In case you missed any of them, here's a roundup of April's ampersand love. 01. Introducing the & 02. Swiss and Toilets 03. A Little Springtime Love 04. Land of Ampersand 05. A Typenerd's Love Letter 06. Newsy Floozy Juxtaposition 07. Ampersand History 08. Haiku for a Rainy Day 09. In the Springtime 10. Living in a Chemical Nightmare 11. Purple Reign 12. & Cut.
Today marks the last day of ampersand love. April has come to and end (well, more like it actually came to an end on Friday) so it's time to move along to May's challenge. "And cut." is something you tend to associate with film production but with this design the phrase symbolizes the end of a design challenge and also is reminiscent of the design style - kind of a cut paper overlay.
I really love this new, experimental font that I found. It's called VAL and you can download it from Fontfabric for free.
Lately it's struck me how many chemicals we use in, on, and around our bodies. I shudder to think of all the junk my body comes in contact with on a daily basis. Today's design speaks to that (I'm choosing to pick on cigarettes). Apparently, there is a list of around 600 additives that have been approved by the United States government for use in the manufacture of cigarettes. The ampersand in this design stands for all of the other ingredients not listed below.
When the winter is gone will you still love me in the springtime? I always love it when random phrases pop into my head. I checked around and don't think this expression is coming from anything. It's an oddly sad but hopeful tangle of words from out of nowhere contrasted with a whimsical design. Photo credit for the unicycle photo goes to Michael Creagh, and photo of the London Parliment is mine.
I've heard it's Spring but one could never guess that with the cold grey sky and patter of rain outside. To counteract this dreariness, I present a pretty picture of the mountains with a haiku on Spring by Matsuo Basho. Basho was a Japanese poet recognized for his simple, natural haikus. The ampersand is in Cooper Std.
What would a month of ampersand be without a little history? The long-short of it is that ampersand is a corruption of the phrase "and per se and". The Scots and Scottish English name for & is epershand, derived from "et per se and", with the same meaning. Through folk etymology it has been claimed that Andre-Marie Ampere used the symbol in his widely read publications, and that people began calling the new shape "Ampere's and".
*all of this thanks to Wikipedia
No matter how this gorgeous thing came to be, there's one indisputable fact. It's always been beautiful.
