The Observatory Newsletter

Jessica Helfand|Audio

Episode 131: Word by Word

With Hrishikesh Hirway: games and puzzles, The West Wing Weekly, soap operas, Home Cooking

Jessica Helfand|Audio

Episode 130: Tackling History

With Bobby C. Martin, Jr.: rebranding Champions Design; football in Washington; demands for change at design schools; cooking during quarantine.

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 126: Screens and Dreams

Take Me to the World: A Sondheim 90th Birthday Celebration; Unorthodox; My Brilliant Friend; The Affair; Anil Dash on the dangers of social media; Anna Wiener on Silicon Valley; quarantine dreams

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 125: Zoom Aesthetics

Zoom aesthetics and COVID-19; Kyle Chayka on minimalism; Deborah Berke on shared spaces; Jessica Salfia’s poem “The First Lines of Emails I’ve Received While Quarantining”; Megan O’Grady on artistic recluses

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 124: That Thing You Do

Making art and design during the COVID-19 pandemic; Christoph Niemann and Daniella Zalcman; Adam Schlesinger; spec scripts for Larry David

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 123: Closing Doors, Opening Doors

Looking at COVID=19: Flattening the curve, Washington Post designers Harry Stevens on visualizing social distancing, Alissa Walker on how dots are people, Stephen Sondheim at 90

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 122: At Arm’s Length

COVID-19, social distancing, Luō Dàwèi’s One Thousand Families project, hiring product designers, Eric Rosenberg’s prop designs for The Plot Against America, Joanne McNeil’s Lurking

Jessica Helfand|Audio

Episode 121: Love and Squalor

With guest host Alissa Walker of L.A. Podcast: Barbara Kruger at Frieze Week; Destination Crenshaw; homelessness; urban design competitions, Rose Lyster on air travel; Molly Young on garbage language

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 120: Federal Style

The Trump Administration’s draft executive order Making Federal Buildings Beautiful Again, the rise of the blur, a CBS brand book at the California Antiquarian Fair, Anna Wiener’s Uncanny Valley

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 118: Excelsior!

Andrew Cuomo’s old-school political graphics; ridiculous subway ads, real and fake; Vaughan Oliver, John Baldessari, Sonny Mehta

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 117: Truth and Yogurt

Christmas cards, the Charles and Ray Eames collection, Didones, the Chobani effect, Hong Kong protest art, a dog who plays Jenga, Uncut Gems.

Michael Bierut|Audio

Episode 116: A Decade in Politics, A Year in Culture

101 political images of 2010s; plus Jia Tolentino’s Trick Mirror; Ian McEwan’s Machines Like Me; Beck’s Hyperspace; Underworld’s Oblivion with Bells; The 1619 Project podcast; Esther Perel’s Where Should We …