Food | Jessica Svendsen

What Katie Ate

13 November 2010

What Katie Ate has some of the most beautiful food photography that it makes me want to drop graphic design and become a food photographer for life. Not all hope is lost, however, because Australian photographer Katie Quinn Davies spent many years working as a graphic designer before re-focusing her career to food photography and styling. Her design background is clearly evident in her typographic style and overall compositions. But her photographs capture a certain color, texture, and realness of food that is overwhelmingly appealing and appetizing.

Each post and photograph also incorporates the original recipe—so all foodies or photographers or both, start reading What Katie Ate (if you’re not already).

IKEA

2 October 2010

Food, Graphic Design, Photography

2 Comments

IKEA recently released the book Homemade is Best, which features these carefully arranged photographs of 30 recipes. Instead of photographing the finished meal, these images simply show the ingredients needed for each recipe, measured by actual quantity. However, I find the layout and texture of each of the ingredients to be the most interesting part of this series. Inspired by the tradition of Japanese minimalism, the most basic ingredients (like the flour, sugar, and butter) take on a variety of shapes and layouts.

Though I still only trust cookbooks with excellent food photography displaying the prepared dish, I wouldn’t mind this obsessively-neat ingredient arrangement as a preparatory photograph.

I’ve included some of my favorite arrangements below, or you can see more of the photographs from the book designers, Forsman & Bodenfors, or from the photographer Carl Kleiner.

Jamie Oliver for Williams Sonoma

26 August 2010

Food, Graphic Design

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Design for wholesome food doesn’t get more grassroots than this. Jamie Oliver’s new packaging for his line of Williams Sonoma products is another example of how the sustainable food movement (or Jamie Oliver’s own Food Revolution) is adopting populist design. Though Whole Foods has quietly integrated simple, vintage design for organic packaging, this seems to be taking it another step. It is as if the first problem with our national food crisis is the misleading photoshop of corporate packaging on every box of corn syrup cereal.

Instead, Oliver hearkens to the roadside stand or the farmer’s market with hand-lettered type on a refreshingly sparse label. As a notorious critic of most packaging (I keep most of my pantry in glass jars to avoid the visual onslaught of colored boxes and bags), I wouldn’t mind having these on my shelf—and Jamie’s touch of humor certainly adds to the appeal.

Check out the full product line over on Jamie Oliver’s website.

Observed

24 August 2010

Film, Food, Graphic Design, Observed

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Video capturing the implosion of the New Haven coliseum. Why I missed this spectacle my freshman year, is beyond me.

Design Love: An article on Massimo and Lella Vignelli as partners in design.

New York Times interview with Susan Spungen, food stylist for “Eat Pray Love,” “Julie & Julia,” and “It’s Complicated.”

“Los Angeles may be the epicenter of the movie business (at least for now, until Beijing or Bollywood surpasses it). But Paris is the world capital of cinephilia.” A. O. Scott’s column on Paris captured in cinema, and the appreciation of cinema in Paris.

“You have the watches. We have the time.” Video of Josh Viertel, President of Slow Food USA and former Co-Director of the Yale Sustainable Food Project, at last year’s Feast Conference.

ATM skimmers as both a security problem and a design problem: Khoi Vinh writes: “The thieves who designed these admittedly ingenious tools had a much easier job of it because, like the ATMs onto which they’re attached, skimmers don’t have to look like they do anything that you would understand. They just need to look like they might do something you don’t understand.”

McSweeney’s hilariously recommends the newspaper as the best e-reader on the market.

Observed

20 July 2010

Food, Graphic Design, Observed, Photography

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A Flickr set of “Greetings From” postcards.

Simple (and often starkly white) food photography by Katie Quinn Davies.

Food photography

9 July 2010

Food, Photography

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As an admirer of the persuasive food photographs found in the Barefoot Contessa and Martha Stewart cookbooks, and even the Williams Sonoma catalogs, I found The Design Files interview with Deb Kaloper, a food stylist in Melbourne, a pleasant and informative read.

I naively did not know that “Food Stylist” was even an occupational option, but after consulting a few of my cookbooks colophon pages, I quickly discovered the vast, mouth-watering world of food photography. When meals are captured with craft, color, ripeness, and an arranged spontaneity, I’ve been tempted by foods I would normally never consider consuming. Case in point: the summer Williams Sonoma catalogs, featuring perfectly grilled meats and vegetables, have left me uncharacteristically ready to go buy a grill and start smoking the charcoals on my fire escape.

Observed

24 May 2010

Book Design, Food, Observed

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A sneak-peek at Penguin 75: Designers, Authors, Commentary, a commemorative book on the past 75 years of Penguin book design. (There is also a splendid photo gallery of items from the Penguin Archives.)

“Farmers Bring Country to Paris”: A New York Times article on how French farmers descended on the long stretch of the Champs-Élysée with miniature fields of wheat and sunflower, with over 150,000 plants covering the avenue.

Observed

22 May 2010

Fashion, Film, Food, Observed

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A behind-the-scenes video with photographer Annie Leibovitz and Creative Director of Vogue Grace Coddington as they shoot the Arts Issue of the December Vogue featuring Lady Gaga and Cate Blanchett, among others. For an additional dose of seeing Leibovitz work, watch this video of Leibovitz shooting the “Women of Nine.”

Director Nora Ephron prepares a meal while being interviewed for Vogue about Julie & Julia, discussing the lack of food in movies and in food films, a lack of real eating. (A similar discussion is featured on the DVD extras, if you do not already own the film because perhaps you are not obsessed with Meryl Streep, food films, Paris, and delicious food, as I am.)

Deck Towel produces linen beach blankets in summery colors and stripes.

An hilarious combination: Steve Carrel on The Ellen Show.

Observed

21 May 2010

Food, Graphic Design, Observed

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An introductory video, to both the value of Pantone and the new Pantone Plus Series.

L.A.’s Museum of Contemporary Art reverts back to its old, more geometric logo, originally designed in 1980 by Ivan Chermayeff and Tom Geismar.

A letterpress perpetual calendar by Krankpress, showing what produce is in season that month and planting recommendations. Unfortunately, they’re compiled by region in California. I look forward to the day when they compile a New England version, because the famine winters here are rough.

Observed

2 May 2010

Food, Graphic Design, Observed

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Stefan Sagmeister created another commercial that arranges objects into typographical messages. For a behind-the-scenes look into this beautiful, and clearly Bali-inspired, commercial, view here. (Click here see Sagmeister’s first typographic video, as well as the rip-off version by Absolut.)

The Most Livable Neighborhoods in New York.

“Growth Spurt: Rooftop farms up the ante on eating local”: A New York Times article on the rise of rooftop gardens in New York. Brilliant Jim Lahey, of delicious Sullivan Street Bakery and of the famous no-knead bread, “hopes to have a roof production up and running next year. For now he has filled recycled breadbaskets with soil and is growing tomatoes and herbs destined for breads and pizzas.”

Dancers Among Us: A collection of photographs capturing professional dancers in everyday New York.