Impressions of 72nd St. & Central Park West
Maps are mostly logical affairs. Anchored in geography. Water is blue. Land is green. Hierarchical typography. The results can be beautiful but they remain bound by convention.
For most of my life, my career was also anchored in logic. As a UX designer, you work deep within a world of constraints and convention. Your job is to carve out a bit of innovation while respecting the current technical constraints, the needs of the user and the company’s business objectives. Design systems, ostensibly a timesaver further codify the lines within which you must color.
In the last few years, I’ve set an objective to try and break free of some of these conventions. To color outside the lines. This map was my 2nd attempt to do so. It is a “map” of the immediate area surrounding 72nd Street and Central Park West in New York City. It is also an homage of sorts to John Lennon who lived at that intersection, in The Dakota apartment building and who was murdered in front of his home by Mark David Chapman in 1980. Following this senseless act, Lennon’s wife, Yoko Ono worked with the City to create a memorial to John just inside Central Park and to rename a small nearby field, “Strawberry Fields”.
So this map tries to capture the spirit of that small piece of New York. The makes reference to multiple elements including,
The intersection of 72nd St. and CPW (represented by the 2 overlapping pieces of paper)
The ‘Imagine’ mosaic just inside Central Park
The ‘Dakota’ apartment building. A reference to the developer’s love of the emerging American West and his love of the sound of Native American words
“The Rambles” a nearby area in the park
Lennon’s interest in “non-sensical” writing as found in his ‘In His Own Write’ book of poetry. The “Art, Art, upon the lampost bright” is by Lennon and a reference to the lampposts that line the sidewalk of Central Park West.
The strawberries of Strawberry Fields
The nearby ‘American Museum of Natural History’
The book, ‘Catcher in the Rye’ that was found on the killer after the shooting.
The faded lyrics to Lennon’s song, ‘Imagine’
Maps can create a kind of unintentional poetry by the juxtaposition of labels you might not immediately experience just by being there in real life. Some of this can happen by mistake but there is also the opportunity to write the poem by creating the map.