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Michael Bierut has written a fantastic post titled “The Smartest Logo in the Room” over at DesignObserver.com dissecting the significance of Paul Rand’s final logo design… the now infamous Enron “E.”

As brilliant as many of Rand’s most famous identities, the “crooked-” or “falling-E” begs for the age-old debate of art imitating life, or life imitating art… Bierut’s post is well worth the read, even if you know very little about Paul Rand’s work or the business of logo/identity design… and if that’s the case, shame on you for not knowing who Paul Rand is!

The Smartest Logo in the Room, by Michael Bierut.

My wife and I found a quote in this NY Times article quite interesting. The article was dissecting the presidential candidate’s campaign website designs, and a Creative Director they quoted said “Hillary’s text is all caps, like shouting.” That struck us funny because when I think of Hillary Clinton’s tone and speech patterns, it does seem like she talks in ALL CAPS.

So that got me thinking… how would you describe, typographically speaking, the other presidential candidates?

Barack Obama might be a Garamond – a sharp, yet friendly serif.
Hillary Clinton would be Futura Black all caps – bold, but dated.
I think Ron Paul would also be all caps, but a generic serif, like Times Roman.
Mike Huckabee might be a gentle, flowing script font like Shelley Script.

What do you think? Am I off base with any? Got any others?

This past weekend I had the opportunity to visit Boston, Mass. Land of Paul Revere, the Kennedy’s and the 2004 World Champion Boston Red Sox – or BoSox. Now, as you may or may not know there’s this little “thing” between BoSox fans and Yankee fans. As is the case with most Yankee fans, I have great respect to the history of baseball – above rivalrys – and this is what led me to tour the fabled Fenway Park: Home of Ted Williams, Carl “Yaz” Yastrzemski and more recently Manny Ramirez and Curt Schilling.

We made a few wrong turns getting to Fenway, but eventually made our way to the park and drove around the perimeter to get a feel for the neighborhood. Interestingly enough, it reminded me very much of the south Bronx neighborhood Yankee Stadium resides in. We turned onto Jersey Street and found a free parking spot right outside the main entrance to the park. It was a crisp (and by “crisp” I mean really really cold) beautiful day. Clear blue skies. We went into the souvenier shop across the street and bought our tickets for the stadium tour. As the tour began, the guide (who’s thick Boston accent put’s even the best impersonations to shame) asked the group if there were any Yankee fans. I hesitated for a moment but then shot up my arm. I wasn’t going to wuss out on my boys in pinstripes. Of course I was the only one and after the boos quieted down, the guide said, “Yep, there’s always one.” The rest of the day she made as many Yankee jokes as she could remember – for my benefit alone. It felt great.

The tour took us up the outer ramp to the 5th level – the Press level. We filed into the press box overlooking the snow-covered field. The seats were marked with the usual suspects (ESPN, Boston Globe, etc…) and of course she mentioned that the New York writers were made to sit in the very back. We then went one level down to the premium seats. Enclosed, baseball-proof glass, stadium seating, bar, big-screen tvs. It was ridiculous! After that we toured the Hall of Fame Club and then made our way outside to the seats on top of the Green Monster. The Green Monster is the pet name for the large green wall in the left outfield of Fenway. One of the largest obstacles (mostly mental) for any big league hitter. This photo is of me on top of the Green Monster. It was unreal. To imagine watching a game from those seats on a hot summer night would be a dream come true – even for a Yankee fan.

The yellow left field foul pole has a few feet where it’s reachable by a human hand near the top of the Green Monster. Those few feet are littered with graffiti of all kinds. My wife pointed one particular scribble out to me that was of particular interest. Can you see it? In big capital letters just below those two bolts? Yeah, I saw it too. The seats to the left of the pole are atop the Green Monster and the dirt to the right of the pole is 308 feet straight down – the outfield warning track.

After taking in the view of the ballfield and of the Boston skyline from the top of the Green Monster, we made our way down through the seats to field level. This last photo shows the Green Monster with the only manual scoreboard still in use in major league baseball. The ladder agove the scoreboard (at the left of the picture) is the only ladder “in-play” in any major league park.

I had an awesome time at Fenway Park. I learned a lot about the history of the Red Sox, the stadium and the city itself. Kudos to my wife for even suggesting we visit the park. It was most certainly one of the highlights of our vacation.