I have to admit that Tumblr has truly rekindled my interest in keeping a personal website. The ease of posting is a dream and despite a little clunkiness, updating the theme template is pretty painless.
So today I spent the afternoon making a new theme where I could explore some HTML5 mark-up as well as some typographic ideas I’ve been wanting to try. Jeremy Keith’s HTML5 for Web Designers has been a trusty companion in this endeavor. Unfortunately my type treatments are more apparent on long-form text posts so I’ll have to see if I can drum up a few.
Unlike the last design, this one eschews CSS3 @media queries in favor of a liquid design that just works at most any size. I also dug a bit further into Tumblr customization options to make this template a bit more complete.
I’d also like to report that after several failed attempts, I finally found a nice serif typeface on Typekit. Le Monde Journal STD by by Porchez Typofonderie has just the feel I’ve been looking for—classical but beautifully readable on-screen. According to the Typekit summary:
Le Monde Journal is the typeface on which the entire Le Monde family is based. By definition, it is intended for newspaper use & at small sizes. This family was designed in 1994 as custom font for the French newspaper Le Monde.
It may be out of fashion but it feels very fresh to me and has the appearance of a typeface designed specifically for the screen. Perhaps the font’s originally design characteristics which make it very readable at small sizes are equally advantageous on screen.
There are more tweaks I want to make, but for now this feels a lot more like me.
Colorless
If you’re looking at a view with no album artwork, iTunes 10 is surprisingly dull.
Comparing iTunes 9 and iTunes 10
It’s hard to make a good case for Apple’s decision to remove any color differentiation from the sidebar icons in iTunes 10. The previous icons were easier to scan, in part because the color made them far more visually distinct.
Viewing requires either a Mac® running Safari® on Mac OS® X version 10.6 Snow Leopard®, an iPhone® or iPod touch® running iOS 3.0 or higher, or an iPad™.
—Gotta® love™ PR® writing®
The first step is to start →
Posted this morning on Signal vs. Noise
Neat collection of paper folding patterns for turning your tear-off Netflix flaps into Origami-inspired forms.
canon residence by Space International
Beautiful use of materials and especially glass in this Pasadena, CA home.
I’m experimenting with SCSS for a new project — this small bit is the same showing it in both SCSS and CSS formats. The nesting is convenient and I’m sure it will eliminate lots of complex selectors, but the nesting comes at the expense of readability. I can only imagine how tough the indent levels will be to read when I’ve got enough inside div.sign-in that I’ll need to scroll to see it all. Verdict: pending.
Squarespace for iPhone v1.1
This is a really beautiful app. I love that the top bar eschews the gradient default bar in favor of a black matte look that the tabs sit in front of. Nicely done.
Panasonic : Earphone Note
Great packaging concept and execution.
Full size →
The tiny hint of dimension on the capital L and 1 really is a beautiful touch. (via neography)
Kinekt Design
The Gear Ring is made from high quality matte stainless steel. It features micro-precision gears that turn in unison when the outer rims are spun.
