Where in the world is Mark Caneso? Catching up with the prolific artist and type designer as he settles in after his most recent relocation.

P.S. Get 20% off everything in Mark’s Cotton Bureau store now through Sunday, November 30 with coupon code featurefriday20 at checkout.

Mark! Let’s do this. It’s always fun to talk to someone who was there at the beginning of Cotton Bureau. The first design you sent us was a collaboration with Cycle Cause. Everything was so simple back then. Two week campaigns. One shirt color.

Twelve years later your embroidered No Space for Hate design is available all the time and comes on 65 different colors and styles — and that’s us trying to avoid overwhelming people with choice!

Have you seen a similar increase in complexity in your life and design practice, or have you been able to hold the line?

Hey. Thanks. The Cycle Cause tee was back in 2014. I believe the first design I sent you was in 2012ish. The Self-Referential Ampersand. But yeah, those two-week campaigns feel like forever ago.

I think life has gotten more complex for sure. But my wife and I hit reset every couple years and move to a new state.  Moving can make things equal parts hectic and new. Design-wise I've simplified my practice. Now I have a more dedicated focus to my type foundry: pstypelab.com.

Shoot. I should have checked the archive more carefully. In any case, that’s a classic and one of our favorites.

Tell me more about the regular resets. I love to travel, but I find I can barely tolerate migrating to a new iPhone each year much less moving to a new state. Where have you been? Where are you going next? Which location was your favorite?

Yeah, So it all started a little over a decade ago now. My wife and I are both originally from Southern California. We thought, what would happen if instead of visiting a place on a short trip and trying to jam in all the “things to do.” What if we picked places and moved for a longer period of time. That would allow us to explore the area at a different pace. Live like the locals and get a better sense of the cities themselves. 

Our first move was to Oahu, Hawaii. At that time, we didn’t have a specific timeframe for how long we'd be there. It ended up being about 2 years. Then we popped back to the mainland — to Portland. Oregon, followed a few years later by Austin, Texas. 

In 2020, a month before the pandemic, we moved to Charleston, South Carolina. We were there for 3 years. We headed south from there, down to Orlando, Florida for 2 years, and just this year we transitioned all the way back to Oahu, Hawaii. We’ve been here since February, so no plans for what is next. I personally don’t like to pick favorites. That is a question everyone asks, but we love various things about each city/location. I think what I enjoy most is when returning to these cities, they feel like home again. I have built a mental map of how to get around, so that is kinda cool. 

That’s quite a timezone and culture tour. Have you considered any places outside the US? And what made you decide to go back to Oahu instead of one of the other islands?

Yeah, in 2017 when we were in Portland we took a trip to Australia for 6 weeks. We considered moving there, but at the time logistics of it all seemed a bit much.
We did consider other islands. Maui was originally the spot, but after the fires we didn’t feel like we should be taking up housing for folks who needed it. We know a few people who were affected, and it just didn't sit right with us at the time. We also visited the Big Island but ended up coming back to Oahu.

Gotcha. We got to visit Maui and Big Island a few years ago. They were both incredible.

I have to say, I didn’t realize how large your catalog of custom fonts is now that it’s your main focus. It must be so cool to see your work out in the world being used by brands like Yellowstone and Pixar. Is that something you can talk about?

Yeah, my library of retail fonts is hundreds of fonts across approx 30 type families.
I've been at it for a bit now. I released my first font back in 2008-09. For the longest time I considered my type design as a bit of a side project. I suppose I was in a bit of Type Design denial. Not sure why but I assumed I'd always be a graphic designer who also made fonts. 

Now, fast forward to today, the only “graphic design” work I do is for myself or my foundry. I take on custom lettering projects if they interest me, but I definitely have a foundry first mindset.

Seeing my fonts being used out in the real world is the best. Always brings a smile to my face to see how others take something I made and put it to use for their projects. So often they are used in ways I hadn’t imagined. The usages range wildly from things like dog food to international music festivals.

