** This post is dedicated to the New York design thinker and doer Jim Walrod, who has passed away. Just a couple of weeks ago I mentioned my intention to post about On 1st to Jim over dinner. Of course, he knew about the store but was excited to see what fresh info I might have turned up. I’ll write about Jim when I have collected my thoughts; wherever he is, I am sure Jim will join us all in the necessary proclamation: Fuck Trump**

//At the entrance to 1159 1st Avenue at 63rd was Sven Lukin’s two-tonne illuminated sign. Photo: Bert Stern//

//On 1st interior including displays of Roy Lichtenstein wallpaper and Gerald Laing plates. Photo: Bert Stern//

In conversation this summer, British artist Duggie Fields revealed to me that, during a sojourn in the US in 1968, he had been in line to work at photographer Bert Stern’s “architecturally mind-blowing” art store/publishing house On 1st in Manhattan’s east side.

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Tags: Alden Projects, Alice Pollock, Bert Stern, Bill Cunningham, Billy Apple, Chicago Tribune, Duggie Fields, Earl's Court, Gerald Laing, Isadore Seltzer, James Lee Byars, Jim Walrod, Julie Baumgold, Kenneth Jay Lane, Marilyn Monroe, Milton Glaser, New York magazine, On 1st, Ossie Clark, Pink Floyd, Roy Lichtenstein, Sven Lukin, Syd Barrett, Todd Alden, Walter Bernard

I heartily (groan…) recommend Alistair Sooke’s half-hour radio documentary on Milton Glaser’s I ♥ NY logo.

Glaser is interviewed, as are Seymour Chwast and Steven Heller among others.

Tags: 1977, AListair Sooke, I ♥ NY, Milton Glaser, Seymour Chwast, Steven Heller