Black & White Beauty

I wish I was better at photography. But for now, I’ll just admire other peoples’ work. Here are some beautiful shots I stumbled upon at Them Thangs via Design Porn. I’ve always preferred Black and White. Maybe that’s why I like to shop at Abercrombie? LoL

Curiouser and Curiouser…

Hey y’all! Time to indulge in my AIW obsession once again.

The Loyal Subjects of the Red Queen, the Loyal Subjects of the White Queen, and the Disloyal Subjects of the Mad Hatter are all building armies on Facebook. The fan page with the biggest army at 7PM EST on Thursday, July 23 will get to see an exclusive new trailer from Disney’s Alice in Wonderland before anyone else. Here is the link where you can pick your page and see some pretty character portraits.

Of course I cheated and became fans of all three, which led me to the main Alice in Wonderland Facebook page where I stole these lovely new promotional posters:

It’s a ridiculously simple and smart way to engage crazy kids like me and get free promotion (I twittered the link and passed it on to some other fans I know on Facebook). Thanks again to my favorite enabler, MM. 🙂

A New Design Direction

I had to get off the island today for a little bit to stock up on food and supplies. My preferred suppliers are Publix and Target. I’ve been a fan of Publix’s generic product design forever and apparently Target is too because they just relaunched their store brand as “Up & Up.” The packaging is so similar – simple, clean sans-serif and monochromatic with generous white space. I mean, these generic packages look better than the branded ones that they’re competing with. Better Design AND Better Price. Everyone wins! Yay!

It’s hard to find much about it yet since the brand literally launched last month, but according to Reuters, they have about 730 products available right now and will have close to 800 by the end of this year. And according to this press release,

“By re-launching Target brand as up & up, we’re able to create a unique identity for this powerful owned brand. The new packaging incorporates an element of design, giving us the opportunity to deliver on both the ‘expect more’ and ‘pay less’ sides of our brand promise.”

Target consistently reevaluates its owned brands to ensure they meet guest expectations. Before introducing up & up, Target reviewed more than 4,000 guest comments on the quality and performance of its store-brand products. This resulted in the reformulation or enhancement of more than 130 products in the line.

Like I said, the design is really similar to my favorite generic grocery brand, but unlike Publix, the Up & Up brand doesn’t have a website for fans of its packaging…yet.

(Even though it hasn’t been updated in almost two years, LoL. Guess they weren’t THAT big of fans.) Here’s a cute, more current website that encourages you to get into a “Green Routine.”

Pretty! Shiny! Sparkly!

Just wanted to sahre some eye candy that Ive enjoyed recently.

I’m not that into fashion, but living in South Beach you’re bound get into it a little bit, even if you’re a blind nudist. Flipping through channels, I stumbled upon the Fashion Channel and saw this company called Yamamay. At first I just thought they were cool b/c the company name is a palindrome. But I checked out the site and it’s got some beautiful Flash animation and their latest Summer 2009 collection was shot in Africa.

I’ve also always like M.A.C.’s Viva Glam ads. They recently launched the sixth lipstick in the line, which is being promoted by Fergie.

And if you’re ever in Japan, check out the 100% Chocolate Cafe which uses chocolate in all the food and drinks on the menu in addition to 56 pre-packaged varieties. The design is equally as delicious and features one of my favorite fonts, Avant Garde!