With my library being on Adobe Fonts, I often don’t know who is using them or for what, as with the case for Yellowstone and Pixar. I remember watching TV and seeing a commercial for Yellowstone when it originally came out. I was so stoked, pointing at the television telling my wife “That's Hatch!” Most of the time I catch a glimpse while scrolling on social media or maybe someone shares a sighting with me. I've been collecting them and building a collection I call “Typespotting 👀”. 

I have some folks who share sightings with me often. One of my favorite things is when I just stumble upon them myself. This happened recently when we were travelling in Japan. We were being tourists and visiting the Tokyo Tower. We walked into the open-air stairs and spray painted on the wall was my typeface “Neighbor Stencil”. Not like it’s some fantastic use of the font, but it’s still a nice surprise to me when I see them. I didn’t see this in person, but Hoss was used in a Hello Kitty rebrand of the Oita Airport for the World Expo this year.

Walking around the grocery stores is a fun place to spot the fonts. I’ve seen them on everything from beer can design to packaging for pork lard. Trader-Joe’s has a few products they offer that use my fonts. These wafer cookies and protein pancakes both use Decoy. Anyway, you get the point. I get excited when I see them used. So if anyone sees them in the wild please feel free to share them with me.

That’s awesome. I know the feeling for sure. We’ve seen hundreds of people weaering t-shirts we have designed or sold over the years. Always brightens your day.

I imagine you can’t narrow down your library to a single favorite font, so let me ask a different question. Of all the type families you have created, which one has the most interesting origin story?

I was working in my type lab late one night and all of the sudden I was bitten by a radioactive spider.... Sorry that's a different origin story.

Actually it’s funny that you used the words “origin story.” I recently commented to another designer about this topic in regard to my latest typeface “Please”.

I wrote:

Not every typeface has a dramatic origin story. Sometimes a single letter is enough to get the ball rolling. A sketch turns into an idea that develops into a moment when I think to myself, “yeah, that could be something.” Please started this way. While experimenting with extremely heavy weights, I noticed the double-story started to close up — its counters filling in as the weight increases. To solve this issue you typically end up compensating somewhere or everywhere. It's just the nature of the double-story form. But I thought: what if I merge them? Or really, remove one of the counters. Would it still read? Would it still be an ‘a’? Did it matter if it looked cool?
That single-counter version became the pulse of Please.

But actually, one of my typefaces that did start out in an interesting way was “Ditch”. This wasn’t originally a typeface at all. It was just 4 letters I made for my Drop Cap. Back in 2017, I had the idea to make some type merch. A hat with just the word DROP on it. I wanted to have the decoration on the hat be 3D embroidered. In order to make it as bold as possible — and for the letterforms to have as much depth as possible — I created an inline version of the lettering. This subtle opening allowed the art to perform better when stitched. After producing the hat I figured I’d see what the rest of the design could look like, so I flushed out the rest of the glyphs.

I love the concept of Please. It may not be the most immediately legible typeface in its heaviest weights, but it’s distinctive and certainly has a place under the right circumstances. (Also, the Andchovies tin… chef’s kiss.)

Sorry to jump around, but I was just thinking back to your itinerancy. Knowing that you will likely relocate every few years, how do you make each place feel like home while you are there?

I have to say I was pretty pleased with myself when I came up with Andchovies.
Making each place feel like home doesn't take much. Just a little paint will usually do the trick. I like to create a custom mural or art piece somewhere in each place — usually my office, but I've also painted few in our garages. It’s a nice ephemeral exercise because I know at some point I will have to paint over it. It keeps me from being too attached or precious with the design. I just make it and move on.

So, to change topics completely, I need to ask you about what I think is easily the most interesting and impactful event since the advent of the iPhone… how are you feeling about AI?

I'm no Prompt Jockey if that's what you're asking. I guess I'm still forming my opinion about it all, weighing the pros and cons. I mean, I use ChatGPT on occasion for copy editing, and I've tinkered with FireFly to make some random images. I haven't used it enough to change the way I work. I'm sure there are people who have strong opinions one way or another. I'm definitely not in the “AI will ruin the world” category. If you’re trying to make things more efficient or tackle repetitive work, I get that.

