The Graphic Designer Who Painted Sea Ranch
In the 1960s, the San Francisco-based graphic designer Barbara Stauffacher Solomon, now 91, brought the Swiss typeface Helvetica to the U.S. Creating playful wall-to-wall paintings — which she called “supergraphics” — with the sans-serif font, Solomon helped shape the visual identity of Sea Ranch, the progressive home-development experiment on the Northern California coast. Drawing inspiration for the community’s logo from the curlicue shapes of rams’ horns and crashing waves, Solomon demonstrated that Modernist graphic design could be minimal without being soulless. This month, SFMoMA will dedicate its third-floor gallery to her meticulously rendered illustrations and splashy supergraphics — which helped to popularize Helvetica across the U.S.
Solomon’s typeface-oriented designs are directional, architectural and often adhere to a primary color palette. In her illustrations, triangular forms abut curved lines to create kinetic configurations reminiscent of Isamu Noguchi’s playgrounds. A calendar she created for SFMoMA in the ’60s demonstrates her quick wit and poetic spirit: the “b” in December morphs into a cherry-red heart and the “o” in October is suspended from the word, like an orange plucked from a tree. The layout for May is a three-letter pretzel. Another standout work is a jewel-toned illustration of a Spanish villa — in which an elaborate fountain crowns a bright-orange staircase, which is bookended by graphic-printed arrows recalling mass-produced neon road signs. Solomon’s background as a landscape designer informs her sharp-eyed yet playful approach to capturing spatial relationships. In sketches that take aerial views of the Italian town of Pontecchio Marconi and street corners in San Francisco, Solomon distills dry urban-planning designs into clever visual riddles that create order out of the chaos of modern life. “Barbara Stauffacher Solomon” is on view at SFMoMA from February 23 through April 28, sfmoma.org — ANNA FURMAN
Hair Accessories Inspired by the Women of the Upper East Side
As a child of the ’80s, the scrunchie was such a staple in my wardrobe that by the time I was old enough to shop for myself, I wanted nothing to do with the accessory. Recently, though, as I’ve tired of bangs and layers and various other ways to style and cut my hair, I’ve taken to keeping it long and minimally shaped, often like two long panels on either side of my head. The Los Angeles-based jewelry designer Sophie Buhai — whose gorgeous silver and gold vermeil earrings, necklaces and bracelets rival what Phoebe Philo used to offer at Celine — has begun to produce hair accessories that reflect my minimalist needs. The pieces in her latest capsule collection are her best yet: sumptuous velvet and organza scrunchies, triple-layered bows and dahlia-like hair ties, as well as classic puffy and twisted headbands. They are neither preppy nor fussy, a throwback to another time but updated by cleaner, more luxurious materials (as photographed on Buhai's friend, the model and actress Hailey Gates and the British shorthair Lil Bonbon). “I was inspired by a certain woman who lives on the Upper East Side or Beverly Hills,” Buhai told me, “A woman in her 70s or 80s who has been wearing the same style padded headband or silk bow since the 1980s. These women are becoming harder and harder to spot, and the style is going extinct.” With any luck, those of us who are searching for a bit more elegance can aid Buhai in bringing it back. $75-$220, sophiebuhai.com — THESSALY LA FORCE
An Outsider Artist Now at the Art World’s Center
Purvis Young, whose art was a response to the extreme poverty, urban decay and racism he experienced in the destitute Miami neighborhood of Overtown in the ’60s and ’70s, was the epitome of an outsider artist. While serving a prison sentence in his late teens, he began pouring over art books and when he was released at the age of 21 he started painting on dilapidated structures and boarded-up storefronts in a derelict alley in his hometown. But the self-taught artist who lived and worked so far from the rarefied world of contemporary art is now at its very center, nine years after his death, with a major exhibition currently at the Rubell Family Collection, a special exhibition in Venice during the Biennale and a pair of concurrent shows at Salon 94 Freemans and James Fuentes in New York, his first solo exhibitions in the city in a decade.
The Salon 94 show, which will open on February 26, includes never-before-seen works in which Young overpainted books from the Miami Public Library. In “The Homes and Gardens Book of Flower Arrangement,” Young painted the pages opposite staid floral still lifes with expressionistic brush strokes that are at once dissonant and complementary. In a history book on England he has sketched groups of figures, rejoicing or defiant with arms outstretched. “Purvis Young” is on view at Salon 94 Freemans from February 26 through March 23, salon94.com — TOM DELAVAN
Soft Socks, to Dress Up Any Outfit
I’ve never really thought too much about my socks. I’m generally aware if they are mismatched, or holey, but have I really strategized about them — and coordinated them to my clothes? No. And yet Comme Si, a luxurious new sock brand that launches this week, is inexplicably appealing. Available in either ribbed Italian silk or Egyptian cotton, the nine lightweight styles come in soothing spring colors like “lime merengue,” “arancia” and “lilac,” which the brand’s Brooklyn-based founder, Jenni Lee, says were inspired by hues from her childhood in Arizona and family heritage as a Korean American. Lee felt compelled to start Comme Si after failing to find socks that met her requirements — “soft to the touch,” “durable,” “thin enough to wear with a variety of shoes,” “cut in a length that is flattering (not too tall, not too short).” “I have always considered socks an accessory, and I wear them as a deliberate part of an outfit, like you would a belt, handbag or piece of jewelry,” she told me in an e-mail. “As a woman who cares about every other aspect of my appearance, I wanted socks that were designed well and made well, not just an afterthought.” $26-$52, commesi.com — ISABEL WILKINSON