Rob hobbles into the studio this week clutching a swollen jaw. No, we didn’t have a fight. We just went for a little walk along a riverbank.
News this week looks at the proliferation of a side of lifestyle images with everything. Easy on the Dachshund, Luigi. Rob looks into eerie images of apartments in New York’s libraries while waiting for his wireless kettle to boil.
Grids are the main topic this week. We ask “what is a grid?”. It's hardly All the President’s Men is it? Jon gets confused as per usual. Rob gets riled about post-rationalised grids.
Pies fare a bit better this week apart from some copywriting issues.
Another episode of Rob’s mum’s favourite podcast* looks at why news gatherers are so lazy by reading out news from news aggregate sites. What is the relevance of 117? How many spoons can a spoon whittler whittle? And why on earth is there a tank on top of the South Downs? Jon then gets all regionalist when he forgets the names of large swathes of the beautiful North. Typical.
This week the Gents talk about dream houses. Where would you live and what would you live in? Moats, Mulberry trees, billiard rooms, gold banisters and mountain top observatories are just some of the ideas bandied about.
Pies arrive and pass without much of a fuss, as they continue to dream…
*At time of last survey.
The news this week seems to be full of Kickstarter projects. The chaps also look at a new approach to kickstarting your design education in just three months.
The book of the month is Bill Drummond's 45, a memoir of his life at that point in time and a truly great book about art, music and the perception of truth. NVS thoroughly enjoyed it and urge you to read it.
Rob returns to a fertile pie source while Jon ferrets around in the freezer for yet another disappointment. Beer is also drunk.
This week NVS is out about in at The V&A in the first field trip. The boys review its new show with the snappy title of “You Say You Want a Revolution? Records and Rebels 1966 - 1970”.
In our hottest episode yet we find out that the always-odd Bjork is doing a spot of 360 VR at Somerset House. We chat about The Design Museum’s design awards, a sale of Second World War vehicles and we say adieu to Mr Gene Wilder.
350 years ago the Great Fire of London broke out in a baker’s shop in Pudding Lane. We discuss this monumental event (see what I did there) and talk about lost buildings we would love to have visited.
This week Rob’s posh pork pie from Selfridges knocks Jon's humble mince beef pie out of the park with an 8 out of 10.
In the latest episode of Rob’s mum’s favourite podcast*, we catch up in the latest design/non-design news including a new neighbour for planet Earth, flockingly good bird photomontages and old photos of inky-fingered Fleet Street.
Following on from our chat about secret places from last week, we talk about maps. We get completely lost discussing their origins.
This week sees an all time low in pies. We’d have been better off with a nice salad.
*Allegedly
The 25% extra free episode. Secret bonus laughter track. Interminable drivel guaranteed.
The chaps catch up with the latest design news freshly scraped from the bottom of a barrel. It is August after all.
Secret places are on the menu du jour today. But you’ll have to listen to find out more.
Pies of dubious credentials are partaken of, and rather enjoyed, by our two young heroes.
25 episodes. Illustration. Lists. Mash them all together and what have you got? That’s right, you’ve got a list of 25 things to do with illustration.
We talk about the illustrators and tools that have inspired us; from childhood, right up to the present day.
And if you get through that lot, we then talk pies. Pies, generously sent through the post by Rob’s lovely mother, all the way from Yorkshire.
Konnichiwa! We’re back! Did you miss us? No, we didn’t think so.
We chat about Airbnb’s new design studio, Brighton’s new eye(sore), Rob talks wistfully about his old tutor while Jon tries out Adobe’s Portfolio.
Our book of the month is In Praise of Shadows by Junichiro Tanizaki. We discuss the book deep in bosky contemplation, while perched upon Japanese toilets.
The serenity is rudely broken by the arrival of Jon’s stonking pea and ham pie and Rob’s bum-tingling chilli pork pie, kindly donated by one of our listeners.
We talk about comics for a while and then remember that this podcast is, but isn't, about design.
