Merry Christmas

And so that's a wrap for the year, and this is my chosen festive Christmas image, albeit a little creepy! Thank you to all of our readers for checking in with us through the year: in our blog's first year we have picked up quite a number of followers. Boheem is back on January 10th, so we'll ensure to have lots of new, interesting and inspiring things to share then. Hope you have a lovely holiday and some special time with loved ones.

Gingerbread House extravaganza!

The Boheem Team enjoyed a fun Christmas activity on Thursday last week. Using supplied gingerbread house kits, we each made our own little candy home. The studio looked like Santa's workshop – we were floor to ceiling lollies, icing, and all things colourful and sweet!

The Lowercase

Friends of Boheem recently launched a lovely online store called The Lowercase. Featuring beautifully designed children's bed linen, contemporary artwork, tableware and many more little treats. Their whimsical site is definitely worth a look and for all those in need of some last minute Christmas shopping they have a 25% off sale this week. Hooray!

www.thelowercase.com.au

Hennie Haworth

Just delightful. Hennie Haworth has nailed the ability to allow her imagination to run wild and free. Check out more of this very talented illustrator's work at www.henniehaworth.co.uk

The Sketchbook Project

This year, Boheem is participating in the Arthouse Co-op's Sketchbook Project. It's a basically a massive, global collaborative artistic event whereby artists and designers from all over take a Moleskin Journal, fill it with stuff and then release it to tour around the US and then end up in the Brooklyn Art Library. Our journal's theme is "Secret Codes", and so far the team have come up with some really lovely, playful (as well as clever and conceptual) compositions. The books will be available to view online after the tour finishes.

Kenzo Christmas

I don't know who Kenzo are, but I sure like this Christmas promotion created for them a couple of years back by the Cosfibel Group.

UnitingWorld Everything in Common Catalogue 2010

We recently completed the UnitingWorld Everything in Common Catalogue and all of its associated material. The campaign features a range of overseas aid projects you can choose from, the idea being that you can sponsor a project as a 'gift' to a loved one. This year we went with a newsprint as a recurring background pattern as a reference to the way newspaper is used as warmth for some and as a source of information and awareness for others. If you're stuck for Christmas gift ideas this month, head to the Everything in Common website and buy a gift with a difference... to make a difference. You'll be sent a card with a description of your nominated project.

Mmmmmmm!

My mum is sending cards out to her friends soon for her birthday, and she asked me to design it for her. Her name's Marianne, and I designed a M-mmmmmonogram for her. Here are a few of the other decorative M's I found along the way.

Farewell Glenda

Today we heard the very sad and shocking news that our team member and dear friend Glenda Duncan passed away earlier this week. Glenda was our extremely diligent book keeper and worked with us in the studio every Tuesday for about five years. She looked after the accounts here at Boheem, and I like to think we did an ok job at looking after her too. This picture is a painting Glenda finished in June this year. Its title is "Viva La Vida" which means "Live Life".

We are so sad she is gone and will miss her hugely.

Sydney Terraces Tea Towels

Meanwhile at Boheem, we've been busy making things. This year our studio has put the retail 
wheels in motion, our online store has just made available these thick 100% cotton tea towels, featuring hand-drawn illustrations of Sydney terrace houses. They’re SO Sydney. We’ve got 100 tea towels currently in stock, so be quick. We’ll be printing more next year along with some other designs, so watch this space...

Available for purchase online at www.boheem.com.au/shop.html.

ps. Feel free to leave a comment... we'd love to hear your feedback!

House Industries

Charming plywood prints featuring retro typefaces and using an unlikely colour palette available from House Industries. This online store is the perfect place to find that special something for the graphic designer in your life!

Claire... squared

You'd think that one Claire would be enough. Since about three weeks ago, your chances of getting the "Boheem, Claire speaking?" greeting when you call the studio have exactly doubled. Claire Robinson has joined our ranks and is already proving to well compliment our already strong team. She studied at St George TAFE and has since worked at Frost* and Ok Sony, and has also squeezed in a few overseas adventures as well. Her interests and design aesthetic aligns perfectly with ours, and her strong conceptual approach is already bringing a new exciting dimension to our clients' projects.

Next Book Club Book

Just a quickie: We've decided on the next book club book, and it's (drum roll please): To Kill A Mockingbird. We'll probably shoot for a late January meeting. Clients and friends most welcome, please let us know if you'd like to come along!

Eye Magazine

Tell me, is it just me, or does everyone else's heartbeat quicken just a little when they see elegant, flowing typographic shapes, so perfectly balanced and oozing in confidence? These spreads show a collected feast put together by Eye Magazine in the UK.

A few old tickets to ride

We've been working on some packaging at the moment and for reference I have been using old train and bus tickets. From small and conventional to ornate, each ticket has some really interesting typographic and decorative elements. I also love the colour palette it creates when they're all together.

The best things in life are free

I'm the sort of person who'll keep the discount DVD hire voucher on the back of my Franklins docket, just to save a couple of bucks on a Friday night in. So you can imagine my glee after finding this lovely, free typeface called Matilde by Typedepot. Download it here.

Oliver Jeffers

Oliver Jeffers is one of my favourite children's book creators. These images are from his book, "The Incredible Book Eating Boy", a book about a boy who becomes smarter and smarter, the more books he consumes. Jeffers' series of books are delightfully illustrated, and feature some beautiful hand-drawn typography too.

Jaqk Cellars

Quite frankly, I wouldn't care if this wine tasted terrible... the packaging and the overall concept is just delightful. Jaqk Cellars have a 'packaged' marketing approach – they sell really great merchandise (including beautifully designed packs of playing cards, of course) along with their varied wines. Have a look at their website and online store here.

