F-2 Design

a few of my favorite things

...from Daniel's and Alan's place.

I went to Lubbock last weekend to visit with Alan and some friends. While I was there, I found a pocket of time where I had Alan and Dan's house all to myself. Alan had to go to work (Rrraaaaaaalph's Records) and Dan took off for tour (Thrift Store Cowboys). I dropped Alan off at Ralph's and decided I needed sandles and a shower. First, a shower. The night before was the Lucero/Thrift Store Cowboys show and I smelled like a stale smokey bar and there was something funky going on with my bangs because someone's whiskey found it's way to the front of my head when the crowd got a little (lot) excited. After my shower, I was trying to fix my hair and do my make up and I realized I couldn't see what I was doing because all the blinds are shut. It's about 4 pm at this point so I went and opened all the blinds in the house. Those two boys have the BEST natural lighting. Sunlight was just pouring in and bouncing off of everything making everything immediately beautiful. I hurried through my hair and make up and pulled out my camera. I felt bad because I didn't ask the boys first, but I couldn't help myself. It is a boy house, but these two have a lot of treasures lying around that little Lubbock home.
Here's a peek.

Daniel & Alan's house
Every time I saw that head over my weekend visit, I told Alan I wanted it. I need to find one next time I'm at the flea market.


When I visited in November, I noticed two-three typewriters within a 10 ft radius. Dan told me he still uses them to write letters and that he HATE emails.
 
Baseball fans, YES!

Alan's trail of life made me love him more. He said he's had the pig since he was twelve. I like finding out what "odd" items people choose to hold on to throughout their life. Do you have anything slightly odd that you are attached to?

 
I didn't capture this one very well, I'm short and this is a shot of the top of their fridge. First thing I loved about this was the way the sun light was peeking from below and above this old radio. Second, I loved that the radio, picture frame and door frame were all uniform in color. Third, Audry Hepburn is framed and on top of the fridge. How can you not love the two boys?


 In the living room, on top of the stereo is Alan's Muppet Babies keyboard. I always tell people that one of my favorite things about Alan is he's a perfect mix between a five yr old and an old man.


In the living room you will find a guitar on the wall, on a mound of blankets, and one on a stand. There was a mic stand in the restroom, but I didn't think to photograph it.



This one made me laugh. It's a framed article about Thrift Store Cowboys, but it's on the floor cuddling with dust mites. Come on Dan.


Their walls are covered with posters by various designers. The bottom one is by Dirk Fowler. You may remember me mentioning him before in the Flatstock post. The top poster always makes me smile and cringe. I smile because it's the first show poster Alan ever asked me to make and I cringe because I was a baby designer still in school when I made it and everytime I see it I was to change it all. haha. I hear it's like being an accountant and not having all your decimals lined up. It made my heart all warm and fuzzy to see it up on their wall.

The random necklace...I don't know.


This was also in the living room. It probably need to go through the wash, but it still rocks.
 
In the restroom, another F-2 Design poster for TSC and Devotchka. I was at that show :)

Here's where I hope I don't get in trouble with Dan. When I peeked in his room and saw his bedside table was a stack of suitcases I actually laughed (in a good way). This is something that in the past couple of months has been a trend in home decorating and here it is, in a man room with super old suitcases. When I asked Alan about it, he said it's been that way forever. Oh Daniel and his eye for beauty. I also go a kick out of his boots (made by Colt Miller) being right by his bed.

I wanted to take this off the wall too.

Behind Dan's door was a cool tin (picnic?) and a patterned dog hanging out.

pretty red bike

...and I better leave Dan's room before he never lets me stay in his house again.

In the kitchen is where you will find most of the posters in the house. This is another F-2 Design poster that was made when The Diamond Center moved from Lubbock to Richmond, Virgina. They had a huge musical going away bash.

Is that a Bueno Bueno feather dangle I see? Brandi gave this one to Alan for Christmas.



more posters. The Magnolia Electric Co is a F-2 Design poster, The one in the middle I have always been in love with, also made by Colt Miller. The one on the right is the second show poster I've ever made. I feel the same way about this one as I do about the first one. Still, it made me smile to see it made "the wall."
 
Two more F-2 Design posters in their kitchen.

I don't know what kind of boy houses you've been to, but I was impressed. These two have some really cool items in their house.
After taking one hundred photos of the Lubbock house, I went up to Ralph's Records to hang out with Alan during his last 3 hours of work. I'll be posting about that later.

