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It’s Nice That is two years old today, to celebrate we’re in the process of updating the design and functionality of the site. As of Monday, months of hard work will be unveiled.

From next week we are excited about bringing you longer posts, interviews with our weekly guest posters, more in depth editorial features, an exclusive online shop, monthly talks and of course the bi-annual publication.

Have a great weekend and we look forward to seeing you next week.

Swiss based designer Philip Cramer has got some great work including this porcelain series Vaduz.

www.philippecramer.com

Jim Lambie never fails to fill my eyes with happiness. I’m a huge fan of his work so am thrilled to say that a show of his work (including a new tape installation) has been hung at Sadie Coles HQ.

The show runs until April 25th and is right next to Hyde Park, which I’m pleased to say is starting to feel very summery indeed.

www.sadiecoles.com

As promised, the fist issue of the It’s Nice That publication arrived with us this afternoon. We are absolutely thrilled with the content and the way it looks and excited to get them out there.

We have the task of getting them all packaged and out to people over the next 24 hours so as a result we will close the pre-order tomorrow (Thursday) at 5pm BST. All copies ordered before then will have the free Print Liberation print included, all details on the publication page.

Thanks to everyone who has ordered so far, expect your copies very soon! We hope you like, more images on Flickr.

More details / Buy a copy

South African designer Conor Cronin has got a pretty sound portfolio. Traveling from South Africa via Dublin where he studied Visual Communication to Spain where he has worked at both Albert Folch Studio and Base Design.

Pictured is the visual identity for fashion designer Simone Rocha.

www.conorcronin.com

Japanese master Utagawa Kuniyoshi should never be overlooked, a true genius in the print room he’s an inspiration for any budding creative, regardless of discipline.

Luckily we now have the chance to stare open mouthed at a collection of over 150 of his pieces at The Royal Academy until June 7th.

www.royalacademy.org

We’re excited to announce that we’re working with the good people at Picador publishing to help raise awareness of a fantastic new novel called ‘White is for Witching’. It’s written by the phenominally talented young author Helen Oyeyemi and has been described as ‘electrifying in its expression of myth and memory, loss and magic, fear and love’.

We’re giving It’s Nice That readers the opportunity to get their hands on an early proof before it’s released on May 1st absolutely free. In return we’re asking everyone who receives a copy to answer a couple of really quick questions about their reading habits and to write their thoughts on the book on the back of a specially made bookmark by the wonderful Jon Klassen.

If you’re already a keen reader, or if you’d like an excuse to start reading we’d love to hear from you. To request a book and some more information drop me an email at alex@itsnicethat.com.

My French isn’t brilliant so please excuse the lack of a description about HELMO, but I hope you’ll forgive me for pointing you in the direction of these staggering images entitled ‘coloured smoke’.

www.helmo.fr

Italian Tommaso Lanza is currently studying Design Interactions at the Royal College of Art in London.

Pictured is ‘Industrial Fragility’, the project tells a story of loneliness and neglectfulness. “Some of the most familiar and iconic items are either so ubiquitous that we stopped paying any sort of attention or silently disappearing from our lives because of technological obsolescence. Mundane and obsolete household objects are given new importance by slight modifications of their established nature, creating a new loving and fragile tension between us and them.”

www.tommasolanza.com

French director Dimitri Stankowicz has got some great animation including this piece, Herr Barr. Dimitri has also been selected by Björk among 10 other finalists for his music video, made for “Innocence” contest.

Dimitri is just one director represented by Passion Paris (the French branch of UK Passion Pictures) with a wealth of great films.

www.passion-paris.com

Nice idea from France I discovered at the weekend is Wallpapers by Artists. Started in 2006 there are currently 14 to choose from including this one from Henrik Plenge Jakobsen.

www.wallpapersbyartists.com
Found via alt.

It’s a surprise I haven’t posted a gem from the Arctic Monkeys’ back catalogue of brilliantly shot music videos on a Monday before. This morning I’m putting an end to that and showing opening track from their break-through first record ‘The View From The Afternoon’.

Stirring stuff for any aspiring drummers.

www.youtube.com

Guest Poster — Andy J Miller

For my last post I wanted a true blast from my past.

I remember right before I started school my older brother told me about The Letter People. He said that Mr. M with the Munching Mouth was his favourite and when we got to Mr. M in our lessons, he wanted me to get him one of the coloring book sheets. I am pretty sure the teacher wouldn’t let me have an extra, so I drew Mr. M for my brother instead.