Back in 2009-10, my father-in-law offered to help my wife and I remodel the bathroom in our condo. We tore out the tub and everything down to the studs to install a walk in shower.  I have no knowledge of this kind of work, and I’m not the handiest person. But he ran his own handyman business for years, so we trusted his methods. We ended up making the upgrade with a method similar to lath and plaster, attaching wire to the studs and covering this 8' x 10' wall with so much concrete. I was hauling 60lb bags of concrete up stairs and mixing it all batch by batch with a hand drill mixer. It was dirty and super labor intensive. We were at this for what felt like days. And we had to babysit it the whole time. Keeping the concrete wet so it didn’t crack. It was so much work. This was all just to get a new wall to tile on top of. When the walls were done and we were admiring our level smooth new wall he said, “You know, they have these moisture-resistant drywall boards now. They’re supposed to make this cheaper and quicker to install. Without hesitation I said “Why the hell didn’t we just use those?”

How does this relate to your question… Maybe it doesn’t. I feel like as things change you can either embrace them or continue to do things the way you know how. The new ways may be a little scary because they are unfamiliar or unknown. Yet, the old ways may end up taking you way longer, costing you more time and energy. I know our wall will be there even if that building burns down. It’s gonna last. It was made well and we took our time. There was craft involved and that feels good. But at the same time, that level of craft wasn’t really necessary. Nobody will ever know what is behind that tile. If I could have typed “make me a wall” and hit generate, I would have done it in a heartbeat. For now, I’ll keep making things the way I know how to, but I’ll keep tinkering for sure.

Well said. Having just spent the summer and most of the fall building a deck, I certainly learned the value of different approaches and choosing the right tools and materials for the job. Still, it’s hard for me personally —  even as someone who isn’t a designer — to be okay with the way that someone else’s work is copied, compressed, and regurgitated by a computer as if it’s equivalent to an original piece created by an artist. After all, I don’t outsource my writing to a mindless agent that has been trained on my past effort, no matter how much “easier” it would make my life. It’s what I do.

I suppose this is how people felt when mass production methods were introduced. I do have hope that for both consumers and patrons, knowing the source of the artwork (i.e. the person who is making it) still carries enough weight to allow those with real talent to continue to make things.

I think this is a great way to send us off to the holiday maelstrom, to be honest — spending time (hopefully) with friends and family (something we can’t ever outsource), coming back recharged and ready to tackle new problems with whatever tools and techniques are necessary.

Hiking enthusiast, digital ninja, and designer extraordinaire, Tom Hillmeyer has traveled both terrain and industry. His career as a technical director demands maximum adaptability, a challenge he's built for. Today's chat covers his all-encompassing role, B-52 Bombers, and why Dwayne Wade is persona non grata 'round these parts.

Browse his site to discover more of his work and enjoy 20% off all of his on-demand items through Sunday, October 12 with coupon code featurefriday20 at checkout.

Thanks for chatting Tom. We're always eager to hear our designers' thoughts on the current state of the industry but first I have to ask, is designer too limited of a term for you? You're a videographer, filmmaker, trivia host, and apparently a water-curtain engineer (which is one of the coolest things I've ever seen).

Can you give us a little insight into your career and how do you define your skillset?

Designer is probably too limited of a term for me! My design skills have come about like most things have in my career, which all seem to be the result or byproducts of something else. I was always pretty nerdy as a kid, which led me into learning how cameras work. In starting to make videos, I naturally began designing graphics, titles, thumbnails, etc. Those skills led me into broadcasting in high school and college, and then in creating my online trivia show with one of my best friends. All along the way my eye for design has gradually evolved, and has served me less as a primary focus by itself and more as an enhancement in my other projects. Design has always been the thing I stress over and take the extra time to make better in whatever I'm doing.

