powers began

I used to think Cubism was just about making faces look weird. Turns out, when Picasso and Braque started shattering objects into geometric fragments around

I used to think murals were just decoration. Then I spent three months in Los Angeles, walking through Boyle Heights and East LA, staring at walls that