My posts from my Japan trip hops around a little… but when I stayed in Tokyo, we took a walk in Ueno Park and found lots of interesting things… and here is one of them — a full size statue of a blue whale diving! The statue is 30 meters long (approx. 33 yards long). It was stunning and awesome, I loved it.

Right next to this great whale statue is  the Tokyo National Museum of Nature and Science. It was closed for the holidays (note: lots of things close during the last week of December and the first week of January in Japan — we couldn’t go to many places because of the new year holidays in Japan, actually…), but would have been great to go in and see… next time!

Posted under Japanese, art

Good morning! Hope you had a nice weekend… I am still struggling from my horrible jet lag… :( Hopefully, by the end of the week, it’ll be all better and I live like a normal person… (not going to bed at 5-6pm and waking up super early.)

Anyway. I found this gigantic inflatable human body floating around at Haneda airport. It sure caught my eye — it was huge!

I want to know the concept behind this guy… if you happened to know the artist or the idea behind this, please let me know!

Have a great day, everyone!

Posted under Japanese, art

This found art is on the wall of a restaurant (I can’t remember the name…) on Bowery Street in NYC (east village area) — catches my eye every time. The frame is painted, too, and the big hands are holding the frame… so many dimensions in one piece! I like the air conditioner is even incorporated into the painting, too.

It is fun to walk around the city — you can find lots of things! :)

Posted under NYC, art

One more post from my visit to DUMBO… some found art. I love how you see a lot of art without going to museums or galleries here in NY.

On the ground. 3 colors stencil (I think). I see this everywhere in NYC…

There are a lot of art installations going on at Brooklyn Bridge Park and Empire-Fulton Ferry State Park area right now. This is one of them. Caught my eye…

Posted under art

I found lots of types, arts and designs on my trip and I would love to share them all here for your inspiration and for my inspiration… I know I can use some of the elements for my design someday… I think it’s also a fun way to show where I have been for the last 10 days :)

I’m going to start from the beginning of my trip… We arrived at Long Beach Airport in LA.

Nice Helvetica welcome board:

and I also saw a different welcome sign — it says the same thing, but you see how it feels so different with different fonts?

found art – it looks interesting and very conceptual piece.

From the Queen Mary restaurant menu (before we get on a cruise ship, we stopped by Queen Mary hotel):

I love this sign. Very vintage and cool.

and this is the cruise ship we took to Ensenada, Mexico:

It was a 3-day wedding cruise, stopped by Ensenada for one day, went to this gorgeous place for a wedding.

The hand-written/drawn house sign:

The patio/pool area:

Oceanfront area:

From the house backyard — Cute turtle statues:

Love this mini bicycle with plants:

Love the patterns and colors! So pretty…

One of the dining areas in the house. Isn’t it gorgeous?

The wedding was beautiful as you can imagine :)

and… right before I got back to the cruise ship, found this wall and the public phones — love the color combination!

I saw lots of hand-written ads on the street on the way to the wedding venue, I wish I wasn’t in the car so I could have taken more pictures because they looked so cool…. next time, maybe… :)

Hope you enjoy so far — more to come!

Posted under trip, typography

Happy Friday, everyone! Well… I am off to a vacation! I’m probably flying somewhere in US right now… going to Los Angels, cruise to Mexico, spend little time in southern California and then Boston… (2 weddings to go for 2 weekends, west coast and east coast) I will be back on Monday the 29th this month with lots of pictures, inspirations, found art and type, please check back then! I might post something here and there from my iPhone… or follw me on twitter for an occasional updates :)

Images are something I found in Lower East Side yesterday. Awesome type and design, caught my eye.

Have a great weekend and have a great week next week! xo Hijiri

Posted under typography

There is this huge open space for outdoor advertising in one of the buildings in SoHo and what was up last weekend was this huge blackboard and (looks very) random lines… it caught my eye, made me wonder what this is…?

If this changes everyday or next week and becomes something towards some ohhhh or ahhhh things, that would be super cool…

If this was a real blackboard/chalkboard, that would be awesome, too…

(Speaking of which, I’d love to have a chalkboard wall in my house someday.)

Posted under advertising

There are lots of street art in the Meatpacking District besides the type I found. They catch my eye every time, but never had a chance to take photos so here they are. It is so New York, I love it!

Happy Friday morning, everyone!!

Posted under art