Hello from sunny Florida,
I'm in to my last night of vacation in Florida, I fly back to the UK tomorrow and I'm appalled by the tourist tack that exists around International Drive.
I did come down for the theme parks and to do the tourist thing, but the signage and billboards are awful from a design point of view and compared to even the biggest tourist traps in the UK it's horrible.
This isn't a USA bashing thread by any means, I've had a great time here, but that designer in me cringed at the twee, saccharine, utterly trite nonsense around Disney and the surrounding parks.
Disney is particularly horrific, glad I did it and went there but by god, it's like it's stuck in the 1980s. Universal Studios is much better but still very poor from a design standpoint looking at the advertising.
On the plus side, there's nothing better than sitting pool-side with your MacBook finishing some collaborative design with an ice cold beer before heading off for The Hulk ride to get some extreme G-Forces.
Working freelance I've not had a proper vacation for about 3 years ad this has been a well needed break, albeit whilst working by the pool, It's also made me realise how good the calibre of design is in the UK and the talent we have there.
I'm contemplating moving to Florida to start a design revolution and push the place a bit more upmarket.
Anyway, it's 00:30 here and I have to check out of my hotel at 11:00am tomorrow so I'm going to get some sleep before I embark on a 14 hour flight home.
On the plus side I'm flying Delta, the best airline I've ever flown with so far so looking forward to the journey.
I'll soon be back about to about 3°C in London vs 27°C here :o( and shivering my ass off as I see over the next stage of our move to new premises, a big cold warehouse and office complex that has no heating yet.
Just thought I'd drop you guys a line while I'm out here.
Hope you're all doing well, I'll have some critiques up again soon.
Kev (plugz.co.uk)