Jon Contino

Here's some more clever hand-drawn typography, loaded with personality and charm. Have a look at the New York-based creator's portfolio here or his Tumblr here.

Lady Rene Typeface

Here's a lovely new font designed by Laura Varsky and Alejandro Paul which you can find at Myfonts.com. As part of the promo there's a darling pdf booklet you can download. It's a story about a black cat, which is perfect for Halloween.

Love your work

Boheem Design was recently featured in "The Transit Lounge", which is part of the Uniting Church of Australia and an online magazine focussing on relationships, reflections, lifestyle and culture. Check out the editorial here. Not sure how big their readership is, but we feel a little bit famous in any case!

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

We're allowing ourselves a little more time these days for our book club reads. We need to allow some time in our lives for being creative, right?!

So we've all just finished reading The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, by Stieg Larsson. Generally speaking, we really enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone wanting an entertaining page-turner. The book is basically about a journalist by the name of Mikael Blomkvist, who takes a year out of his life to help an old guy Henrick Vanger solve the mystery of what happened to his niece Harriet, who went missing 40 years prior. Lisbeth Salander is the one with the dragon tattoo, and she joins forces with Blomkvist in this whodunnit.

Heads up for those who haven't read it yet that there are a few not-so-nice scenes… I'm not very brave with scary stories though! Hot tip would be to skip the first chapter altogether about the Wennerström affair – all you need to know is that Blomkvist has been framed and is heading to prison for a couple of months. The details are a bit tedious and not a great start to an otherwise easy read.

A few unresolved sub-plots we thought, and we reflected that the biblical references which had started about a third of the way through the book would continue to some kind of climax, but instead disappointingly those themes tapered off. Blomkvist is the protagonist, but we really relate to Salander more, whose thoughts and feelings we end up getting more insight to.

A recommended holiday read for the summer!

Unusual, tragic and alive

Who out there is cottoning on to the Tumblr phenomenon at the moment? My good friend Amy has a delightful Tumblr site, and then this week whilst researching for new brand direction for a client, I found one displaying these pictures and thousands of others like it by a young lady by the name of Andrea. The collection makes me want to drink beer, laze around in the sunshine, go on long road trips, listen to Joy Division and be seventeen again. The clever young contributor uploads posts really frequently, so there's constant inspiration to be found. Check out the many other lovely pictures at this link.

Mei moves on

They say that all good things come to an end... and whilst I'm not really prepared to fully embrace that as a life philosophy, it's what comes to mind when I try to understand why Mei couldn't work for us for 30 years. Our fabulously talented designer has moved on to other (not greener or greater I'm sure!) pastures, and we are very sad to say goodbye. Mei has worked with us for almost 4 years, and in that time she's been responsible for much of the beautiful branding work we've done for UnitingWorld, PLC Sydney, The High Tea Party and many more satisfied clients, who I know will miss her as much as we will. The team headed out to Toko Crown St on Friday for a farewell lunch.

Three Potato Four

Found this lovely recently opened homewares/design store located in Philidelphia whilst researching for some coffee branding we're doing this week (I promise I was working..!). It's called Three Potato Four and by the looks of things they do offer international shipping...

Feltmaker: Esther Turnbull

Many of you would already know that we've been on the hunt lately to find a new Boheemian to join our team. It's been such a pleasure meeting so many talented people and pouring through their very inspiring portfolios. One of my favourite projects was this one by Esther Turnbull. For her final year university piece Esther made by hand a range of felt textiles, photographed them and then featured them in her own art book. The textures and colours were just gorgeous; literally took my breath away!

The High Tea Party Moodboard

We just love a mood board, it's the most perfect way to kick-start a brand or bring redirection to an existing aesthetic. The girls at The Peppermint Group are some of our favourite people to work with, and their main event is an expo for beauty-and-fashion-conscious women known as The High Tea Party – check out their site here, illustrated and designed by us. Team Boheem is looking forward to heading to The Westin this Friday for an extra special cuppa, a spot of shopping and an insight to whether florals are the new black this summer, etc etc...

Lexus 2010 Melbourne Cup Invitations

We have the pleasure each year of being given the Lexus Melbourne Cup invitations, and it's always an opportunity to stretch ourselves creatively and try some new paper stocks and finishes. This year we had the invites debossed with a pearl foil and then laminated onto thick card. I think I'm most excited about having a close-up artsy photographs of textured stock with letterpress in our portfolio... something every designer must have at least one of!

One Seed Botanical Fragrances

One Seed botanical fragrances is a range of hand creams and perfumes we not only love, but that we've had the privilege of designing the new range of packaging for. This is the postcard, and the product range can be seen on their website. We've just completed the hand cream tubes and will be working on the perfume bottles in the coming months. We love One Seed for their beautiful products but also for the holistic, gentle approach to what they create and their inspiring philosophy.

Street Art

Took this picture of a wall in the back streets of Newtown the other day. Somebody printed/painted this solitary little girl and knew when to stop and put their brush down.

Earnest Sewn

Why do I feel un-hip for being in a hemisphere not going into winter? I was looking for imagery for a mood board the other day and came back to Earnest Sewn, which is one of my favourite stores in New York's Lower East Side. Their aesthetic is classic, rustic and just a little nostalgic. Here are some of the spreads from their latest lookbook.

Speedball Textbook

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These books bring me back. My dad used to do a little sign writing on the side, he was the community favourite for all school, church and fete lettering. It was a bit of a hobby for him, and he used to have a little collection of typography books like this one. While my sisters were indulging in Enid Blyton and Elyne Mitchell, I was pouring through the beautiful pages of the Speedball Textbook, wondering just which ampersand I liked the most.