Saturday, July 31, 2010

The (Cookie) Art of Davi Botts

Good Housekeeping's 1958 "Book of Cookies" is much more than 60+ pages of tasty dessert recipes-- it's actually an eyeball poppin' collection of out of this world children's book style illustrations by Davi Botts too! Take a look at this small but superb sampling and see if you don't agree:






"Book of Cookies" is easily found in any used bookstore or antique mall (just look in paper sections where sellers have old cook books and recipe pamphlets.) There are dozens more fantastic illustrations to be found inside... and yes, some of the recipes are pretty darn delicious too!

6 comments:

Mykal Banta said...

When artists today shoot for a retro look, this is the look they shoot for. The layout with whitespace and mono-color, the drawing, and especially the font. This is it right down the line. I was born the year before this, and my mother's scrapbook from that year was stuffed with this look.

Mr. Karswell said...

Reminds me of some of Bob Clarke's finer MAD Mag moments...

Prof. Grewbeard said...

suddenly, i'm fantastically tired of the 21st Century...

loved the polar bear and the cookie jar!

Pappy said...

I remember the '50s art styles because I was there when they came out. I wasn't too hip to this modern style. In the '60s I thought this art style was, in George Harrison's words from A Hard Day's Night, "Dead grotty."

But, that was then. Now I think this illustration style is great and look for it. So personal tastes change. And speaking of tastes, bake any of those cookies yet? I'm up for some snickerdoodles, myself.

Mr. Karswell said...

My favorite is the kid in the homemade go-kart, Prof... but yeah, that polar bear definitely gives Breezly Bruin a run for the money too.

As far as the recipes go Pap, I've made the Coconut Butterscotch Squares, the Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies and the Chocolate Mint Brownies. All were excellent!

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