Asbury & Asbury

Past posts

This blog is a year old today. We thought we would mark the occasion by dusting down some of our greatest hits (and misses) from the last year.

This poem about lost brands went down well.

Corpoetics has enjoyed its year in the sun.

We can also draw horses. Sort of.

There have been sporadic outbreaks of Cloudy Language bringing mainly unsettled themes.

Could you tell the difference between a Fall song and a tax avoidance scheme?

The A-roads poster is still taking shape.

The search for John Hanna was good fun.

Songs For Animals is hibernating, but will rise again.

And our Failed Jokes seem to have died a death.

Oh, and this photo set the tone early on.

Thanks for reading, if you have been.

Teatime is free time

This morning, we took delivery of a very marvellous thing – a box of free goodies from the godlike people at Yorkshire Tea. No reason, apart from some friendly to-ing and fro-ing on Twitter, originally sparked off by mention of our Pentone Yorkshire mug. Plus, what might be construed as some shameless begging.

Thanks Yorkshire Tea. Not just for this. For everything.

PS: If you haven't seen them already, there are some great Yorkshire Tea ads featuring John Shuttleworth over here on Creative Review.

New Country Songs

Not sure why I started coming up with these imaginary country song titles with a modern twist, but here they are. Thanks to Daniel Gray and Mike Reed, who joined in on Twitter and got us up to a triple album's worth.

Mama Get A Hammer (There's A Fly On My Blackberry Storm)

I Keep Forgetting I Forgot (My Online Banking Password)

My Wife Ran Off With My iPod Touch (And I Sure Do Miss It)

Ctrl – Alt – Divorce

I Was Calling Back To See If You Were Calling Back To See If You Could Arrange A Redelivery Time For My Replacement Router

PS3 I Love You

Untag My Heart

Your Heart Has No DRM

I'm So Miserable Without My Blackberry Storm, It's Like I Still Have It

This Song Is Just For You Jesus (And Anyone Within Thirty Feet Of Your Apple Headphones)

You've Got A Facebook Friend

By The Time I Get To Phoenix (You'll Still Be Downloading That PDF)

Error 404: That Love Can't Be Found

Grandpa (Tell Me Bout Second Life)

Ring Of Firewalls / Ringtone of Fire [Double A-side]

Return To Sender (Unknown Address Error 550-"Sender Policy Framework of "tiscali.co.uk" Domain Denied Your IP Address.")

Walk The Line, Then Rasterize It

I Gave Virgin Media A Ring, And They Gave Me The Finger

Achy Breaky Hard Drive

My Phone Ain't Been Ringing, So I Guess It Wasn't Technical Support Calling Me Back Like They Promised

I Don't Know Whether To Kill Myself Or Call BT

If You Put Me On Hold Again (I'm Gonna Hold It Against You)

Making Love To You (Is like Booking A Ticket On thetrainline.com)

I Hate Myself For Loving Windows Vista

I Still Miss You BT Freestyle 750 Cordless Phone (But My Aim Is Getting Better)

If I Had Shot The Guy From Verizon When I Wanted To I'd Be Out By Now

Horse drawn

As a freelance graphic designer, there's one thing I'm pretty hopeless at and dread being asked to do, and that's sketching – or specifically, coming up with a quick sketch for a client presentation. Drawing isn't really my thing, especially drawing without reference material. But freelancers are expected to turn their hand to just about anything. Even when you try to explain, the reply usually comes that they're not after anything special, just a quick sketch to get the idea across. The client might get confused by mac-ed up artwork, thinking it's the finished article and then how would they justify the fees?

So I'd sit down with my pen and paper and come up with something like this...

...if they asked for a horse, of course.

Personally, I don't mind my drawing. It's embarrassingly inaccurate, but not without its charm in a naïve sort of way. The horse is smiling for one thing.

But I've always admired people who can knock out a convincing drawing of a horse, pigeon in flight or whatever – so I recently decided to do something about it and get a bit of practice in.

There are loads of instructional books on drawing out there (mostly for kids), but with my art and design training I'd always dismissed cartoon or copycat drawing out of hand, because it didn't sit well with my idea of drawing from observation. Now I have to confess, I'm hooked.

In two minutes flat I can draw this...

...a recognisable horse.

Referring to a slightly more grown-up book, I came up with this stallion in less than five minutes...

and here's the head...

All the drawings are first attempts and there was no 'cheating' with rubbers or heaven forbid, tracing. It's relaxing and stupidly good fun. Here are some of my other efforts – they're not all supposed to be horses.

 

How to draw 101 animals
Draw 50 animals

Owen goal

Given that one half of Asbury & Asbury is Liverpool and the other Everton, there are mixed feelings here about the fortunes of Michael Owen, former Liverpool and England football legend, now languishing at relegated Newcastle United, and reduced to advertising himself for sale in an already-infamous 32-page brochure.

Speaking as the red half of Asbury & Asbury, I’d happily have worked on the copy for free. That said, when faced with the brief, I’d like to think my advice would have been “Don’t produce a brochure at all”. Does anyone really need to know Owen’s brand values include ‘Cool’, ‘Dynamic’ and ‘Sincere’?

It’s almost as though the award-winning Christopher Doyle Identity Guidelines have found their counterpart in real life. Not sure if Owen has a colour palette, but he certainly doesn't look great in black and white.

UPDATE: This has since been picked up in a good article on Creative Review’s blog, as well as by fellow wordsmith Rishi Dastidar. Thanks also to Effektive Design who originally brought our attention to it. The latest breaking news is that Hull City are interested in making a bid. Not one to enter for the Design Effectiveness Awards. 