I would say that may have been the starting point of my style and influence. I only remembered the letter people this year, but looking back there is truly a rich supply of great influence on my work in the Letter People. The link is to a hilarious and amazing Youtube video introducing Mr. N with his Noisy Nose!!!

Enjoy!

www.youtube.com

Big fan of Chris Martins work, plenty to look at and perfect for a long Friday peruse.

www.mrchrismartin.co.uk

We’re less than a week away now from having Issue 1 back from the printers and distributing it out to everyone so it’s almost your last chance to pre-order! As mentioned before all pre-orders will come with a free Print Liberation poster and will be dispatched next week before it’s available in any shops.

Check out the latest images on our Flickr.

Check out the Publication Page for more details and to pre-order.

‘Everybody wants to be good’ is the tagline to run alongside the latest Honda ad, an epic spot directed by Erik van Wyk and produced by Bouffant through advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy, Amsterdam.

‘Let it Shine’ features a huge grid of the new Honda Insight come alive at night to act as pixels in the worlds largest LED screen. It is a quite incredible animation featuring hugs and kisses, frowns turned into smiles, and general good will, which is all meant to convey people’s inherent wish to be good. Definitely one to watch, everybody will be talking about it.

YouTube Link
Also check out the making of.

Guest Poster — Andy J Miller

I ashamedly was unaware of Girard’s work until House Industries recently put on their current massive dedication to his work on their site.

The hand-drawn illustration scene today seems to echo all of Girard’s work. Unlike many other grandfathers of illustration/design, Girard’s work seems almost timeless in all aspects, with little evidence to set it apart from the work in the current market.

The sign of a great artist I guess!

www.girard.houseind.com

Seeing someone speak that you admire is always a pleasure, and we were lucky enough to be invited down to the British Film Institute last night to do just that.

BUG is a night of music videos and YouTube nuggets (two of my favourite things) and is hosted by all-time top 10 funny man Adam Buxton of Adam & Joe fame.

Basically the audience sit in comfy seats in a beautful venue for an hour and a half, while Adam plays great music videos and chats about things he’s seen on YouTube, there’s no magic formula, it just works fantastically.

We were played many wonderful pieces of film, including this one from Spike Jonze and Ty Evans for Unkle, but this was my favourite one. If you ever get the chance to go to one of these bi-monthly events I cannot reccommend them highly enough.

www.bugvideos.co.uk

Guest Poster — Andy J Miller

The Decoder Ring Design Concern is actually the resign I decided to pursue illustration. More specifically however, it was their major Modest Mouse gig poster campaign that sealed
the deal.

They created a different screen printed poster for each date on MM’s tour in 2005. Each poster was based on one of the many songs from the MM catalogue. This one was based on “The Good Times are Killing Me” the closing track from Good News for People Who Love Bad News.

www.thedecoderring.com

Philadelphia based graphic designer Lizania Cruz has got some great work including this concept and design for a clutch bag made out of a FedEx Tyvek envelope.

www.lizania.com

Yellow Bird Project is a non-profit organisation based in Montreal. In a nutshell they get musicians to design t-shirts with them then produce and sell them online with the profits going to a charity of the musician’s choice.

Aside from making you feel good about yourself, there’s also some great designs. Everyone’s a winner

www.yellowbirdproject.com

Guest Poster — Andy J Miller

Noah Butkus achieves a fashionable air in his work with help from super heroes and villains. That alone I think is worthy of recognition.
With a retro appeal, Noah manages to produce highly memorable and symbolic images that have left long lasting impression on my mind.

I have included two links, one Noah’s official site which includes one image and his e-mail address and the other an image archive of
his site.

www.noahbutkus.com
www.noahbutkus.com/images

Based in East London, Tomorrow Studio are a young, multi-disciplinary design studio specialising in forward thinking design & art direction.

Pictured is the The Russian Club Gallery identity.

www.tomorrowstudio.co.uk

Muumuu House is a publihing company founded in 2008 by the excellent author Tao Lin. It publishes some really great stuff ranging from fiction, poetry and even Gmail chats…

They’ve just released their first ever book, a debut poetry collection by 20 year old Ellen Kennedy titled ‘Sometimes My Heart Pushes My Ribs’. I’ve no doubt it’ll be a wonderful read and I’m looking forward to getting my copy…

Tao Lin has also penned the first ever introduction to our debut physical It’s Nice That publication.

www.muumuuhouse.com