Welcome to the Liv Design blog, an eclectic mix of great design and quirky finds

The world had been waiting for something interesting to happen in the car world for a long time now. No, not 'interesting', but 'really interesting'. Proper excitement. Up pops the 'new Fiat 500' from the dangerously-close-to-closing Fiat factory. Not since the 'new Mini' has a car received such critical acclaim before it's even released. And before that it was the 'new Beetle'. Coincidence then that all three were all reinventions of classics? Icons of their day. They're all 'new '. Perhaps we all have a hunger for, and a heart-felt connection with, our past – our youth and childhood. Or maybe we all suffer from a love of old things but a desire for modern things. Perhaps all these 'new classics' fill our need for modern and traditional. Or perhaps we all want to be individuals in this world of mass production, high street chainstores and mediocrity. Car manufacturers are obsessed with playing safe, going for cars that ju...

A new Tarantino and Rodriguez collaboration inspired by US 'Grindhouse' cinemas (drive-in and ghetto cinemas) of the 60s and 70s. It's a double bill (although the UK I believe is getting them separately...) full of shocks, horror, cheese and violence. Site has brilliant graphics, it's entertaining, atmospheric and stylish. The first film is a zombie horror flick called 'Planet Terror'(!), the second a thriller with Kurt Russel called 'Deathproof'. With interactive elements, part game, part behind the scences, it's got everything. It's everything a website should be, especially when film sites tend to be just the trailer. Nice to see creative web design is still alive! Check out www.grindhousemovie.net/index2.html

The Helvetica font is celebrating its 50th birthday. One of the most influencial, widely used and mist recognized fonts celebrates it’s 50th birthday this year. Yes it’s conventional, yes some people hate it, and yes it has the loathed default cousin font Arial, but you have to admire a font that still looks modern today (particularly with the Neue family addition from the 1980s). It’s such a clean, simple and organised font. It’s minimal. It says very little but speaks volumes. If a font was unbiased and civilized this would be it, the UN of fonts. It’s lack of novelty and cleanliness actually lends itself to being read, ironic really as it’s a sans-serif font (serif fonts like Times are supposedly easier on the eye to read). It’s probably no coincidence then that it was created by the Swiss, Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann in 1957 for the Haas Type Foundry in Switzerland. The list of companies that have used the font is endless, including such household giants as Gap, Orange, Curry...