Rewatched the 2007 film Helvetica tonight and was reminded how great it is and how influential that film was for me as a designer.

The film took me a journey deep into the origins and influence of a typeface designed in 1957 that still influences us all today.

Helvetica also introduced me to what would become my favorite band — El Ten Eleven — a key part of the film’s fantastic soundtrack.

Thank you, Gary Hustwit!

Missed my Sketchnote Layout Live Workshop in November?

Now you can pre-order the full recording for December 1, 2022 release w/ discount code LAYOUT10 for 10% off!

rohdesign.com/layout

In this workshop video recording I share my approach and think about sketchnote layouts: what they are, how they work, then I deconstruct 3 sketchnote layouts in detail.

Watch as I take what I’ve learned from one of the deconstructed layouts to show you how I build thumbnails for reference and them demonstrate how I create pencil guides to structure some of my sketchnotes when I want to use a certain layout style.

My goal with this workshop is to reveal my approach and thinking, so you can take ideas from the workshop and apply them in your own sketchnotes.

Materials Needed:

• Black gel or felt tipped pen
• Color gel or felt tipped pen (your choice)
• Pencil
• 9 x 12 tracing paper pad
• Printouts of reference PDF (link above)
• Loose printer paper or your sketchbook to take notes
• Printed reference PDF printed out (provide with the video sale)

rohdesign.com/layout

In a recent private workshop, I had a new idea — what if I gave students of the Sketchnote Workshop a certificate that gave them the permission to “suck at drawing” while they learn drawing at their own pace?

I created a certificate and it was a hit with students, so I’m offering it here as a PDF, for you, your students, or anyone who might enjoy it. Print out, add your name, and hang in a prominent location.

Download it for yourself!

The Sketchnote Handbook turns 10 on November 30th, 2022. It seems crazy to made that 10 years ago I was reaching the finish line with my first book — with no idea if it would sell or not.

It was an intense 9 months from signing the contract to writing, illustrating, managing, designing, shooting video for, and creating production artwork for that book, but it was also a blast.

I remember reminding myself to be happy with the progress of each day, and eventually I pulled it off.

Of course it was the work of a small, smart team around me that helped make it all happen. My wife for her support, editors, fellow sketchnoters, and plenty more people who aren’t even in the credits of the book made The Sketchnote Handbook happen.

Celebrating 10 Years
So, we’re celebrating with a limited-edition Happy Birthday sticker I designed for the book and Peachpit has created a special offer on the Handbook, Workbook, and Video.

This set of books makes a great gift for new sketchnoters… or the perfect way to replace YOUR lent out the copies of the books that haven’t been returned.

If you already own a physical copy of The Sketchnote Handbook and would love a digital copy, you can get the eBook and the video for your iPad.

The offer: 2 together for 50% off
I figured the best way to make the book accessible was to offer 2 for half off and we were able to do it. We’ve generated the code HAPPY10 to give buyers 50% off when they buy any 2 of The Sketchnote Handbook, The Sketchnote Workbook, or The Sketchnote Handbook Video, together. The code covers print and eBook editions.

If you’re interested, more details are here on my site.

In December 2020, at the height of the pandemic, I ran a live, online workshop teaching my approach to lettering for sketchnoters. I had a blast sharing and I was honored to teach 200+ students that day in December!

Now, I’m back to teach a NEW live workshop sharing my approach to layout in sketchnotes, designed for sketchnoters.

Why layout? Because I’ve heard over and over that sketchnoters struggle with layouts every time they sketchnote.

They ask:

• Which layout is the best one to use and when?
• How do I deal with too little or too much space?
• Why do some layouts work and others don’t?
• How can I improve my sketchnote layout skills?

To answer these questions, I’m offering a NEW, 2-hour, live, online workshop on November 5th from 12-2pm US Central, called The Sketchnote Layout Live Workshop!

Grab your ticket today for just $40: rohdesign.com/layout

This workshop is designed for beginners through advanced sketchnoters. It includes a full video recording to watch again or as insurance if you miss the live event.