I can't take credit for engineering the water-curtain, but I will take some credit for figuring out how to make it fit in a ballroom! My day job is as a live event technical director, where I design and execute the AV for corporate meetings and conferences. I've ended up in this career in part because it's a wonderful combination of all of the skills I have in broadcast, video, and design. Most days I'm designing room layouts and stages, getting as creative as I can within the limitations of LED screens, lights, and rigging. (and budgets, of course).

Oh wow, that sounds like an awesome work environment. It also feels like the perfect intersection of your abilities. But seriously, a water curtain has to be the wildest thing you've worked on, right?

Any other conferences or projects that specifically stick out as being incredible experiences?

Of course the water curtain is near the top of the most unique projects I've been a part of. The group of people I get to work with mean the world to me, so the projects that usually stick out are the ones where we pulled off a complicated show or solved an especially difficult problem. We also get to travel around the world together and have done events in some historic places, so certain events definitely stick out when I've called a famous venue my "office" for a few days!

Without a doubt the craziest place I've had the delight of working is a couple hundred yards from an active runway during AirVenture Oshkosh, the world's largest airshow. I'm lucky enough to be part of the team that produces the live streams for EAA during AirVenture, and it never gets old opening the door of our control room to see a B-52 or a Lockheed Constellation sitting right there. Also, that show is definitely the one where my graphic design shines the most these days, as I put together our on-screen graphics package every year.

That sounds so cool! Most designers we chat with are in a more concentrated field or are very selective about the type of projects they take on. What's it like working on big productions where you have to integrate design assets with event planners, engineers, film production, and other departments? Is having too many voices in the room ever part of navigating those especially difficult problems?

It can be difficult for sure, but having dipped my toes in several roles I'm able to understand a little bit of where each of those departments are coming from and what they're trying to specifically accomplish. Every show is a tightly choreographed dance of what the video, audio, and lighting departments need on top of the look and feel the client is after. It is a game of compromises and prioritizing certain aspects, while of course keeping event planners, venue staff, and the laws of physics happy.

Having too many voices in the room can just make a problem more difficult, however it is also incredibly useful to present a difficult problem to a larger group and get everyone's thoughts. It becomes more of a problem of controlling the chaos, but there may be a good solution that only one person on your team thinks of.

Balancing voices in a field like yours might differ from obstacles that independent artists deal with. Is that a reason for your side projects? Between Fast Facts Live, a podcast, and other design work it seems like you can flex your creative muscles and follow your vision 100%.

That's exactly the reason for my side projects: they're both an opportunity to flex my creative muscles and as a way to still do the type of work I want to do that doesn't necessarily align with my full-time work. That being said, I am constantly taking something I learned doing Fast Facts and applying it to my live event work, and vice versa.

Coming out of college I was so worried about being locked into one type of work and missing out on doing the other things I was passionate about. My career has definitely proven to be more wide-ranging than I anticipated, but regardless, having these side projects does exactly what you said: they give me an opportunity to make a vision or idea come to life.

Call it predictable, but my favorite side hustle has to be your photography. We're big nature geeks at CB and you've been to a ton of really cool locations.

Any favorites to photograph or just visit in general? Have your travels influenced your technical director job at all? I could see your experiences aligning well with featured projects at shows or some of your other endeavors.

When I'm deciding where to travel personally, I'm heavily influenced by photography. In almost every case the pin goes in my bucket list Google Map in response to a cool photo I've seen from that location. In fact, the very first trip I planned myself back in college was completely centered around getting that iconic shot of Horseshoe Bend in northern Arizona. Building that trip around that single photo led me to discover Valley of Fire in Nevada and Zion National Park on the way, still two of my favorite places. Plus we ended up in Antelope Canyon, the site of one of the most expensive photos ever sold. It kind of taught me that you can build a really great trip around a single photo, and I've used that method ever since.

