A Brief Valentine’s Day Message

I’m not much for this holiday, really. It’s kind of hard to get enthusiastic about it when you’re not dating anyone, as happens to be the case with me at the moment. In spite of that convenient pessimism, I have two Valentine’s Day-related bits to share with you, both of which also happen to be A Brief Message-related.

First is today’s adorable new Message, written by Esther K. Smith about giving pink hearts a chance, embracing cliché and reliving the abandon of grade school arts and crafts. This one was illustrated — also adorably — by Clément Fabre. Don’t be afraid — go read it.

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The Power of the Printed-on-Demand Word

Digital evangelists: if you have any doubt about the convincing power of print, then order yourself a book of your own making over at Lulu.com — remember to put your name prominently on the cover — and show it around to your friends. That’s what I did for a project I’m working on with Steven Heller; I wrote and designed a ten-page spread (illustrated by my good friend, the incomparably hilarious Olso Davis) and created a PDF in which the pages are repeated over and over again about fifteen times, then sent it off to Lulu.com for a single hardcopy.

The effect I was going for was a kind of bookish trompe l’oeil in which I create the impression of a real, full-length book. But more on that when the project actually comes to fruition.

In the meantime, I’m very pleasantly surprised and delighted by my first experiment with Lulu.com. I just got the end product in the mail last week, and when I opened it up I saw it was really just a bunch of laser prints hardbound together — nevertheless, it’s convincing as heck. When I show it to friends and colleagues, their eyes light up with amazement at my name on the cover. I mean, it stops people in their tracks. Sadly, Web sites don’t do that.

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