Shortform: Nice Work

Typography: MD Lórien and MD Nichrome , recommended by Noemi Stauffer at the excellent Fresh Fonts
Icons: Font Awesome

Back in the day—in this case, the early ’00s—there was a guy who did these incredibly ornate #pixelart patterns and just gave them away. That was it. That was the site.

I’ve been trying to remember the name of this site for what feels like years. It was called something unusual, and I finally, after some strategically-minded googling, located it: squidfingers.com, by Travis Beckham. Of course it’s different now. But this being the internet, someone archived it, and you can see his remarkable work here.

Something about the whole thing feels very #old-web for some reason. I don’t know. I’m sure designers still do this. I just associate Squidfingers-type projects with the earlier, more experimental web.

A green pattern showing pixelated green flowers.

A pixelated pattern showing a black background with dark gray interlinked roses.

A pixelated abstract pattern of blue leaflike designs with gold curly elements.

A pixelated abstract pattern of blue stripes with green and gold ornaments.

Matt Sephton shared something pretty cool: someone named asivery built a site devoted to the MiniDisc, showcasing all the different #MiniDisc packaging designs (and players) from the early ’90s through 2013 or so. Photos taken by Dan Marker-Moore.

When I think of ’90s–00s packaging and industrial design, the first thing that comes to mind is the bright, translucent colors that everyone started using after the #iMac came out in 1998. Reviewing the collection here, it’s interesting to note the presence of a lot of translucent Bondi blue several years before Apple made that color ubiquitous.

I rarely use physical media anymore (does anyone?) so it’s hard to compare, say, a CD case design from 2002 with a contemporary one. Nevertheless, I’ve had a sense that industrial #design has been getting more austere—i.e. less interesting—for a while now: curves, color, and translucency giving way to boxes, grayscale, and shiny surfaces.

minidisc.pics is a cool reminder that there was a time when tech products didn’t just look sleek and powerful, they looked fun.