I have data on all the freemason's lodges that have been/are in NC (765 to be exact)

I have their open date and close date (most are still open and holding meetings). St. John's Lodge #1 in Wilmington is the oldest running lodge, started in 1755 by the United Grand Lodge of England.

I want to make a chart that shows these lodges in a linear (or not?) fashion like below


a gantt chart I made in excel/oo calc.

but I really like the look of something like this:


I've also thought about taking a reductive map of NC and placing 765 transparent circles where the lodges are/were and sizing them according to a standard based on years open. i.e. 50 years = 1in. 100 years = 2in. etc. but in a linear fashion, it's illustrative to see where lodges overlap in time.

anyone have ideas? Any good sites you can reference to?

I'm not a graphic designer, but maybe some of you have a knack for it. This will eventually become into a wall-sized canvas type poster for a museum up in the Grand Lodge (off Glenwood Ave ITB) that will be open to the public. (The Grand Lodge is already open to the public, however.)

FYI, If anyone's ever been interested about it, I'd be glad to show you around the Grand Lodge.

/ sorry for the giant image. didn't know until posting.

[Edited on January 11, 2011 at 10:33 PM. Reason : shit]

1/11/2011 10:32:28 PM

use lots of glitter

1/11/2011 10:35:39 PM

SPEC WORK ITT

1/11/2011 10:39:05 PM

Looks like it would take a little time. I have some graphic designer buddies that are in the $60-$75 an hour range if interested (which is pretty darn competitive for their skill level).

I like that infographic you referenced by the way.

1/11/2011 10:39:12 PM

http://informationisbeautiful.net has a lot of neat ideas

1/11/2011 10:50:21 PM

haha, I was on that site for a long time thanks to marko :-) good stuff there.

1/12/2011 1:04:35 PM