Isn’t it every kid’s dream to see his or her drawings come to life? Perhaps some do, in the absolutely limitless worlds of childhood imagination. Now, however, kids and adults alike can see it happen on the big screen: The Itch of the Golden Nit, premiering for the first time in North America at the Children’s Festival this Thursday, is animated entirely by illustrations submitted by 34 000 children across the UK.

Fellow web designers, developers, coders, writers, creators, and enthusiasts – unite! UBC Robson Square in Vancouver is about to host the second annual Interlink Conference, an event crafted by creative web professionals, for creative web professionals, and sponsored by the companies that support our creative web professions, including Microsoft, Mail Chimp, UBC Continuing Studies, Clio, and more. Imagine: two days full of education and empowerment, where the worlds of web design, code, and content intersect and take flight. This is where technology and innovation forge the future.

Your One-Stop Recycling Shop now has a brand-new online image – in tandem with opening its new Nanaimo location, Regional Recycling also has a completely new website, designed and developed by Kihada Kreative! Visual vibrancy and sleek imagery are the focal points of the site, every single element of which was custom-designed to impress. Regional Recycling’s is a story to tell, and what better way to share it with the world than through bright and bold imagery?

Hot off the presses, we bring you the launch of Fortress Paper’s new website, designed and developed by Kihada Kreative! The original website, along with the company logo, underwent an extensive remodeling to create a clean, sleek modern look that better reflects Fortress Paper’s multi-national operation. As the leading producer of the specialty pulp and paper products used to print banknotes in over 100 currencies in more than 50 countries worldwide, Fortress Paper needed a website worthy of its enterprise – and we at Kihada were pleased to provide.

Reel 2 Real Annual International Film Festival for Youth is HERE! Bringing from around the world a collection of brilliant films for kids and teens to the Vancity and Pacific Cinémathèque theatres. This eight-day event is a fantastic opportunity for young people (and adults too) to learn about film and cultures from every corner of the world. Over 50 films and showcases, educational and entertaining, will be presented for viewers of all ages – though the presentations, and the festival itself, have all been created with youth at heart. In addition, the festival will feature a variety of workshops, activities, demonstrations, galas, and hands-on exhibits that are sure to delight, inform, and inspire.

We’ve been crazy about recycling lately, and our zeal for cans in particular has led us to a most fascinating encounter: the arrival of Canstruction Vancouver for its tenth annual exhibition of can-structure extravagance. Engineers, architects, school groups, and designers have gathered in teams to build immense models entirely out of cans and compete for best in show. Since its grand opening on March 26th, the incredible collection of can creations has emblazoned the halls and atria of four buildings on Georgia Street: the Four Seasons Hotel, the HSBC Pendulum Gallery, the FortisBC building, and the Flour building. As a result, your simple stroll along Downtown Vancouver’s thoroughfare is now a spectacle of impressive design, construction, and ingenuity embodied by cans!

Mention statistics to any recent graduate and you’re sure to get a cringing response. After a visit from Hans Rosling, however, you can expect a much different outcome. This lively Uppsala professor, medical doctor, public speaker, and statistician has transformed what we used to associate with dry lectures and tedious documents into animated graphics that intrigue and inform – to the delight of global development agents and geography teachers alike. He has even created a software program that allows widespread access to this educational innovation. But with the visualization of statistics, and statistics in general, comes a recurring concern: are we using and interpreting them truthfully?

Kihada strongly believes in community stewardship, and cultivating a symbiotic, mutually beneficial kinship with our neighbours. The future of our success lies within the community, and that’s why we’re proud to contribute to local organizations and charities every year. Dreams Take Flight is one of the amazing non-profit organizations we have the privilege of working with, and their first annual Gala 4 Dreams Swing Fling is just around the corner!

Set for release this spring, Greg Durrell’s captivating documentary is a stunning and provocative response to Burton Kramer’s life of design and éclat. The film offers a fantastic follow-up to Durrell’s biographical retrospection of Kramer’s work, published in May 2011, and is sure to be a monumental tribute to one of Canada’s leading graphic designers. Seeing examples of Kramer’s design functioning in cities and media across Europe, India, the Middle East, the US, and Canada, and hearing Kramer’s own interpretive insights, is the ideal inspiration for both budding and veteran designers everywhere. Furthermore, it speaks to the influence of modern creative and cultural industries, and the eminence of the artists they employ.

The truffle is an epicurean delicacy widely sought throughout Europe, Africa, Asia, and North America. It’s famed for its fragile texture, superlative flavour, lofty price range – and the use of truffle pigs and dogs in its detection. Due to its natural tendency to grow symbiotically with tree roots and richly nitrogenated soil, it cannot be commercially farmed or mass harvested. The aromatic morsels and warmly robust oil they yield are thus treated with only the utmost care and expertise – and savoured most appreciatively.

Vancouver, our city and buzzing hub of arts and entertainment, is a stage on which the brightest and most brilliant shine – even without a spotlight. What sets a truly exceptional individual apart from the rest is innovation, and a talent from which the greatest advancements are forged. In the realm of cinematography, the latest beacon of such innovation emanates from one Selim Mete, photographer, cinematographer, graphic designer, and now novice programmer. And yet, the young winner of many cinematic awards and acclaim is still the most humble person I’ve met!

As I run down the long, windowed corridor that stretches between me and the imminently-departing seabus, a busker at the far end plucks a Spanish number from the strings of his guitar, and it seems to me like an echo of the play I just attended. El pasado es un animal grotesco, written in Spanish and performed with English subtitles, struck many chords of its own in a soundtrack of lifelong yearning. The play depicts the lives of youths pulled through tension, passion, self-doubt, and rare moments of clarity. Time is marked by the slowly rotating stage across which the paths of four Argentinians are strewn.