Creative accounting

Just been perusing The Guardian's gallery of MPs' expenses claims, which includes receipts for everything from garden plants to the Tesco weekly shop. Many of them are partially or almost entirely blacked out. It's striking how interesting they become purely as pieces of graphic art. Someone should blow them up and sell them as limited-edition screen prints. Naturally, they would have to be extortionately expensive.

Brand new Nick

Just uploaded Nick's new site to bring it in line with Asbury & Asbury. Next up, a similar redesign of my site; then we’ll be one big happy family.

It's raining in Rainow

Hand.Written.Blog.Post.

Recently got round to contributing our handwritten letter to this collection by Manchester designer Craig Oldham. The project is an interesting look back at what used to be a common pleasure in life and is now all too rare: receiving a proper handwritten letter. Craig’s site is full of nice stuff, so it’s worth a good dig around.

As a curious footnote, Sue has recently been working alongside a designer called Craig at a (very good) agency called Music in Manchester. It was only a few days into being there that she realised his second name was Oldham. If we’d twigged earlier, she could have hand-delivered the handwritten letter.

Dodge or Fall?

The Guardian is running a series of stories looking at the schemes UK companies use to avoid paying their fair share of tax. The names given to these ingenious tax dodges are strangely resonant – things like “The Double Luxembourg” and “Outward Domestication’. In fact, they sound very much like lost B-sides by Manchester songsmiths The Fall.

See if you can tell the difference between a corporate tax avoidance scheme and a Fall song title, by playing our soon-to-be-household-favourite game:

Dodge or Fall?

1. Cross-Border Tax Arbitrage
2. Hybrid Debt Instruments
3. Hexen Definitive Strife Knot
4. Auto Tech Pilot
5. Thick Capitalisation
6. Corporate Inversions
7. Octo Realm Ketamine Sun
8. Intangibles Fragmentation
9. Senior Twilight Stock Replacer
10. Aspen Reprise
11. Dividend Traps
12. Dutch Sandwich
13. Bremen Nacht Run Out
14. Systematic Abuse
15. Swiss Roundabout
16. Imperial Wax Solvent
17. Defeased Leasing
18. To Nkroachment: Yarbles

Either turn your screen upside-down or stand on your head for the answers.

Abandoned London

So we’re just about shaking off the seasonal slumber and ready to post again.

Best spot of the festive season was this Flickr set by IanVisits, all taken on Christmas morning in central London. (Found via Design Observer.)

It's pretty much how we imagine London looks every day, now that we've moved out.

Silly old Mensa

Not normally one for moaning about apostrophes, but even I have to draw the line somewhere. If your strapline is The High IQ Society, you’ve got to at least run the spellcheck before calling your product Worlds Best Brainteasers.

(You can tell this is a highbrow blog when we’re talking down to Mensa. Next week: Silly old Noam Chomsky and Come on Henry Kissinger, try harder.)

Snow on Rainow

Image copyright Jane Osmond

Moving into our new place in Rainow tomorrow. This being the North where people are officially nice, we’ve already had a drink (and a singalong) with some of the neighbours. Turns out one of them is a very good landscape artist – you can see (and buy) some of her work here. We particularly like the series of etchings, of which this is one. Ours is the fourth chimney from the left.

Human palindrome

Loft inventory

Sun lounger (fold away)
Suitcase (hard)
Big orange plastic bag (empty)
White laundry basket
Suitcase (soft)
Samsonite bag (zip broken?)
Berghaus rucksack
Electric guitar with case
Guitar case (Nick's – empty?)
Keyboards and stand
Drum machine
16-track
Sony double tape deck
Technics turntable
Technics CD player
Sony speakers
Sony hi-fi
Hi-fi amp
Sony turntable (Nick's)
Anglepoise lamp (possibly broken but easy to fix)
White spotlight
Bag of dustsheets
Green blinds
Christmas tree stand
Box of Christmas stuff
Small electric heater
Blue wall clock (50s)
Small box containing whisky bottle, gold coasters, candles and mugs
Few small soft toys (birds, rubber duck, rubber cow, Bagpuss)
Box of red stuff
Box of old letters (Sue)
Box of old tapes
2 x pillows
Exercise mat
Blow-up bed
Blue double duvet (Nick's)
Winter double duvet
Box of bubble wrap
Dozen foam boards and cardboard
Box file (Nick's stuff)
Blue folder (Nick's invoices)
Banana Republic bag
Square pine frame (ephemera)
Large brown wooden frame (whisky labels)
Box of old photos
Box of plugs (music-related stuff)
2 x roll mats
2 x tents
2 x sleeping bags
Camping mattress (blow-up)
Pallet of CDs
Screen printing stuff
Old printer
Large bag of Sue's winter clothes and shoes
Large bag of Nick's stuff and blue throw
Large bag containing fluffy rug and floor cushion
Large floor cushion
Wedding dress
Bag of cushions
2006 D&AD annual
2007 D&AD annual
5 x Smith & Milton books
Box of stuff (just general things like maracas and that)
Treasure chest (with photos)
Box of boxes
More bubble wrap
Tall Mathmos light box
2 x portfolio cases and old portfolio file
Silver (!) briefcase
Shoebox of Nick's stuff
Blue toolbox of tapes
Small black rucksack containing more of Sue's stuff
Box of CDs
Box of Corpoetics
Box of trophies
Box of small frames and knick-knacks
Another box of CDs
Brand new computer speakers (white)
Camera and computer boxes with manuals
Bin bag of old Christmas cards
Bucket of paintbrushes
Paint (lots)
Large saw
4 x shelf brackets
Box of invoices and tapes
Small chest of drawers
3 x drawers of LPs
2 x old radios
Box of computer cables