Turnstyle on Monday, Mar. 4th
99% Invisible is, as producer Roman Mars tells it, a “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world”. Don’t let the “tiny” fool you: there’s nothing small about the ideas Mars explores.
Everything you ever wanted to know about the bygone Red Cars– the Los Angeles Pacific Electric Railway– and the way that rail line reshaped the destiny of LA. A story of conspiracies, strange marriages, and bad urban planning! Check out the episode page, it’s got a host of great images and more. No, really, check it out.
Side note: Roman can snark about the LA freeways all he wants, but at least we don’t have to deal with the Bay Area’s bridges. -NN
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Remix Radio on Thursday, Sep. 20th
After making Kickstarter history just last month with the most funded journalism project ever, Roman Mars’ 99% Invisible has already kicked off its third season. This “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world” explores some mighty big ideas.
Episode 61: A Series of Tubes
In this episode “architectural historian and pneumatic tube aficionada Molly Wright Steenson” takes the 99% Invisible team through the history of pneumatic tubes. It’s a technology that has one foot in the past, one foot in a future that almost was.
Catch videos and more at the 99% Invisible blog.
New episodes of 99% Invisible, air weekly on 91.7 KALW in San Francisco. Fridays at 7:35am and 4:30pm, Saturdays at 8:35am, and Tuesdays at 10:55pm. Also, 24/7 on Public Radio Remix.
Produced by Roman Mars, with support from LUNAR. It’s a project of KALW, the American Institute of Architects, San Francisco and the Center for Architecture and Design. Twitter: @romanmars
Read the rest
99% Invisible is, as producer Roman Mars tells it, a “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world”. Don’t let the “tiny” fool you: there’s nothing small about the ideas Mars explores.
Episode 60: Names vs. The Nothing
New Public Sites is an investigation into some of the invisible sites and overlooked features of our everyday public spaces. These are the liminal spaces within cities that are not traditionally framed as “public space” because, quite frankly, they are often ugly and unpleasant, the leftover scraps of urban design centered on the automobile. By giving these places succinct, fun and poetic names and leading people on playful walking tours, Graham Coreil-Allen says we can help start a discourse about our public spaces and how we want to envision them for the future. You can download a pdf of the New Public Sites book here.
See the photos that accompany this episode and more at the 99% Invisible blog.
New episodes of 99% Invisible, air weekly on 91.7 KALW in San Francisco. Fridays at 7:35am and 4:30pm, Saturdays at 8:35am, and Tuesdays at 10:55pm. Also, 24/7 on Public Radio Remix.
Produced by Roman Mars, with support from LUNAR. It’s a project of KALW, the American Institute of Architects, San Francisco and the Center for Architecture and Design.
Twitter: @romanmars (more…)
Read the rest
99% Invisible is, as producer Roman Mars tells it, a “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world”. Don’t let the “tiny” fool you: there’s nothing small about the ideas Mars explores.
Episode 59: Some Other Sign that People Do Not Totally Regret Life
Sean Cole is a poet and he knows what you think of that.
He is also a radio producer. One night, drunk and stumbling around the Hudson River with his friend Malissa O’Donnell, he discovered a monument — two of them actually — to two of his poetry heroes. Apropos of the name of this show, the tribute wasn’t very obvious. In fact, he and Malissa nearly walked right past it. Still, embedded in the architecture of a 25 year old plaza were the words of Walt Whitman and Frank O’Hara. And weirdly, Sean had he’d been reciting from O’Hara’s Lunch Poems just minutes before.
Read the rest at 99% Invisible.
(Header image: Battery Park City- World Financial Center Plaza by Wally Gobetz) (more…)
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Turnstyle News friend and PRX wizard Roman Mars is proving what the next era of public media looks like. The Kickstarter campaign for Mars’ fantastic 99% Invisible podcast has already cleared over $100K in just two weeks.
That’s well over double the amount he was looking to raise, and he’s still got half of the campaign left to go. But that doesn’t mean that Roman is resting. Oh no. He’s tackled on another, possibly bigger, goal. To reach 5000 backers for the campaign. Any size donation counts. If he makes it, the Design Matters Institute will kick in another $10K and Mars will buy a tropical island where he will construct a radio rocketship.
Okay, I made the island part up. And the rocketship.
He should totally do that, though.
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99% Invisible is, as producer Roman Mars tells it, a “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world”. Don’t let the “tiny” fool you: there’s nothing small about the ideas Mars explores.
Episode 57: What Gave You That Idea?
Starlee Kine’s friend Noel works in advertising. In 2003, Noel was working in at an agency in Richmond, VA. Everyone wanted to work on flashy spots like Apple or Nike or Gatorade. Do you know what wasn’t flashy? Insurance. Which is why when a company called Geico became a client everyone hoped the campaign wouldn’t end up on their desk. Noel ultimately got stuck with Geico. His job was help them somehow figure out a clever, not painfully boring way to explain how simple it was for people to sign up for their insurance online.
Maybe you see where this is going.
But you don’t know where it came from.
Starlee Kine guides us back through the surprising, culturally rich path of inspiration that ultimately resulted ina commercial for an insurance company.
This story originally appeared at Pop Up Magazine #6 in San Francisco.
New episodes of 99% Invisible, air weekly on 91.7 KALW in San Francisco. Fridays at 7:35am and 4:30pm, Saturdays at 8:35am, and Tuesdays at 10:55pm. Also, 24/7 on Public Radio Remix.
Produced by Roman Mars, with support from LUNAR. It’s a project of KALW, the American Institute of Architects, San Francisco and the Center for Architecture and Design.
