is a blog about design, technology and culture written by Khoi Vinh, and has been more or less continuously published since December 2000 in New York City. Khoi is currently Principal Designer at Adobe. Previously, Khoi was co-founder and CEO of Mixel (acquired in 2013), Design Director of The New York Times Online, and co-founder of the design studio Behavior, LLC. He is the author of “How They Got There: Interviews with Digital Designers About Their Careers”and “Ordering Disorder: Grid Principles for Web Design,” and was named one of Fast Company’s “fifty most influential designers in America.” Khoi lives in Crown Heights, Brooklyn with his wife and three children.
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If you can believe it, I disappeared over the past few days to Paris, France. Yes, that Paris, France: land of unconscionably good baked goods, storybook architecture and head-shakingly beautiful women. Since my father now lives there, I’ll be visiting fairly often (even if my last trip there was nearly 
you are worried about not having anything to say if you will be going to paris on a regular basis? that would only be excusable if you were blind and did not see or experience anything worth reporting. but i doubt that is that case. here’s a challenge: keep a journal of the most banal thing and write about how sublime it could be, and of something sublime and how banal it could be. for starters: french fries.
Also, next time you come blog about it before hand. I’ve been a lurker on your blog for almost three years, and I’m studying in Paris now. I could tell you all sorts of fun places to go and things to do. And you could give me an internship at the New York Times.
I don’t know how long you’ve been estranged from drawing, but I love these wonderfully gestural sketches.
I was stood on the bridge to the Ile de la Citж on Saturday (I think) and I even said to my girlfriend, “I’m sure that guy with the green rucksack is the writer of a website I read” and she said, “go and ask” but I said, “pretty unlikely, isn’t it?”. And by the time it crossed my mind to look to see whether your camera was a nikon (which would have been irrefutable proof, of course), it was too late…
I’m about to get my own photos of the weekend off my camera so I’ll be looking out for yours on flickr.
Rob: Thanks for the compliment. I’m going to try and draw often and post scans here.
Alex: Next time, I’ll post beforehand, it would have been nice to hang out, though I probably won’t be able to bring any internships at the Times along with me, unfortunately.
Thomas: It could very well have been me… I was walking downtown that afternoon. I’ve got a blue backpack with a camouflage green flap covering most of the back. You should’ve come up to say hi!
I still can’t freaking find a baguette in the US as good as the ones in France. Dammit.
France is amazing ain’t it? It’s often a love/hate relationship, i.e. you either love it or hate it. I happen to really love it!
Paris is uniquely artistic somehow and very inspiring. I spent 15 days in Montmartre last year (seen Moulin Rouge? that’s it!) and luckily am going back soon. Great designs Khoi … hope I can be half as inspired.
I think you will find you have quite a few readers living in Paris who could give you a pointer to stuff happening in this wonderful city, next time you come over just shout!
Khoi I can’t imagine that you writing and drawing France and your experiences there would get boring or commonplace. Its your site, do whatever the hell you want with it and screw anyone who thinks it’s not particularly good, they still have Digg.
Ahhh France….
I will live there in the not distant future. As long as I have a fast internet connection I can be most anywhere. Bourgogne will probably be the place I settle. The quality of life is excellent, and the real estate is much more affordable than the San Francisco bay area. Interestingly, the french people from the country are usually not enamored with Paris. Looking forward to your future Paris posts.
Ahhh France….
I will live there in the not distant future. As long as I have a fast internet connection I can be most anywhere. Bourgogne will probably be the place I settle. The quality of life is excellent, and the real estate is much more affordable than the San Francisco bay area. Interestingly, the french people from the country are usually not enamored with Paris. Looking forward to your future Paris posts.
It may well sound odd to some that regular trips to somewhere like Paris wouldn’t produce enough material to warrant a post but I can relate. However one possible solution for this might be something I considered a while back when I made semi-regular trips from London to NYC. A sort of photo assignment for myself. Pick a fairly mundane topic such as ‘lights’ then take a photo of lights at a set time in one city and then at the same time in the other. You might be suprised with the results.