The Phaidon Archive of Graphic Design

If you like or work with graphic design, you should probably buy this ;-)

More info...

Happy 40th Birthday to Pentagram

A lovely story told through the visual history of the design agency, Pentagram...

A Brief History of Title Design

via vimeo.com

Lou Dorfsman - Gastrotypographicalassemblage

via vimeo.com

Kemistry Gallery celebrates the work of legendary designer Lou Dorfsman.

Peter Saville Designs New England Shirt

via creativereview.co.uk

Let's hope it makes them play better than they did in the World Cup ;-)
The team will be wearing the new home shirt for their match against Bulgaria on September 3.

Brain Eno - Small Craft On A Milk Sea (WARP)

More info:

http://brian-eno.net/

UNKLE - Where Did The Night Fall

I've been meaning to post this for a while. Lovely AD from Ben Drury and photographers Warren du Preez and

Nick Thornton Jones. Haven't listened the album yet but heard it's more on the raw rock, indy, psychedelia tip.

Paul Rand - Logo Thoughts & Tribulations

Paul Rand is the master and godfather of logo and identity design! Just came across these wise words above ;-)

More about Paul Rand here...

Wanker or Genius - What do you want to ask Neville Brody?

via creativereview.co.uk

A few more hours and then #Brodydandad starts! Tweet your questions to him LIVE.




I have a few, I heard him speak in the summer at OFFF, he actually said there had been nothing new, fresh or

breakthrough in the last 20 years. Come on Neville, you can't believe that? He obviously means since his heyday. 


He then went on to show some of his recent work that looked very 90s stylee :-(

Big-up THE FACE work and FUSE though ;-) And even The Times redesign!

Posted via web from Greg's posterous

Creative Review - Art Vinyl's sleeves of the year

via creativereview.co.uk

It's really important in my opinion that record/album sleeve art never dies! Even though downloading and file

sharing is increasing all the time, artwork is usually and if done in the right way, an extension of the music, artist... 


and concept!

That saying, I'm not so impressed with this selection on the whole. Whatever happened to great design covers by

the likes of: Pink Floyd, New Order etc. Could it be something to do with record labels cutting production budgets?

Well that shouldn't really effect the creativity should it!

But then again I really need to see these in the flesh and not on a digital computer screen. I think Apple are trying

to cover this problem in the latest iTunes, by not just showing the cover, but as much visual and factual content as

possible related to that album. Still it's not the same as pulling out that old LP or 12" is it!

Peter Saville for Marc Jacobs by Juergen Teller

Of course!

INTERNET: Costs/Speeds Around The World

Stefan Sagmeister - 7 year itch

I was lucky enough to hear Sagmeister talk at Offf 09, last May in Portugal. Although he is one of those speakers

who seems to be at all the conferences, the way he articulates his presentations and the simplicity of the themes

are always really impactful and memorable. A must see speaker!

In this new Ted talk above, he talks about the break he takes every 7 years from commercial work and puts a lot of

great rational behind it. I had a similar break for 6 months in 2003, really beneficial... hhhmmm roughly 7 years ago ;-)

PANTONE - For iPhone

Pantone iPhone and iPod touch app! It's like having a full Pantone Library in your pocket - PMS, Goe and Fashion +

Home colors to go. Build and share palettes, cross-reference between systems, extract colors from photos and more

for only $9.99! Learn more and download at http://www.pantone.com/iphone

Y-3 adidas - Fall / Winter 2009 collection

Y-3 always have a great digital online presence... simple, engaging and the ability to view the products in detail.

Does it need to have share options? Probably not if you want to keep something exclusive ;-)

Experience the campaign here...

PETER SAVILLE - Optical Advertising

Peter Saville turns his eye to safety on roads in this co-directed spot for Transport For London. Through M&C Saatchi.

Not known for moving image this is a great spot which is defiantly disruptive, even though it was made over a year ago.

More info via CR...