The photos with locations that end up on my bucket list are almost always tied to nature, and most of those are places that I don't know if we as humans could've even dreamed up. I look at places like the Grand Canyon, Banff, and even lesser known places close to home like the Apostle Islands in Wisconsin and wonder what had to happen to make these places as beautiful as they are.

What's really rewarding about traveling for work is I'm not deciding where we're going, so I end up in locations around the world I probably never would've picked otherwise. Sometimes I'm taking my camera around these places, but most of the time I get to enjoy the place as-is without any expectation of needing to get to an iconic spot. In terms of influencing my job, having photography as a side hustle really helps from a sales perspective as I'm usually the one taking cool photos of our stage setups to sell to future clients. I'll often come back from a show with an SD card full of photos of the stage and our lighting setup right next to photos from the hike I took right behind the hotel.

Now you're speaking my language. Zion is my absolute favorite park followed closely by Banff.

Diving into your comment about building a great trip around a single photo… it strikes me as oddly contrary to your professional and personal outlook. Do you find it more rewarding to get one amazing picture or would you rather have a series of really good ones?

Clearly you juggle a lot of skills, which provides a certain security. But does a broad approach prohibit you from really honing and maximizing your potential in one particular craft?

Of the thousands of photos I've taken on trips, there are usually only 2-3 per trip that stand above the rest. I do find it more rewarding to get one amazing picture, but it's often not the picture I went to get! I got that picture of Horseshoe Bend, but it's actually a picture from nearby Antelope Canyon that's framed on my wall. I have a picture of Angel's Landing in Zion I planned a trip around, but it's a photo of The Watchman in Zion that went on my wall first. The inspiration photo for a place is almost a consolation prize, but it puts me in a place for inspiration and I oftentimes walk away with something unique.

With that question you've hit on the thing that I ask myself all the time. The honing of a craft comes in phases for me. I have never been someone to stick to a single particular thing for very long, however I always tend to build up a muscle in that area. For example, after learning broadcast television in high school and college I never moved on to working full time at a TV station where I could really maximize those skills. However, I had built up that muscle enough that when I started working in live events, those skills were invaluable and put me a step above those who had never had that experience.

The roles I've found myself in and the things I'm passionate about are all things that require a patchwork of skills. There are definitely jobs out there where you can focus on one thing, become very good at it, and that's how you move forward in that career. The career I've built for myself requires me to be just strong enough in key areas to fill my specific role. I'm not the best designer, programmer, engineer, or photographer in the world but I'm strong enough in each of those areas to successfully be a live event technical director. It's a niche role that you can't just learn by itself.

You've set yourself up quite nicely in a very cool, important industry. And it sounds like the route you took to get there was the only way to make to work.

So you're in an accomplished position. Business is good. Now it's time to look down the road. Do you anticipate ever narrowing your scope or specializing in one area? Is it all just adding tools to the toolbox from here? It's interesting to consider what your career and hobbies look like 10 years from now.

I have resisted narrowing my scope, and I've done that to avoid losing the skills I've gained. I don't do a ton of video editing nowadays, for example, but I haven't completely gone away from it. Every so often I find myself in a position where I need to get back into editing for a single specific project, and because I've kept up with it I'm able to re-teach myself quickly and accomplish that task. I wouldn't be surprised if I settle into something specific, but having a little bit of experience in a lot of fields has really benefited me. I don't anticipate that changing, and I'm excited what my toolbox looks like 10 years from now!

If it ain't broke, right? But just to drive this question home, I have to try from one last angle.

Any chance you drill down to one or two teams? I mean, you have Marquette, Kansas City, Milwaukee, all the St. Louis squads, and plenty of other designs in your CB catalog. We'll let your KC and Bucks support slide, but D-Wade is a non-starter for us diehard Pitt fans. 

I'm a recovering St. Louis Rams fan, and when I became a free agent I chose the green and gold rather than the red and gold (Good thing the Packers and Steelers are in two different conferences!) It'll always be the Cardinals and Blues for me...

…and #3 speaks for himself. Ring Out Ahoya.

