flipbook film

This is dedicated to my brother Mark and his fiance, Alaina.
Congrats, you two!!

Pecha Kucha Night in Denver!

I attended my first(only) Pecha Kucha Night last year during 100%design in Tokyo. The name means "chit-chat" in Japanese, and is a presentation format that allows people to present their creative projects to an audience by showing 20 slides for 20 seconds each. I was so inspired by the event that I fantasized about bringing it to Denver - and am lucky to have secured an exclusive handshake agreement with the founders to be the local Pecha Kucha Night liason. Luckily I roped Jaime from designklub in from the very beginning, and she was instrumental in securing a dope location and 90% of the speakers. I'm super excited about the lineup, which includes Denver creatives of varied disciplines: architects, graphic designers, writers, planners, artists, and crafters (PLUS my dear friend, Steve!). The platform allows both professionals and casual folks an opportunity to present on the same level, to mingle, network, and get artistic feedback. It's like creative show-and-tell for adults...

Join the chit-chat next Friday, March 28
Buntport Theater, 717 Lipan Street, Denver CO.
Doors at 8, Program starts at 8:20 pm (as in 20.20)
$5 suggested donation at the door, beer provided.

Pecha Kucha Website
Pecha Kucha Night on wikipedia

BENTA plates

BENTA plates are my latest project: a dinner plate with a curved edge, designed to hold in one hand while pushing food against the curl and onto your fork with the other hand. The plates are a mini-collaboration with my sly designer boyfriend, ZK, and are part of Umbra's U+ collection for 2008. They premiered at the NY Gift Fair last month and were recently added to Umbra's website here. I'm not quite sure what the black lace and star fruit have to do with the design, but behold: the BENTA.

My mother received her order today and promptly posted pictures to her flickr account. I haven't yet received my samples from Umbra, so I was super excited that my mom surprised me with a mini photo tour tonight! The highlights:


stack of 6 plates nested together


signature decal


special foam packaging

Also, here's an unrelated photo of me enjoying an English breakfast in London a few weeks ago:


I imagine that a BENTA plate would have come in super handy as I scooped up my eggs and beans...


Plans for a dinner party are underway - menu to include peas and similar rolly-type foods. Evidence to follow.

Thanks, Mom!

p.s. This post also serves to add closure to my first post on these plates, initially dubbed "ZK pro-model plates." Except for that part about a flipbook... perhaps there will be some filming at the Green Pea Dinner Party.

six-word memoir:

Interview was a disaster. Now what?

(inspired by Six-Word Memoirs on NPR)

Interview at the Royal College of Art!

If I knew how to turn comments on, I would invite you to offer encouraging words. So in lieu of comments, please send good vibes by performing a happy dance at 2:40 pm GMT on 2/26.

obsessive compulsive collection

Inspired by Daniel Eatock's on-going collections (see: trees, car batteries, and camera straps), I scanned my childhood collection of hundreds of sugar packets and cubes and added them to my flickr and portfolio website.

I started gathering the packets in the early 90s when my brother Eric brought me a set of island-themed sugar packets from Hawaii. I picked most of them up during travel (lots from a visit to Eastern Europe in 1992 and Belgium and France in 1995), but there are also some US gems (including the Fashion Cafe!!)...

I always wondered what I would do with them, and I think they've reached their permanent destination. Now I finally get to eat them :)))

planning and prototyping

In assembling my portfolio for graduate school, I came across some old sketches from years ago when I was completing my BFA in Ceramics at CU-Boulder. The fall semester of 2005 my instructor Jeanne Quinn encouraged us to develop a system and rules for our method of working - this was easy for me since I'm a compulsive list-maker anyway, and my work has always been more calculated and planned than emotional and "artistic".

This was the system for my chain-link magnetic cups:
1. Cast a 12-ounce glass from Target into ceramic
2. Indent the soft clay casting using the original glass used, so that there is a space where two cups could hug together
3. dig out spaces for magnets to fit into opposite cup walls, allowing for clay shrinkage so the magnets will sit snugly and flush with the surface of the cup
4. Cast this prototype into ceramic again; produce

This sketch hung on my studio wall for the semester, and I'm glad I saved it. When David Pahl took product shots of the CLMCs last month, I played art director and - without realizing it - styled the cups pretty much identically to my original sketch:


Somewhat eerie, but comforting to me as well. I do like when things work out this cleanly.

Bangkok Craving Cups

Look what the Gumption guru found in a Thai newspaper:



Sweet! Thanks, Tong!

Out with the Old, In with the New

Happy New Year!
Big changes here at INV/ALT design:

Old: My studio is officially closed. I have loved operating my ceramic studio out of my garage and then a shabby warehouse in the Ballpark district of Denver - but it's time for me to wrap things up and re-tool for some new projects. My experience working with Umbra has piqued my interest in product design, and I'd like to move away from producing my own work to learning how to use computer programs that aid in product design and development. I'll start looking for a creative job in Denver soon - bonus if I can keep my fingernails clean and learn a new skill or two. I also have a few more tableware ideas that I'd like to pitch to some product manufacturers - and I'm applying to Grad School. Wish me luck!

New: I just finished my brand new website! I finally have a place to gather my portfolio projects from the last couple of years - please visit invaltdesign.com to see new pictures of old work and some new work as well. I used indexhibit to build the site, and I highly recommend the application to anyone who wants to "build and maintain an archetypal, invisible website format that combines text, image, movie and sound" - plus it's free, and just challenging enough to figure out that I felt like a rockstar developer when it was up and running. Please go give it a spin!

At home in DWELL

Magnetic cups are in Dwell magazine!



The February issue is already out on newsstands, so go check it out pronto. My personal favorite is on page 40, but there's plenty more to see - including the mirror report on page 76 by design superstar Sally Kuchar (I love her video blog - SallyTV.com - she is super cool, and she has the coolest crew of friends ever.)

Thanks, Dwell!