Friday Fives, Vol. 194
This week, we get our first taste of life on Mars, reconsider what real music is, and place our orders at the trendiest designer delis in the city.
In addition, check out Digiday to see Jolene’s thoughts about how brands are connecting on TikTok.
Every New Yorker has their go-to local deli. A no-frills establishment often visited wearing sweatpants and a hangover, where comfort food is king. Lately, these spots are disappearing, and in their stead, we find extra stylish stand-ins that prioritize decor as much as deliciousness. These designer delis are an amalgamation of Jewish culture, 21st century aesthetics, and a desire to reconnect with the past. Take USA Brooklyn Delicatessen for example, a neon-bathed eatery that’s trendy and well-designed, but poorly named, as it cashes in on the marketing value of Brooklyn but exists in an entirely different borough. We can sit here and write about it all day, but the only real test is to taste it. Reubens, anyone?
When Type Becomes a Stereotype
Design choices can make any piece of communication inherently gendered. Much like choosing pink immediately denotes femininity or picking blue marks masculinity according to gender stereotypes, fonts often fall into the binary of for men, or for women. The main culprit behind this needless gendering is, unsurprisingly, the market. Telling consumers that soft, curved line types are for women and rigid, straight lines are for men makes it easy to know what to buy, but simultaneously stratifies people into groups with which they may not identify. Type foundry Klim wants to elevate fonts beyond gender with the non-confmorming Epicene family. Gendering type is lazy — let’s all work harder to make design more inclusive.
Singer-songwriter of the future, Grimes, is forming an all girl group of AI pop stars called NPC. Listen to an early clip here, and let us know if you think it’s a banger. Grimes’ fascination with decentralizing and rethinking stardom is apparent in her duties as a judge on Alter Ego, a singing competition that fuses real vocal talents with fabricated digital personas. If NPC can become successful, it could lead us down a path where entertainment’s top talents are made in computer programs, not on stages. Although detractors of the current state of pop music will tell you that that’s basically what pop music is already.
If you need any more proof that we’re a society built entirely upon dipping one food into another food, look no further than Heinz’s “Marz Edition” Ketchup. This special sauce is made with tomatoes grown in Martian soil conditions. Although we’re still a long way from Earth-like levels of production, it’s comforting knowing that one day we could all be sitting in our Martian homes, dipping Martian fried potatoes into a familiar red condiment, grown locally on the red planet. We just hope slapping the bottom of the bottle to get the contents out is easier in lower gravity.
Arby’s, no longer content with just having the meats, also wants you to know that they have the potatoes. Arby’s is releasing two french fry-flavored vodkas, of the crinkle-cut and curly variety. At first, this seems like a microcosm of what’s wrong with the “out-weird the competition” style of marketing, but it actually makes a (tiny bit) of sense. Vodka is made of potatoes, and peculiar flavored vodkas already exist. Is the idea of french fry flavored spirits so wild? Both bottles are dropping on Nov 18th, just in time to really wow that potato lover on your gift list.
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Established in 2017, we collaborate with emerging and evolving companies for end-to-end brand building, including strategy and visual identity, print and digital design, content, and creative campaigns.
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The Working Assembly
NYC branding agency exploring the intersection of art, design, technology and culture. Partnering with emerging and evolving brands.
