Ripped from an email to a client:
“That said, I can reflect on something a design mentor, Ed Gold, said (He’s was honored for a AIGA medial some time ago, when I was involved with the local chapter) … Design is the one profession where, when you are doing it well, the goal is to achieve your highest heights by doing something even more different. Most other professions: like doctors, lawyers, etc., are about honing the expertise into doing the same thing very well.”
Forget everything you thought you knew about how to motivate people—at work, at school, at home. It’s wrong. As Daniel H. Pink explains in his new and paradigm-shattering book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, the secret to high performance and satisfaction in today’s world is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.
Meeting John at his Mill Centre office was a nice, quiet experience in the midst of a hectic October.
This interview ended up being vastly different from some of the other interviews we’ve done (and not in a bad way). In seeking to gain insight into what John does, I really ended up being the subject of his approach, with the meeting starting off with our initial casual conversation, which touched on Baltimore politics and other local issues, where we caught up a bit (I had met him at a BLEND event), eventually squared by having us share our similarities. It was almost as if I had interviewed a designer and by virtue of what she does, she just starts designing a poster on the spot for me.
John Starling represents a calming, attentive force, helping to craft vision and achivement strategies for companies, as he recounted in our conversation. And while I can’t vouch for his clients, I had a real sense of his understanding, just by the way he listened. Real easy, disarming. Our conversation, in which he revealed that he’s a black-belt and former MP, touched on how he worked to surpass his own limiting beliefs to be a better person for his family.
Location: Metro Gallery in Station North
Passion is the raw fuel of creativity, but without love it is just a volatile caldron of disorganized concepts. Rich Roat explains why House Industries’ passion for Stromberg 97s, molded plywood, air-dried inks, solid maple, circus posters, hand-fabricated drum brake vents and thousands of other ingredients translates to true love and timeless design.
Known throughout the world as a prolific type foundry, House Industries has made a considerable impact on the world of design. House Industries fonts scream from billboards, wish happy whatever from tens of thousands of greeting cards, serve as the basis for consumer product logos and add elements of style to a wide range of mainstream media. In their illustrious career, House artists have mastered a large cross-section of design disciplines.
Their typography deftly melds cultural, musical and graphic elements. From early forays into distressed digital alphabets to sophisticated type and lettering systems, House Industries’ work transcends graphic conventions and reaches out to a broad audience. What ultimately shines in the House Industries oeuvre is what always conquers mediocrity: a genuine love for their subject matter. Be it hot rods, classically relevant lettering or mid-century Modernism, House continues to provide typographic optimism in this age of the lowest aesthetic common denominator.
courtesy Von Glitschka
Von Glitschka, Illustrator on “Creating 5ive Alarm Ideas”
Oct 14 2010 – 6:30pm – 9:00pm
Location: College of Notre Dame, Knott Auditorium
courtesy Dave Plunkert, Spur Design
Pulp, Ink & Hops
Oct 21 2010 – 6:30pm – 9:00pm
Location: Baltimore Print Studios, 18W. North Avenue
Join AIGA Baltimore for the region’s largest paper show, featuring paper, print samples, and designer services from more than 30 local vendors. Enjoy light fare and “hops” from our fine local breweries while you network with 600 of your fellow creative professionals and “paper-addicts.”
This year’s venue is Baltimore’s premier public print studio which offers letterpress and screenprinting facilities to area artists. Baltimore Print Studios is located in the heart of Baltimore’s Station North Arts District.
Don’t miss the must-attend event of the year! Reception starts at 5:30 p.m., program to follow from 6:30 – 9 p.m.
Baltimore Print Studios
18 W. North Ave
Baltimore, MD 21211
In Advance Pricing
Members: $15
Non-members: $30
Students: $15
At the Door Pricing
Members: $25
Non-members: $40
Special: Note that buying your advance ticket to Pulp, Ink & Hops gets you a reduced price ($2 members, $4 non-members) to the Von Glitschka presentation, so no excuses and double down.
Visit the Pulp, Ink & Hops site and the AIGA Baltimore events page.