Dine. Travel. Design.

Tonight I went to Boston Public Library to listen to Suzanne Thorin, University Librarian and Dean of Libraries of Syracuse University (my alma mater!), speak about SU’s treasured artifacts and special collections. And what an incredible collection it is! Of course, as always, I wish I knew about it sooner- when I was a student less than 2 years ago. Although there were only a handful of items presented, all had an impact that I wish I had known about- particularly during freshman art history class. I had no idea that SU had nearly 80% of Marcel Breuer’s original architectural design sketches or Margaret Burke-White’s original camera equipment and photography prints and negatives. It truly brings history to life to be able to see first hand the thought process of writers and artists or to appreciate artwork close up!

I was able to snap a few photographs of some artifacts:

It’s not just the sound of “Thomas Edison’s Blue Amber Record,” but the packaging that is significant. Package on right LEFT uses less material and 1 less color- saves on cost, production, and materials! A genius Edison was.

“Illuminated Manuscript,” significant in its use of vellum paper and Gutenberg’s Printing Press over woodblock typography setting. Gorgeous.

The Special Collection (6th floor, Bird Library) is constantly in search of ways to better itself for the use of Syracuse University’s faculty and students. I can’t wait to hear more about the Plastics Collection of the 1940’s-50’s that came from Leominster, MA! This will certainly be a great resource for ID students in Smith Hall

Thanks for the educational evening! Learn more about Syracuse University’s Library here.

I was on the phone this afternoon with Brendan Baker (Centre for Sustainable Development, University of Cambridge), who’s doing his master’s thesis on “the state of environmentalism in product design,” elaborating on the survey I filled out from his site.

He’s collecting surveys until end of August, so fill it out and pass it on because he’s still looking for help and more contributors from the product design field!

It’s a very interesting project with many intriguing questions. He’s not pushing environmentalism or sustainability, just pure research into what exists in the business world today. It made me think about my company very differently- or perhaps allowing me to internalize after verbalizing what I already knew…

I’m not one to follow on politics much, which is what intigued me about this site called Glassbooth.org. Through a series of questions, it rates which presidential candidates have values most like yours and address the issues most important to you.

Seems like a great way to get unbiased info on the candidate and really understand what these people stand for.

The site is rather well designed too!