NMCA 08/06/2010
 Esquire 1962  Esquire 1960 Some people take their hobbies very seriously, as you can see on the National Magazine Cover Archive. Their home page sums it up, "The Nation Magazine Cover Archive (NMCA) is a non-commercial 'hobbysite' devoted to helping keep inspirational magazine design alive. These are strange days for editorial designers with homogenisation and closure of many well known (and loved) titles and independent publishers emerging to fill the gaps. Just don't forget to vote with your feet! Support quality magazines. Don't let them die." — The Management Now it may look like just a collection of covers, but there is a wealth of visual culture here, even if it is mostly from the USA. Click on any cover to see the range and depth of that particular magazine. Covers range from photographic and illustrative, to stark minimalism and those with amazing conceptual value. There is the wickedly funny Esquire magazine, and that all-time classic, Time. There are some new unknowns such as Etapes, an international design magazine from France, which has some pretty interesting covers. Check out the 1960 issue of Esquire (image above) which has an article titled 'India's Future After Nehru". I wonder what they predicted back then, and how much of it has transpired. Another great one from Esquire is the one shown above, with the contents typed out on the cover. For illustration-lovers there is 'Little White Lies', a cinema buff's magazine, which only has a range of illustrative covers. Some magazines pull out all stops when it comes to being experimental. Neo2 and Tokion, both of which manage to pull off the unique and daredevil covers of each issue, with finesse. Layout and typographic treatment are radically different everytime, which must take considerable vision and hard-work. And the best, a range of covers from one of the most creative magazines ever, Mad. The covers are just a mild flavour of the rib-cracking, rollin-on-the-floor humour and satire inside. Great humour is rare, and it's an expression of real creativity. Mad had it all, with one-liners, amazing cartoons, caricatures, and satirical commentary. The variety of the mastheads could be a study in itself. I could go on and on about it, but its best you visit the site. A great resource site for magazine lovers. Happy browsing. By Armeen Kapadia  Mad  Mad 1976 2 Comments The Footprint Chronicles 08/06/2009
 Mini-site: The Footprint Chronicles Patagonia is a California based clothing company that mostly makes outdoor clothing. It was founded in 1972 by Yvon Chouinard. Since its inception it has been considered a socially responsible company. Since 1985, Patagonia has donated $25 million to over 1000 organizations. It commits 1% of the total sales to the environment. Build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis. – Patagonia's Mission Statement Patagonia adheres to minimalist style. Its approach to product design is always simplicity and utility. Apart from focus on the design principles, it is also deeply concerned about the steep decline in the overall health of our planet. It is one of the few companies that is aware that it creates pollution as a by-product. It is working steadily to reduce those harmful impacts. As an employer it promotes Fair Labor and Environmental protection where its products are made. Its employees are paid fairly and enjoy good benefits. Patagonia only designs, tests, markets, and sells its products. It pays other factories to produce the fabrics and do the actual cutting and sewing. Factories to which it gives contracts for production are reviewed for both product quality and working conditions. It works with factories that get a positive review on the basis of product quality and working conditions. It has an active factory assessment program, since 1990, that keeps scorecards based on performance in different areas. It has an active third-party audit program, since 1994, that initiates discussions about change. There was a time when it lost track of who it was doing business with, and what working conditions were like in many of its factories. To resolve this problem, it has an active employee education program that focuses on factory workplace issues and work efficiency. It also trains its staff in social responsibility issues. In order to understand the social and environmental impacts of its supply chain, Patagonia has launched The Footprint Chronicles. Since Patagonia designs, develops and markets clothing, it has attained an environmental conscience. The Footprint Chronicles is an interactive mini-site that allows you to track the impact of its products from design through to delivery. The sheer transparent approach which they have adopted is heart-warming. They are aware that there is still no such thing as sustainable business and they are working towards it. If you select any of the products in the site, you can actually see the location trail on the globe. When you hover over every location, you can get information (photos and/or video clips) on what happens in every step of the process. For every product, you can see four mouse-overs — energy consumption, distance travelled, carbon dioxide emissions and waste generated. For example, if I select the Puckerware Shirt (Available in spring 2010), I can see that the fiber was acquired from Turkey, that is spun, woven and sewn in Thailand before it is shipped to Nevada in the US. If I want to know how far the Puckerware Shirt has traveled, it shows that, "Every Puckerware Shirt travels a total distance of 13,550 miles from origin as polymer raw material through garment delivery." The best part is it is equated to relative concepts such as this, "Every Puckerware Shirt travels the entire length of Nile river (4,132 miles) three times." Patagonia also is a co-founder of 1% for the planet. This is an alliance of businesses that, like Patagonia, commit at least 1% of their total sales to the environment. Patagonia bears the ultimate responsibility for the social and environmental cost of every product. Hoping many companies will emulate its efforts. If you have time then read these essays and the blog. Great day! By Sanjay Basavaraju Money becomes the message 07/23/2009
 Billboard made out of Zimbabwe currency  Zimbabwe currency as flyers We know that there is a crisis in Zimbabwe because of one man's stubbornness. That man is Robert Mugabe. The Zimbabwean, a national daily, commissioned the the Trillion Dollar campaign which communicates Mugabe's effect on Zimbabwe's economy. Recently, Zimbabwe launched a 50 billion dollar note, which bought its bearer two loaves of bread. By March 2009, the price for two loaves of bread had jumped to 7.5 trillion Zimbabwe dollars. Epic in progress: Write something 05/24/2009
 writesomething.net Epics are generally massive pieces of literature, usually covering the entire gamut of human emotions, written by one inspired soul. There is an online epic in the making, though some may call it senseless, it does talk about thousands of human emotions, as thousands, or millions of people have written it. Writesomething.net is where the action is. The Girl Effect 05/07/2009
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