I hope you enjoyed this boy-land with me!
muchos besos,
kel

Flatstock + lesson from Dirk

Two weekends ago, I drove down to Austin for one night. It was SXSW and I really wanted to go to Flatstock. I made it happen. IF you have never been to Flatstock, this is what it looks like

Flatstock




Imagine a whole convention center room filled with brilliant design/designers.

Flatstock
(The potty mouth banner belongs to Decoder Ring)


Needless to say, I was in Heaven. We did one complete walk through without purchasing a thing so we could view it all and soak it up. I snagged A LOT of business cards and FREE postcards during the first round. The second round was for buying and chatting it up even more than the second time. All the Designers were getting pretty friendly during the last hour of Flatstock. Poor Julie was practically Dragging me out of there towards the end.
Keep in mind that these people = my "Rock Stars."



The Man From Kentucky
(The rag says "Don't Forget To Wipe)
I met Ron Jasin from Mad Pixel Design and he was super friendly right from the get go. We exchanged typical Kentucky/Texas jokes and I bought a singing bird print from him. CLICK HERE TO VIEW HIS PRINTS.




Julie's Happy
Julie bought a print from Hero Design Studio (run by Husband & Wife in Buffalo, Ny) and I think it now lives in her office. I wanted an owl print! I just found the Hero etsy shop where you can still buy them :)



I wanted this print the mostest (below from Hero)!
I started laughing uncontrollably when I saw this guy in the corner and really strange little voice came out of my mouth when reading"I Believe in Magic." 


Then I came across some familiar faces...F-2 Design
The lovely Carol and Dirk Fowler of F-2 Design from good ol' Lubbock, TX. There are just too many wonderful things to say about these two. If you haven't been to their site, please, do it now! I had most of my designy classes with Dirk at TTU, but I never had the opportunity to take class with Carol (I hear she's a wiz at packaging and typography) so this was the first time I met her. It was their 16th Anniversary and they were spending the weekend doing what they love at Flatstock.




The 3 images above were taken from Dirk's Gigposter.com page. Be prepared to go
through 16 pages of yummy design.

They brought a friend from Lubbock to show people how Letterpress posters are made. I was stoked because this is something I have always wanted to try and I finally got to (thanks Dirk). It was really cool seeing all the other people stop and give this thing a go. Here is a short video of Julie working the press.





Then, it was my turn and I was such a spaz. Ready to ink it up!
Inking


and ta-da!

Geeking out at Flatstock 24
 Just look at my face. That's not an expression you'll see very often. It's actually quite embarrassing how geeked out I get over this stuff. Oh well, everyone else in that room was right there with me. 

How cool is it that F-2 Design brought stuff down so that people could be a part of the poster production process? I believe the correct answer is VERY COOL. 

I bought a few posters including
Rainbow Warrior-AP
from Dan Stiles (Portland, OR)
He was also very nice and helpful.


































This was the first poster I bought that day. It is a print from Mark Pedini (Austin, TX) titled "2 dogs."



Shirts I bought



My Associate Cornelius: Face T-Shirt
one for me
My Associate Cornelius: Sub Kids T-Shirt
and one for my nephew Ryder bear!
Both shirts are from My Associate Cornelius (Gardner, KS)
(btw he has a great picture of Bill Murray with bright orange luggage on his BLOG)

Other Prints my mouth watered for, but couldn't get













Print by Lure Design (Orlando, FL)
The Lemonheads were one of my favorite bands elementary school. I specifically remember skating (pre- inlines) on my friends drive to The Lemonheads. Brandi listened to them a lot and she was a young teen at the time so everyone in our house knew what she was listening to. Also, look at all that hair! I love big hair and it's RED! You know me, I like my redheads <3





Alphabet prints by Strawberry Luna (Husband & Wife from Pittsburg, PA)
I would love to own the whole set, but that would = $335. For now, these four will remain in my dreams.


I can't wait to go next year. Hopefully Alan will come with me and go crazy with me. We may have to make handkerchiefs so we don't get drool all over the posters. I still feel overwhelmed with inspiration two weeks later and it's amazing. I kind of don't want to post what I've been working on after showing you all this beautiful/smart design. Maybe after a weekend with the sister, I'll work up the guts. Happy (Easter) Weekend. 

muchos besos,
Kel