My teaching includes:

• Sharing the basic principles of how layouts work
• Reviewing 7 common sketchnote layouts and where and why they work best (with samples)
• A deep dive into Mike's top 3, go-to layout templates and when to use them
• A live deconstruction of effective sketchnote layouts, sharing why these layouts work and how to apply their layout principles so you can create your own custom sketchnote layouts from your learnings
• Live Q&A after the session to ask your questions
• A full video recording of the session

The kitchen is completed! Last week the last details were completed on our 10-week long kitchen remodel project. We’ve been moving into the space and organizing the chaos very slowly in the rest of the house. It feels great to use the kictchen!

Here are three before and after photos to give you context of where we started and where we ended:

It’s hard to believe its the same house! Every morning I come into the space and am thankful we decided to go through the chaos so now we can enjoy the kitchen.

My favorite features are the built-in kitchen bar where we eat most of our meals, and the under-cabinet lights that look fantastic at night. All in all it turned out better than we could have expected.

Special thanks to my sister-in-law, Janet and our contractor, Joe for the great execution.

In the summer 2022 edition of The Rohdesign Dispatch, the Sketchnote Handbook turns 10, I share 3 new podcast appearances, Sketchnote Army Podcast season 11 & 12, an upcoming workshop on page layout at the Wild Wonder nature journaling conference, 5 Cool Things, and more - rohdesign.com/weblog/di…

A few steps away from completion of kitchen and flooring!

Dishwasher was installed by the plumber Wednesday. He ran a rinse cycle when I happened to walk into the kitchen to test for leaks — I could not hear the thing running it was so quiet.

We also unloaded and took apart our refrigerator so that our neighbor and his son Miles (thanks guys!) could take the fridge body from the mudroom into the kitchen via our front door with an appliance dolly.

With the fridge in the kitchen, we cleaned, reassembled it, hooked up the water line and hey — we have all working appliances!

Flooring is finished as of today, and we now are awaiting trim installation over all the new flooring and against kitchen cabinets, along with a short punchlist of small tweaks to make (moving an outlet, installing a toilet, vanity, and mirror in the half-bath, etc.).

Looks like we ought to be fully completed before the end of July, which is far ahead of our original guesstimates. It feels great to see a project like this coming together.

We have grouted tile in the kitchen and just that detail of arctic white makes a huge difference. If you look closely you’ll see that our Ukrainian-made tile is designed so that the waves align — meaning if they’re set correctly they flow in waves across the wall. Pretty cool, eh?

The subtle waves are a perfect compliment to both the gray cabinets and quartz counter. We get the brightness to lighten the space and subtle shadows create a light pattern with under-cabinet lights on.

Kitchen Bar Stools

We’ve also found a set of medium gray leatherette bar stools for our kitchen-bar table area. Found these on Amazon for a good price ($200 for 4) and they’re comfy and seem pretty sturdy. They’re a perfect match for the darker gray cabinets the kitchen-bar table is built on.

Flooring

Finally, vinyl planking is done in the living room and dining room, moving to the kitchen, hallways, and half bath on Monday and Tuesday. Looks so great! Because the floors were pretty level, only subtle feathering was needed so that there will be no seams all the way from the back door to the bedrooms.

It’s uncanny how much this vinyl plank looks like real wood. It has a subtle distressed look and some of those knots in the wood — I’d swear they’re real until I touch them and they’re flat!

As the vinyl plank is installed in two rooms, we can see our choice of flooring is working as a pleasing contrast to the original honey-oak trim and to the new gray cabinetry.

We’re loving that all of these small decisions are creating a whole that is balanced, unified, and complimentary. We were hoping our choices were good when this kitchen was just drawings on paper — it’s really satisfying to see it all coming together.

We’re getting closer every day. We cannot wait to share the finished kitchen along with shots of the original for contrast.

We’ve got tile in place but scheduling dictated that grout will have to come next week. But it’s looking great!

The wave pattern has alignments so that the tile guys could line them up to make the waves flow across long sections of tile, which is extra cool. Been pleased with this Ukrainian-made matte tile and it’s going to look great with white grout in place.

