Blair Spray-Fix Packaging circa 1949

Here’s a funky packaging for Blair Art Products from Memphis Tennessee. It’s a low odor spray fixative with a very lighthearted and fun feel. I wish their products looked less serious as they look today, specially for products with artist as their main target audience. Anyway, really love the funky illustrations on the front and back, although the front guy looks like he’s enjoying the smell of it quite too much. Beautiful script type on the front as well. I’m going to take a wild guess and date this to the late 40’s based on this little history page which states spray fixatives were introduced in 1949. Enjoy!

Design: Unknown  |  Year: 1949  |  Photo: Javier Garcia

Miguel Aceves Record cover by Jim Flora

Well this weekend is México’s Independence Day and I thought I’d do a theme post so here’s a super fun record cover illustrated by the absolute wonderful Jim Flora. I love how he managed to include all the folklore of a traditional Mexican celebration. There’s the lady cooking outside, a bar, a pulqueria, a church, plata (silver), and animals including pigs, rosters and of course donkeys!

This is a different color version from the U.S. release. This one was released in Spain. The artwork is identical of the U.S. release but the colors and the RCA logo area are different.

So if you like delicious food, drinks and folklore, make sure you look for some of these festivities this weekend. Enjoy!

Design: Jim Flora   |   Year: 1955   |   Photo: Javier Garcia

Charley Harper Cookbook Giveaway!

I just didn’t quite get to do some Spring cleaning this year and some duplicate books are accumulating on my collection so I thought of giving away this exact copy of the beautiful Betty Crocker cookbook fully illustrated by the wonderful Charley Harper. The book is titled “Dinner for two” and it’s a small book of 207 pages, measuring roughly 5.75″ x 7.75″ The book is filled with fun illustrations all over.

You have a few options to enter:

  1. Leave a comment on this blog post and let me know if you’d be interested in another give away.
  2. Tweet the following message “Hey @javiergdesign count me in for the Charley Harper cookbook giveaway http://www.javiergd.com/blog/?p=1595 #design”
  3. Follow me on Twitter at @javiergdesign. (anyone who followed me starting August 27th is in)
  4. Leave a comment on this Flickr photo »

You can try a few of these to increase your odds. I will ship this anywhere in the world (as long as it can get there). I will randomly select a winner on and announce it on Friday August 7th 2012.

I hope you guys like this and if everything goes well I’ll have some other stuff to give away in the future. Stay in informed by following me on twitter at @javiergdesign or subscribe to the blog RSS feed.

Enjoy!

Design: Charles Harper  |  Year: 1958   |   Photo: Javier García

Swedish bank Money box by Kjell Westerlund

This is a fun little money bank created by the swedish designer and illustrator Kjell Westerlund in the sixties for the swedish bank Sparbanken. This is often mistaken for a Stig Lindberg design but that is wrong. I really love the illustrations which have a double function. You can mix up the characters for fun and you can adjust all three rings to a certain position to open it. So this time I’d say illustration follows function. Enjoy!

Design: Kjell Westerlund     |     Year: 1960’s     |   Photo: Javier García

P.G. Wodehouse Book cover by Olle Eksell

Here is a book cover designed and Illustrated by the swedish designer Olle Eksell. This was found all the way in Stockholm, Sweden and I was very excited to scavenge a copy of this magnificent book. The illustrations and colors in combination with the custom typography makes this cover vibrate with joy. Unfortunately the book is in swedish so I won’t get to read it. Enjoy!

Design: Olle Eksell   |   Year: 1952   |   Photo: Javier Garcia

Jim Flora Disc Digest Booklet circa 1946

Here’s a fun booklet filled with Illustrations all over. It’s for Columbia Records. I’m going to go ahead and label this as a Jim Flora piece since he was in charge of most of the Columbia Records materials at the time and the style of illustration matches that of Flora’s earlier career. I know that George Maas and Robert Jones also illustrated some Disc Digest issues. Please feel free to correct me if I am wrong. This one is from a record store in San Francisco. Enjoy!

UPDATE: Thanks to the wonderful Irwin Chusid — who is an expert in this subject — we now know that only the cover was designed by Jim Flora.

Design: Jim Flora | Year: 1946 | Photo: Javier García