27 Comments

love “Bright Equals", and the whole list, but that term/concept I'm here for!!

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It’s a good one! I love my Bright Equals <3

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Top of the list ❤️

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The whole list is fantastic. Especially loving and dying over: Styling a table with half of a papaya or cantaloupe.

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I love the authenticity in everything you write & post. This is no exception. HNY!!

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It's a no-brainer to gas you up, my brilliant friend. Loved this as always!

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Ditto, obviously!!!!!

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Love the lists even though I may fall under a few of the out’s in the in’s ( like Pinterest tags … haha )

Also love the term bright equals. Haven’t heard It put that way and I like.

Happy new year !

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The only in & out list I enjoyed and nodded along so far!

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Love this so so much! ESPECIALLY no more “found on Pinterest” 🫠 I have a collection of print ephemera that I am finally going to try and organize in 2025 !

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Hi Ali, I’m newish to your newsletter and I’ve been scoping your digital archives a bit every day, like a great book. It’s honestly been a big highlight of my holiday season. ❤️

Glad to know this is IN! I do tend to get very spun up about fonts tho. Is there a way to determine what they are without asking?

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Ah I love to hear it! Thank you so much for reading!

One easy way to figure out what fonts are being used on a site is by using the Chrome extension WhatFont—you just hover over text on a page and it tells you what it is!

The reason why I put it on the list—and again, these are just my own personal thoughts, I can't speak for everyone!—is that, as designers, it's our job to hunt down and collect typefaces, to choose them carefully for our clients, and to always be looking for things that not everyone else is using. It's a lot of work to do so and it's what we get paid for! So I think it's fair to be a little gatekeepy about it all. Some designers believe otherwise and that's totally okay, but for me, it sometimes can feel like the person who's asking doesn't totally understand the value of that information.

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This is so helpful, thank you! Makes total sense about guarding the hard work. I'm not a designer, so I hadn't really thought of fonts in those terms....just that I'm super nosy about them out of my own curiosity. I will get Chrome extension. Thanks again!!

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Completely excellent list! Thank you for reminding people to credit their creative sources. It's such an easy thing to do and when not done it causes all sorts of mischief.

I especially love "Keeping some of your best ideas for yourself." from the In column and "Having an idea, then hemming and hawing about it for so long, other people beat you to it" from the Out column. You know me so well.

Happiest New Year.

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I love how tangible all of your “ins” are 👌🏻

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Excellent as usual!! Question... what's a vacation responder?!

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An out of office!!

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duhhhh! need to try that sometime! hah!

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I think this is the only ins/outs list that I’ve truly loved. Yay for scoping out all 37478 pages of a digital archive, citing sources, bright equals, and so much more. I need to write a ton of these down!

Happy New Year, Ali and À la Carte!

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Happy new year Kelsey!!!! xo

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This is so so good.

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Yes yes yes. Bring back beautiful things I can feel and touch. If you love me, you would needlepoint a handkerchief for me.

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Loved this so much and couldn’t agree more. Thanks for sharing.

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Also ❤️ Bright Equals! And quite a lot of the list. X

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