So we prattle on about Roald Dahl, camera lenses, work spaces, tennis balls and Argentinian bookshops.
After the recent “recycled” coffee cup revelations, our main topic this week was waste. Does capitalism give value to anything other than pure profit? We talk about our own impact on the environment and what we can do to make less of an impact on resources. It’s a subject to which we will return.
We then eat pies. Rob’s has got pork scratchings sprinkled on top, which is just naughty. Jon’s is so hot it could solve the energy crisis.
Everyone’s favourite podcast called North V South is back after a week’s break.
We catch up with the latest design news: Jon finds out that Elon Musk is not a BodyShop fragrance. We also look at another rebrand using nostalgia as a weapon of mass distraction.
Jon talks about Frank, his WW1-based daily diary project from 2014, and how the tight deadlines made the writing process both a challenge and a pleasure.
Rob scoffs a Royal pie. Jon is pleasantly surprised by Aldi.
This week in the podcast that is and isn’t about design, we look back to a halcyon time which may or may not have existed*.
We talk about the triumph of Jeremy Deller’s latest art project, the London Museum of Brands and Lego’s latest nostalgic model of a VW Beetle.
Nostalgia is our topic of the week. Other chocolate-based confectionaries are available. Do they still make Topics**?
Watchmen is our book of the month. We enjoy it as much as you can enjoy a comic that’s about self loathing crime fighters. Pies are then scoffed as they should be.
It didn’t.
** They do.
This week’s episode is all about space. There isn’t anywhere else to go that isn’t all doom and gloom. Rob takes a look at his lifelong fascination with all things space-related. We hear about the latest happenings in space exploration and Rob goes on to talk about the influences in his life as a sci-fi illustrator.
WARNING: This podcast contains upbeat positivity and hope for the future of the UK. It turns out we are not very reliable futurologists.
We catch up with the latest design news in a world where, for now, it seems the dishonest, ill-informed and downright unpleasant are king.
On the eve of what’s turned out to be the biggest break-up of our lives, we discuss what happens when things go horribly wrong with your clients.
Pies are eaten.
Rob and Jon kick off this week’s podcast with some amazing Friday night banter: Graphic file formats. We talk about redesigning death, Tate’s brand refresh and look at a new cut of the classic typeface Johnston.
As our nation teeters on the edge of being European, we turn our attention to notebooks: the debate consuming the nation.
Jon’s pie this week is a surprise early Fathers’ Day gift. Rob sets fire to his mouth with a hot one.
This week Rob airs his dirty laundry in the revamped Ikea bag, while Jon curls his lip at Michael Wolff’s archly lupine comments about the new British Steel logo. We then prattle on about knolling and networking.
Rob grapples with a pie that is defined, but ultimately ruined by, a slice of Chorizo while Jon sings from the terraces with a basic steak pie from Tesco.
After a week’s hiatus, which can be painful if not carefully managed, our intrepid presenters are rejoined in dialectic dysfunction.
We jump into a design time machine and take a look at new logos from British Steel and Co-op, as well as rooms frozen in time (or not). The boys then jump back to 175,000 years to a meeting with Neanderthal architects. A lack of decent coffee forces their swift return.
It’s a birthday in some form or another for both our businesses, and so we look forward to what the future brings. Indigestion if Jon’s pies are anything to go by.
This week we are talking about mistakes in design. For once we live up to our name as a diametrically opposed podcast and disagree with each other. Surely shome mishtake?
Jon’s pork pie gets a lot of love. Consumed by pie envy, Rob embarks on a desperate quest across several counties for a rival. He fails.
This week Rob p-p-p-picks up a new edition of Pocket Penguins. It's not the only bird he's picked up this week. We talk 3D soundwaves and discuss the new Instagram logo like we just don't care: We really don't care.
Our book of the month is "Insanely Great" by Steven Levy. We explore the origins of the tool that pays our mortgages, hitch a ride back to 1995 and the story of the birth of the Macintosh.
The pies this week turn out to be boils on the behind of Beelzebub himself. But we still eat them anyway.
