DESCRIPTION:
As National Forest, Steven Harrington and Justin Krietemeyer collaborate on graphic design projects spanning from print and illustration to interactive and motion graphics. They studied together at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, a stone’s throw from where both grew up. In only a year and a half, they’ve amassed an impressive client list including Rolling Stone, Showtime, Element Skateboards, and record labels like Sony, Capitol, and EMI.

VOICE:
Harrington and Krietemeyer are drawn to desaturated colors, roughened textures, and unpretentious, joyful line art. Harrington believes in giving print a tactile, aged feel, like a prized object: “We want our pieces to feel like a scan of something older, like there’s an original out there, tucked under a bed, maybe.” Krietemeyer concurs. His introduction to “Everybody Enjoys” (their first solo gallery show) sums it up well: “The images that we use in our work are things people have experienced, but may have forgotten. Sometimes it takes a pencil-rendering of girls in tube socks on rollerskates hanging in a gallery for people to stop and remember how cool that really was.”

DISTINCTIVE MARKINGS:
Sharing a brain. Very often one begins a project and the other finishes it. As Krietemeyer notes, “It’s definitely become apparent that when the two of us work on something, it’s more than twice as good.” When doubtful of their whereabouts, check today’s surf report or the local skateboard park.

HABITAT:
National Forest works in a converted Pabst brewery in East Los Angeles. Their space is a huge loft with a silkscreen apparatus, a pile of vintage books from their local St. Vincent’s—they especially dig How to Draw books by Ed Emberley—and a very thirsty plant on Harrington’s desk. Krietemeyer is a little concerned and considering an intervention.

SPOTTED BY:
Helen Walters, editor of the online magazine Idanda.net, New York: “National Forest represents the new generation of designers for whom technology is nothing but another useful tool. As such, they use the computer only when they need to, combining it with elements they painstakingly create by hand to produce pieces of work that feel both timeless and bang-up-to-date.”

CONTACT:
626.818.2028 | www.nationalforest.com

Written by Jude Stewart