Shakespeare’s Genealogies, designed by Giampietro+Smith for Melcher Media, has been recognized for excellence by the 2008 New York Book Show, which honors books with unique formats.

Above: Page C6 from The New York Times, 20 November 2007. (Click here to enlarge.)

Above: The New York Times Magazine’s “Year in Ideas” issue, 2004. Chalk drawing by Nicholas Blechman and Brian Rea. Photograph by Zachary Scott. (More credits here.)

Stuart Elliott’s column in The New York Times today rounds up a number of “separated at birth” advertising campaigns, like the AT&T “Works in More Places” ads featuring made up place names like “New Sanfrakota” (more on these AT&T ads here and here), and ads for a company called Riverbed Technology that are strikingly similar, right down to the orange background and typeface style (Gotham for AT&T, Avenir—once Cingular’s font of choice—for Riverbed).

But we couldn’t help but notice the Shell ad that ran with Elliott’s article, visible to readers of the paper but not to those reading the essay online. That ad, featuring a white-shirted-and-red-sweatered girl making delicate line drawings on a chalkboard, is itself strkingly similar to the cover of the Times Magazine’s 2004 “Year in Ideas” issue featuring a photo by Zachary Scott. Art Director Arem Duplessis respun his own cover into a cover for the Society of Publication Designers 40th Annual, and illustrators Nicholas Blechman and Brian Rea recently reprised their chalk drawings at a conference in San Francisco. It seems pretty safe to say that the Shell ad wasn’t shot by Scott or his team, as it includes a small disclaimer on the lower left reading, “Based on a Zachary Scott photo.” Hmmmm.

We’ve got another illustration in the New York Times Book Review this week, this time accompanying a review of Pierre Bayard’s book How to Talk about Books You Haven’t Read. Bayard’s book proposes that it’s not so much total knowledge of individual books that matters, but a broader knowledge of how those books fit together into a network. Our illustration plays on this idea of the aggregate revealing something that its individual components do not—in this case, more questions. Read Jay McInerney’s entire review here.

Photo by Kevin McCauley.

Hosted by Alice Twemlow, Chair of SVA’s new D-Crit program, this historic evening with Wim Crouwel and Massimo Vignelli was an inspiring and energetic journey through two outstanding lives in design. Rob Giampietro and Laura Forde co-chaired the event for AIGA/NY, which was made possible by Presenting Sponsors Imagination, Parsons The New School for Design, and Knoll. After the event—Crouwel’s first in New York since 1965 and one of the few times he and Vignelli have spoken together—the two speakers offered AIGA/NY their responses to the famous Proust Questionnaire: Crouwel’s is here, and Vignelli’s is here.

The event has gotten some coverage already. Over at DESIGNY, the AIGA/NY blog, Michael Brenner has a great write-up of the evening’s conversation. More write-ups on Monoscope and Unbeige, along with the charmingly titled People for the Ethical Treatment of Typography and Swiss Legacy. The photo above is taken from Kevin McCauley’s write-up, and Andy has perhaps our favorite response on his blog Reference Library.

Above, from left to right: Kiyo Akasaka, Under-Secretary-General for Communications and Public Information; Jan English, Distribution Manager, Traveling Programs, American Museum of Natural History, New York; UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and his wife Madam Ban Soon-taek; and Ambassador Joseph Verner Reed, UN Under-Secretary-General.

Organized into nine major sections, this photography exhibition hosted by the United Nations and initiated by the American Musuem of Natural History included over 60 photographs touching on subjects including the environment, manufacturing, health, biology, religion, energy, and urban life. Photographs were accompanied by lengthy scientific captions and framed by wallpaper-like patterns deliniating each section drawn from the movement of water itself. In addition to its design, Giampietro+Smith oversaw the photo editing and production of this exhibition, which was opened by the Secretary-General of the United Nations during a special conference on climate change.

More images after the jump.

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In an all-star follow-up to his set at the National Design Awards, Giampietro+Smith’s own Kevin Smith (aka DJ Chroma) was on hand to get the party started and serve as MC at the Design Observer bash last weekend for AIGA’s National Conference in Denver.

Guest designer DJs included Eye magazine’s John Walters, voice of Design Matters Debbie Millman, Helvetica director Gary Hustwit, illustrator Laurie Rosenwald, fab designer Adrian Shaunnessey, and of course Chroma himself.

For more of the action, Unbeige’s Alissa Walker has the whole hot night covered here.

The New York Times’ City Room blog has invited eight designers to assess the new NYC TAXI logo. Reporter David W. Dunlap has written a cogent summary of the genesis of the new logo here. Read Rob Giampietro’s critique here, and read all eight critiques here.

We’ve got another illustration in the New York Times Book Review this week, this time accompanying a review of Richard Pevear’s account of his and his wife Larissa Volokhonsky’s adventures in preparing a new English language translation of Tolstoy’s War and Peace. Our graphic suggests, as Pevear himself does, that translation is at best inexact, and always more of an art than a science. Read the whole article here.

We’ve got another illustration in the New York Times Book Review this week, this time accompanying a review of Jonathan Chait’s book The Big Con: The True Story of How Washington Got Hoodwinked and Hijacked by Crackpot Economics. Chait’s argument focuses in particular on the controversial theories of Arthur Laffer, and his iconic Laffer Curve was the defining economic model for Ronald Regan and his fellow neocons. Our illustration plays on the idea that the Laffer Curve’s real message is that of a pot of gold at the end of its parabolic rainbow. Read Roger Lowenstein’s entire review here.

Rob Giampietro was interviewed by CNBC’s Julia Boorstin for a short segment on AT&T’s new rebranding campaign, which reintroduces certain elements of the Cingular brand back into the AT&T formula. Catch the online version of the clip here. Read more of our thinking about the mechanics of cell phone mergers in our BusinessWeek Logo Doctors column “Anatomy of a Merger.”