It's a tribute to the fonts of English businessman, printer and typographer John Baskerville (1706 - 1775), although it has some lovely characteristics all its own.
Like his fonts, Baskerville was a controversial character. He hired a certain Sarah Eaves as his housekeeper, but her duties involved more than just sweeping the scullery.
Eventually her husband Richard abandoned her and their five children, and Mrs Eaves became Baskerville's mistress and eventual helpmate with typesetting and printing. On the death of Mrs Eaves estranged husband, she married John Baskerville inside a month. Licko's selection of the name Mrs Eaves honours one of the forgotten women in the history of typography.
Really, what a beautiful way to be remembered.
Taking a five minute break from writing
to seek inspiration on the Internet, I found this colourful background to the
name I share with the company. (source: Internet Surname Database)
"Percival: This interesting name,
with variant spellings Perceval, Percifull, Purcifer and Passifull, derives
from the male given name Perceval, first recorded as the name of the hero of an
epic poem by the 12th Century French poet Chretien de Troyes, describing the
quest for the holy grail or chalice. The name is fancifully taken from the
French elements "percer", to pierce or breach, plus "val",
a valley, hence "pierce the valley", a nickname presumably given to a
keen poacher or soldier remembered for his breach of a fortification. The exact
origin of the name is uncertain; however, the most likely source is the Celtic
"Peredur" from the Old Welsh meaning "warrior of the
cauldron". This name was borne by a Welsh legendary hero of the Middle
Ages and the cognate Old Welsh "Pair-cyfall" means "warrior of
the Chalice". Occasionally, the name may be of French locational origin from
Perc(h)eval in Calvados, Normandy, as in Richard de Percevill (Staffordshire,
1203). The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of
William Percevall, which was dated 1229, in the "Calendar of the Close
Rolls", Shropshire, during the reign of King Henry III known as "The
Frenchman", 1216 - 1272."
I've always been a FroggyPhile, so my
Gallic sympathies suddenly stack up!
Well we were busy the last quarter of 2008 so it was time all our new work made a debut on this site.
Click here to see our new portfolio, with enhanced navigation thrown in for good measure too.
The last couple of months we’ve been shuttling down to the Pembrokeshire National Park, an enchanted corner of Wales.
Here I’ve been working at a place called Bluestone, a completely new take on what a holiday resort can be.
In a simply breathtaking valley, and centred around a traditional Welsh village, it’s a total retreat, a place to calm down, chill out and generally forget who the hell you are.
For once, I’ve been the middle man, a consultant working with a creative agency (redrivercreative.com) and a technical agency (fusionworkshop.com) to create a brand spanking new website, http://www.bluestonewales.com
Bluestone seems to be inhabited by the nicest people in the world ever. (I always remember the tennis commentator Dan Maskell saying of a Seventies tennis ace, Tom Gorman: “Tom Gorman. One of the nicest men….in the world.” Quite what the empirical or contextual basis for this sweeping statement was, I’ll never know, but it caused a giggle or three at the time.)
Last night was quiz night in the Tafarn Pub in the village, and I can now tell you that Q and Z are the highest scoring Scrabble letters. Great camaraderie, superb service, and uber quaffable local ale.
Bluestone deserves to – and will – succeed. It’s endlessly endearing, ‘green’ to the core (the Blue Lagoon water park is powered entirely by biomass fuel grown on site) and situated in a matchless location. The Coastal Path with endless hiking and whale watching opportunities is nearby, they’ll soon be Britain’s first new racecourse in decades just twenty minutes away…..I could go on and on, it’s just a totally different, fresh experience.
A place to lose yourself and find yourself.
(Spoiler warning: this blog entry contains cheese.)
I skied twenty consecutive seasons, and then suddenly the passion went dead.
Maybe it was some bad luck with poor snow conditions, ill-fitting ski boots (my last girlfriend called me Shrek Feet, enough said), the ridiculous cost of a ski holiday (yes white powder is an expensive Class A drug), or a host of other reasons. But I missed 3 consecutive seasons on the bounce. I fell out of love with hurtling down mountains.
Until….approaching Christmas, with nothing other than London based r’n’r planned for New Year, a friend and I suddenly imagineered a week in the Alps. And did it.
The only place with a spare bed left in the whole Tarentaise Valley was La Plagne, so that’s where we headed.
The early signs didn’t augur well. The road we had to negotiate up to the resort had more hairpins than Elsie Tanner, and the village was a selection of boxy sixties buildings, among which were the first tower blocks I’ve ever seen in the mountains. Chocolate Box charm was thin on the ground.
Thankfully, the snow situation was quite the opposite. The whole place was carpeted in the white stuff.
Our hotel, the Araucaria, was new and meant well with vaguely Art Deco inspired décor and ski lockers that worked on your electronic room key (why don’t all ski hotels have these?) It was fabulously located at the bottom of the slalom slope so you could have a late afternoon aperitif on your bedroom balcony and catch all the races. Basically a nice place, apart from the hyperactive Maitre’D who in the charm stakes made Basil Fawlty look like Basil Brush.
I’ve always found skiing a totally creative experience and source of almost divine inspiration, a time when the mountains rule and you think expansive thoughts. (Laurence, cut the spiritual crap, Ed.)
But the first couple of days, I just couldn’t get it right. My boots were adjusted all wrong, I bruised the top of my foot so each turn was agony, and my short short curvy carving skis felt all wrong to a man who’d skied his formative years on 203cm planks with nary a curve between them.
The sun was great, the snow was new, but I wondered if I’d ever get back ‘that feeling’.
And then: like it always does with anything truly addictive, the magic cut in. We skied across the Paradiski region to Les Arcs, and suddenly we were on kind red runs snaking through the trees, with hardly a soul on them, and then my knees began to flex, and that sensation of feeling the skis through the balls of your feet and effortlessly unweighting from one to the other began to cut in (yes I know that’s Old School technique, but hey ho!).
My friend and I weave in and out of each other’s tracks, and I see a smile even bigger than my own. And briefly, oh so briefly, I feel like I’m flying and master of all I survey.
And it may sound cheesy, corny, call it what you will – and it maybe it’s the Vin Chaud talking - but I see next year and all the creative projects, for me and for work, and we can make them fly too. Sometimes creativity comes easily, sometimes you have to carve it out.
