Studio 360 Challenge: Redesign Valentine’s Day

In mid-January, on the generous recommendation of fellow design chronicler Alissa Walker, Bryony and I were invited by Studio 360 — the beloved Public Radio International show hosted by Kurt Andersen — to tackle a rather interesting problem: Redesigning Valentine’s Day, everything from the hearts, to the roses, to the chocolates, to the expensive dinners, to Cupid. Everything we know about Valentine’s was due for a new approach. Now you might think, who would want to come up with this challenge in the first place? Well, Studio 360 has posed similar challenges in the past: Pentagram was asked to redesign Christmas in 2006 (in which I participated while employed there) and Worldstudio to redesign the gay flag in 2009. Of course, we said yes. Yes, to a project that we