Flooring

Now we’ve shifted to flooring through much of the first floor, starting with the living room and dining room, where most of the square footage is. Next up are the kitchen and hallways. The vinyl plank is looking great.

I had to pull up old Pergo and that was something else. Once we got it started it came up pretty quickly. Underneath the Pergo was some “gorgeous” Congoleum from 1978!

The new vinyl plank looks great and should be a nice contrast to the old trim.

One step at a time.

After a week of waiting and little activity, the countertops were installed this week. What a difference it makes with those in place.

Plumbing should be completed this week and we can start moving our kitchen from the dining room into the kitchen — with water, electricity and somewhere to prepare the food.

Flooring Chaos Ahead

Then we pepare for the next wave of chaos that is floor installation. We’ve decided to go with the same vinyl plank flooring starting in the utility room off the garage, through the kitchen, and into the livingroom, dining room, and hallway to the bedrooms — as all of those floors are ugly.

What this means is moving EVERYTHING from the living and dining rooms, washer and dryer in the utility room, into our family room or garage (save maybe a piece or two we can shift for the installer).

Basically, more chaos. But we know that in the end all of the chaos and disruption will result in a better living space for us for long-term enjoyment while it will increase the value of our home.

Here are some images with the new floor AR’ed into place with the LL Flooring app using photos above that gives us some idea of how the vinyl flooring should look:

Just a few more weeks to go!

A new interview with Jorge Arango on his Informed Life Podcast. We talked about my background as a print and web designer, living through transitional times, and of course sketchnoting.

theinformed.life/2022/06/1…

I was honored to be a guest on Elizabeth Pearson-Garr’s The Experience Podcast, talking about what it’s like to be a Visual Thinker. We had a great discussion I’m very proud of. Have a listen here: theexperiencepodcast.buzzsprout.com/1862078/1…

Let there be light! Some fixtures, under cabinet lights, and outlets were installed by the electrician today. More to go in a week.

Flooring picked up today, here’s how it looks against the cabinets in place:

We’re now in pretty good shape as we await countertop installation later in June. Once that happens the plumbing and backsplash tiles can get done, along with electrical.

Drawer pulls look great in place and we’re going with a brushed nickel edging for the tile backsplash.

Backspalsh tiles we chose are white matte 4" x 16" subway tiles with a wave pattern we love, and bonus — they’re made in Ukraine. We’re changing it up with hexagonal tiles in shades of darker gray that pick up the tones in the counter for a square section right over the stovetop.

Kitchen fan unit installed and operates well, awaiting a microwave this week.

Some touchup paint needs to be done, half bath vanity built, toilet purchased and other small things.

Flooring follows soon after with vinyl plank chosen to bridge the color gap between old 1967 trim and new kitchen. We cannot wait to get rid of the old Congoleum and shabby carpeting in a few other rooms.

All cabinets in save the eat-in kitchenette that goes in today. Drawer pulls purchased.

Countertop measured on Monday, installed later in June. Once that’s in we can have plumbing and other stuff done.

I’ve been posting these images and notes to share the kitchen remodel process from start to finish — which I think is super cool. It’s a pain to live out of our dining room for a month but the long term results will be worth it.

This article from Summer Brennan via Austin Kleon on what really happens when you “get a book deal,” and this is spot on. Makes me appreciate the experience and success of The Sketchnote Handbook and my amazing editor, Nikki, who helped made it all happen.

summerbrennan.substack.com/p/the-9-b…

Severance is great TV: beautiful to watch, superb performances, fantastic production design, and great writing that makes me think and rewards my rewatching. I haven’t had a show get me thinking about it this much since Ted Lasso.

Severance Trailer

First little 6-cell animation created with my son Landon on Arteater, an online tool that uses drawings on pre-printed templates to make animated GIFs. Thank you @patrickrhone for turning me on to it this week.

www.eatmy.art

Animated GIF

Some reflections on my favorite coffee shop coffee, the flat white.