Twitter: @romanmars
Read the rest
Remix Radio on Thursday, Jun. 14th
99% Invisible is, as producer Roman Mars tells it, a “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world”. Don’t let the “tiny” fool you: there’s nothing small about the ideas Mars explores.
Episode 56: Frozen Music
On this week’s episode, Roman considers how the recording of music has changed the way we think about music. As part of this edition, 99% Invisible rebroadcasts an interview from Sound Opinions with music super-producer Jon Brion. It’s superb.
Roman wants to “throw down” in the comments section on this episode at 99% Invisible about how the “objects of music change the way” we both make and listen to music.
So get over there when you’re done listening. Join in the fun.
New episodes of 99% Invisible, air weekly on 91.7 KALW in San Francisco. Fridays at 7:35am and 4:30pm, Saturdays at 8:35am, and Tuesdays at 10:55pm. Also, 24/7 on Public Radio Remix.
Produced by Roman Mars, with support from LUNAR. It’s a project of KALW, the American Institute of Architects, San Francisco and the Center for Architecture and Design.
Twitter: @romanmars
Read the rest
99% Invisible is, as producer Roman Mars tells it, a “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world”. Don’t let the “tiny” fool you: there’s nothing small about the ideas Mars explores.
Episode 54: The Colour of Money
This week 99% Invisible takes a look at the design of cold, hard, cash.
Here’s a taste of the post from this week’s episode:
US paper currency is so ubiquitous that to really look at its graphic design with fresh eyes requires some deliberate and focused attention. So pull out a greenback from your wallet (or look at a picture online) and really take it in. All the fonts, the busy filigree, the micro patterns…it’s just dreadful.
Even though paper currency itself, just idea of money, is a massive, world changing technology, the look and feel of US paper money is very stagnant. Richard Smith is the founder of the Dollar ReDe$ign Project and in an article in the New York Times, he pointed out five major areas where the design of US currency could improve: color, size, functionality, composition, and symbolism.
It just so happens that Australian currency addresses each and every one of the points made by Richard Smith. Tristan Cooke and Tom Nelson of the blog Humans in Design are big fans of all the design innovations in Australian money. Aussie polymer notes are varied in color, get larger with each denomination, are more durable and are generally considered better and easier to use than US currency.
There’s pictures, mock-ups of American currency concepts, and videos all at the blog. Check it out.
New episodes of 99% Invisible, air weekly on 91.7 KALW in San Francisco. Fridays at 7:35am and 4:30pm, Saturdays at 8:35am, and Tuesdays at 10:55pm. Also, 24/7 on Public Radio Remix.
Produced by Roman Mars, with support from LUNAR. It’s a project of KALW, the American Institute of Architects, San Francisco and the Center for Architecture and Design.
Twitter: @romanmars
Read the rest
Turnstyle on Monday, May. 14th
The latest podcast from our friends at State of the Re:Union begins their “audio obituary” series:
Viola Morse, a lifelong Vermonter, died last year. After living in the same town for ninety-nine years, she must have left quite an imprint. State of the Re:Union set up a voice-mail box so Viola’s friends, family, and admirers could share their memories in their own words. This first piece in our new audio obituary series was produced by SOTRU intern extraordinaire Sara Brooke Curtis.
Head over to the State of the Re:Union website to hear the podcast episode.
For more from State of the Re:Union, subscribe to their podcasts on iTunes and look for a new podcast every two weeks.
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99% Invisible is, as producer Roman Mars tells it, a “tiny radio show about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world”. Don’t let the “tiny” fool you: there’s nothing small about the ideas Mars explores.
Episode 53: The Xanadu Effect
This week’s episode of 99% Invisible is a doozy. Asking a simple question:
What happens when we build big?
And taking us on a ride through the psychological effects that scale brings to the architectural table. Here’s a little more of the essay at the 99% Invisible Blog.
Julia Barton remembers going to the top floor of Dallas’s then-new city hall when she was teenager. The building, designed by I.M. Pei, is a huge trapezoid jutting out over a wide plaza. Julia found the view from the top pretty fantastic, especially when munching on a Caramello bar from the City Hall vending machines.
But once she went to a protest in the plaza below. And those same windows, now hulking over her, made her feel small, and the whole event insignificant. Texans have a fondness for big structures—big arenas, big houses, big freeways. Julia wasn’t sure if their hidden message wasn’t simply this: I’m important, you’re nobody.
You can listen to the episode above, but to get the full effect head over to the 99% Invisible blog and check out the full essay, photos, and a bonus video. Big things really do come in small packages this week.
New episodes of 99% Invisible, air weekly on 91.7 KALW in San Francisco. Fridays at 7:35am and 4:30pm, Saturdays at 8:35am, and Tuesdays at 10:55pm. Also, 24/7 on Public Radio Remix.
Produced by Roman Mars, with support from LUNAR. It’s a project of KALW, the American Institute of Architects, San Francisco and the Center for Architecture and Design.
Twitter: @romanmars
Read the rest
As you all undoubtedly already know, Google Glass is finally here.
Sponsors
Now streaming: the archive of our Google Hangout On-Air with Jesse Vigil of Psychic Bunny, one of the designers of the new audio adventure game FREEQ (iOS/Android).
We’ve featured dancer Matt Luck’s work before.
I first encountered Sifteo Cubes back at IndieCade last October, and spent some time playing around with the little blocks which I first mistook for iPod Nanos.
Over the weekend I was having a conversation about the new Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Museum that’s been announced.