RANDOM DESIGN - To Keep You On Your Toes

In reference to the Planning Lab brief, a interesting, fun, little game...

which causes you to design the best you can with limited material. Something every designer

has been effected by at some point in their career. These are my quick efforts below, I think

I got lucky with the images a bit, but give it a try when you have 5 minutes. And don't cheat ;-)

How to enter...

1 - Go to "wikipedia." Hit “random... Read more” or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
The first random wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.

2 - Go to "Random quotations" or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.

3 - Go to flickr and click on “explore the last seven days”
or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days
Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

4 - Use photoshop or similar to put it all together.

LOVE MAGAZINE - The New Pop?

The long awaited, much hyped style/fashion magazine LOVE was released the end of last week, published by Condé Nast.

With Katie Grand at the helm, formally editor-in-chief at Pop, she has promised a 'back to reality' approach with a ban

on size zero models amongst other things, hence the launch cover. I haven't seen a copy yet but really looking forward 

to seeing if Love can live up to the outstanding disruptive Art Direction set by Pop.

But on release the magazine has gained a lot of negative and controversial press from within the design industry and

the high street due to the vast amount of adverts and advertising and it's unoriginal front cover. The cover is almost a

direct copy of an NME cover from 2 years ago, same model but with different colours and typography. Check it here...

Personally I don't really care if it is a copy, this is much better, taking the concept and turning it into a more artistic

approach. And what better way to create hype and press on a launch of a magazine than with a little controversy ;-)

Above is the Colette shop window, created for the launch. Lovely!

SPIN - Update

One of my fav design agencies have updated with some new graphic design and identity work. Spin...

AIRSIDE - Transparent

Transparency and Honesty are some key words for brands these days and something I've been trying to plug to

clients for a while now. Although nothing new conceptually it is in no way mainstream yet, or something to discard

because it is not the latest buzz thing. So many brands still need to adopt this practice as it is to become an

important model for the next 20 years. Once there a brand should take these practices in a new ways and channels,

but they need to adopt these ways of thinking first.

A blog with the right type of content is one way for a brand to do this, which most brands are opting for at the moment. 

Funny really how a year or so ago the same brands wouldn't have understood and laughed it up, why should we give

are secrets away to rival brands? Why does the consumer need to know these things, they just want the finished

product! Well these things feed back into the brand and shine a good light with honest insight. Some brands had

heard of a blog and wanted one because it was the new thing. Well done for adopting the new, but little thought had

gone into why, what or even if it was/is the right channel for their product/service/brand. More importantly who was

going to produce the posts and content? Little Jimmy can do it when he's not busy! Yeah right!

The 4 c's of blogging...

Today many brands with blogs have hired people to work directly with social/networking/viral etc.

It's a move in the right direction ;-) Good! I have been compiling a list of the best ones which I'll post soon.

Now onto the point of this post. Many creatives, strategists, planners, economists etc are all onboard with these

forms of communication and see the importance in these new ways to reach the audience for their clients.

But how many creative agencies are really practicing what they preach? Some are but not many! 

But AIRSIDE are! Rather than just posting things they like creatively, like many creative agencies, they are posting

the development process of their projects, how they got to the final solution. What directions did they take and

discard? Well you can can see it for yourself within their blog. It gives nice transparency and a form of honesty. 

In a way they are the brand and their clients (or more importantly, their future clients) are their audience or consumer.

This style of posting is seen more within student blogs and experimental / conceptual art blogs / websites. 

What I like about this AIRSIDE approach, is that it shows great insight into their process, to their future clients... 

they get to know how they work and what they will get for their money, thus bringing them closer to the agency :-)

Because as we all know, it's not just creativity and ideas that make brands want to work with an agency...

it's just as much about the people they will be working with, are they are nice, stupid, open, fake, true, real, fair, knowing,

understanding, blagues, cooperative etc etc... and do they practice what they preach :-) 

Airside have always created fun communication, which is what people need these days, brands should utilize them

for this style and dark times strategy, it comes so naturally to them ;-)