Alright I think we have to wrap it up on that note. This was fun!

Hey Daniel! Welcome to our Designer Interview series, we're happy to have ya. Let's start with the basics. What have you been up to?

Skateboarding! To be honest, I had been struggling to focus creatively and to stay motivated. For a while I just felt stuck. But one thing that helped was getting back on a skateboard. I've been taking it easy relearning some basic tricks and trying not to injure myself too badly. It's been fun and therapeutic.

I also recently got an Ipad and learning to draw on that.

Skateboarding sounds like an awesome way to find some new inspiration. I feel like skateboarders are the most creative athletes. To a skateboarder everything is a potential rail/ramp/jump etc. It just seems like you look at ordinary objects and make something fun out of them. Meanwhile I'm just using railings trying not to trip down the stairs lol.

How's the iPad drawing going? I assume there's quite a learning curve there. Think there's a chance it'll become your go to drawing method?

Drawing on an iPad for me is one of those things where it's the same but different. The motions are the same as drawing with a pencil on paper but with the iPad I now have these additional gestures and features to add to that. There's so much more that you can do that it can be a little overwhelming. It's definitely a learning curve for me and it's probably because I don't normally use a stylus when I digitally create.

My laptop paired with adobe illustrator has always been my go-to tools ever since my school days. I don't know why but I never used a mouse. My cousin gave me his old Wacom tablet for a while but after it stopped working I just defaulted to my laptop trackpad. Anyone else on team trackpad? Well...I guess I'm team trackpad/iPad now.

I've seen artists who moved their whole workflow to just the iPad; I don't know if that will be me anytime soon but who knows? As super convenient as it is to have everything digital I am still a fan of the analog and tactile. I like my cheap Bic mechanical pencil and flipping through the pages of my sketchbook.

I'm not much of an artist myself but I definitely understand craving the pencil and sketchbook every now and then over the iPad. I feel the same about books rather than reading on a Kindle or iPad. For me it's a break from the constant screens in my face all day. Back to the basics is refreshing sometimes. 

What’s your favorite part of the illustration process? Do you enjoy the sketching and getting your ideas down, or is there a moment later on when things really start to come together that you love most?

Yeah. There is a definitely a convenience/curse element to all the tech around us. I always feel refreshed after a good screen break.

My favorite part of the creative process is that initial thought or idea. Ideas really can pop up out of nowhere and if that idea continues to repeat in my head then I know I have to get it out and just make the thing. What usually results in this brain dump is a starting point for the final piece. I also like this stage because you have that freedom to take a concept into multiple directions without necessarily committing to one just yet. It's the play before the work.

Ah okay, yeah that makes a lot of sense. I can see the appeal for sure and I've seen some really cool designs from you so your process must be working! 

Speaking of your designs, we must talk about The Office for a minute. If you got to spend the day with any one of the characters, who are you picking?

That's a good question. I probably put more thought into this than needed... I know you said one person but I'm going to bend the rules a bit and pick a trio of people: Kevin, Andy, and Darryl aka Kevin & The Zits. I feel like with other characters there would just be too much crazy antics; they're all fun to watch on screen but having to be involved with that all day seems stressful. Kevin and the Zits are a group of guys that know how to party but also know how to chill. I imagine having an ultra feast, dance offs, boardgames with cash prizes, maybe rollerskating to Dave Matthews' greatest hits, and ending it off with an acoustic jam session by a dumpster.

And if I couldn't hang out with those guys then I also wouldn't mind listing to more stories from Hidetoshi Hasagawa, heart surgeon number 1.

Hahaha I love this answer, I appreciate all the thought you've put into this one. To be honest, Kevin and The Zits never would have been my pick. After your explanation though it's a real toss up for me. Ultra feasts and roller skating is really hard to pass up on. Maybe I'll start a rewatch so I can make a final decision. 

Well hey, it's been great chatting with you. Big fan of your work, good luck with the iPad, I can't wait to see what you come up with next!