Hey! Surprise, here’s a Friday edition of the Twotone newsletter!
The ways in which May has been wild could be a whole issue on its own, so it’s certainly not ironic this subject line rhyme caught my eye. 🙃
Well, it was inspired by Matthew Jones of
Accept & Proceed. He made a pretty relevant (to me)
post on LinkedIn about a designer named Harvey Ball. In 1963, Harvey created the design for the ubiquitous Smiley, the forerunner to every single emoji we know today. 🙂
Jones’ post tells this story:
“An insurance company in Massachusetts hired [Harvey] to create a design to boost the morale of their employees. He got paid $45; it was so popular people started printing it themselves and putting it onto anything they could, hats, tees, badges, posters…
Harvey never trademarked the design… and partly because of that, this mark has brought global joy, it’s a shorthand for ‘happy’, and has been adopted by movements and cultures worldwide. It was a symbol of the UK’s acid house scene in my youth.”
Jones’ point? Harvey’s Smiley shows, in our globalised world why design is so important. It cuts through all barriers, all languages, and resonates deep across borders.
My take, menial & even cheesy aspects of projects can lead to legendary work and, as Jones puts it, even invent culture too. So put your best foot forward and consider each opportunity as a chance to contribute to manifesting the future you want to find yourself in. After all, “
where attention goes, energy flows!”
as always, thank you for reading & sharing,
Jon
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🙏 Thank you all for the replies & good vibes each week!
📷 Banner image is another B&W snap by my daughter of my son
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