turn clients into small giants Jim Bull on the design language of ‘lessism’
industry insight
muscle matters
ISSUE 293 june 2019 £6.99 • US$16.99 printed in the UK
the power of mistakes! Turn your failure into success and weakness into strength
the character design workout GO BIG WITH OUR GUIDE TO CREATING STRONG CHARACTERS
flex your skills and win £800 Get your work on this cover! Page 75
Eat, sleep, brand, repeat
featuring: J U L IAN G L AN D ER E L EN O R K O P K A J ER O N B RA X T O N P H I L I P P A RI C E M a n v s M a ch i n e
How to build a bold new identity with studio AH-KB
Bulk up on big ideas!
Plus!
The must-attend UK graduation shows Design legend Lance Wyman The books that inspire creatives
Meditate like a pro
Harness the potential of mindfulness with furniture designer Freyja Sewell
We have lift off
How branding agency NB Studio turned clothes packaging into toy jet packs
cover image | muscleman by julian glander
COLLINS on why form should always follow fun, not function
ne w v e nt ur e s
New v en tures
Vault 49 London hiring! Paul Woodvine, the new creative director of Vault49’s London office, explains what you can expect from the new studio our readers should know that we’re hiring,” exclaims Paul Woodvine, the new creative director of Vault49’s London offices. The New York-based agency opened up shop in the UK capital at the beginning of April, and Woodvine is excited about the “extension of the US office – from a client perspective, the two offices will be seamless,” he says. And at the time of printing, there are six positions being advertised on their site, ranging from illustrator to branding and packaging designer. Vault49 was actually started by two Brits, Jonathan Kenyon and John Glasgow, during their final year at the London College of Printing, then relocated to New York in 2004. So the new studio is a return home of sorts for the agency. And having worked with the two co-founders from a client perspective, Woodvine feels
Y
perfectly positioned in his new role. “After four year of collaborations [with Vault49] I was ingrained into its culture, and as a creative director myself, I was inspired by its creativity, insight and humility,” he tells us. When Woodvine made plans to move to the UK, it made sense that the former global design director at PepsiCo should front the new Vault49 enterprise. “When I went from agency to client-side,” says Woodvine, “I brought to Pepsi how to best use an agency: what information to provide, what questions to ask, how best to brief creative.” This in turn led to the creative director working with some of the best global creative agencies, and it’s something he’s eager to bring to his new role. Woodvine also brings tried and tested skills in specific areas. “What I’m excited about is bringing my background in packaging,
com putera rts.creati vebloq.com - 11 -
Above: Paul Woodvine will head up Vault49’s London studio. Left: Vault49’s Instagram was taken over with original art when the announcement was made.
CU LT U R E
AUGUST 2018
Based in east London, Land of Plenty is a design and branding studio founded in 2016 by Marc Atkinson, Jonny Rowe and Joe Russell. It creates identities and communications for lifestyle and culture brands, including hotels, restaurants and award shows. www.landofplenty.studio
M Y D E S I G N S PA C E
green and pleasant land Marc Atkinson, co-founder and creative director of Land of Plenty, describes the studio’s relaxed vibe e’ve recently moved into this beautiful space, in the London Fields area of Hackney in London. We know the area really well: our previous studio was just a stone’s throw away. It was a much larger space that we sub-let to other creatives, and we met some amazing people during this time. But when our lease came to an end it felt time to move on. Our new studio was previously occupied by Ab Rogers Design, so everything is custom designed and built for the space. As soon as we saw it, we loved it. The light is magical and it’s a
W
lovely calm space in a bustling area. From the moment we moved in it’s felt like home, and we have friends and clients keen to drop by – always a good sign. You can’t miss the building’s unique, bright yellow doors from the street (1). It’s a colour that we’ve embraced with our new window vinyl. The three founders of Land of Plenty have known each other for well over 10 years. As well as being designers, we all happen to be green-fingered, too. Our initial small collection of plants has grown with us over the years, multiplying by swaps and loans from friends and studio
C O MPUTERA RTS.CREATI VEBLOQ.COM - 16 -
mates. Some of the more mature ones had to be given away as gifts when we moved, but the remaining green makes for a pleasant working environment (2), and we wouldn’t be without them. We aim to go to at least one cultural talk or event a month as a team. One of our first as Land of Plenty was the Smile in the Mind talk that the Partners (now Superunion) gave for the TypoCircle. At the end they raffled off lots of smileenducing work, and we managed to get our hands on this poster (3). It’s a calendar for a toilet cubicle company, of all things, in which you ‘spend a penny’ to
TPREEOPNDS LE
AUGUST 2018
1
2
3
mark the current day. It’s a lovely piece of work by a company that we’ve always admired, and a constant reminder to us of the importance of an idea. If we can also make people smile along the way, then we’re all happy. The board (4) is our essential project development space. This is where we pin up visual reference, notes and designs, and crit them together. One of the jobs we’re most excited about on the board at the moment is a brand identity for a new brewery out in Portland, Oregon. It’s the venture of some close friends of ours, and is set to launch soon.
Last year we started work on the brand identity for The Commonwealth, the re-development of an eight-storey neogothic building in downtown Memphis, Tennessee. Memphis has been on the up in recent years, so our clients saw this as the perfect opportunity to improve the city further. As well as being their new home, it will include street-level retail offered to local ventures, and a space for community events. On a site visit, our client Stuart took us to an NBA game and bought us this basketball (5). It’s an awkwardly shaped piece of hand luggage, but a lovely souvenir. C O MPUTERA RTS.CREATI VEBLOQ.COM - 17 -
4
5
S HO W C AS E
june 2019
com pu ter ar t s .cr e ati v ebloq .com - 28 -
June 2019
SHOWCASE Our selection of the hottest new design, illustration and motion work from the global design scene
Earthy tones Leather Fashion Design by Irradié www.irradie.com Design agency Irradié has created branding for Leather Fashion Design, a new creative media outlet aiming to unite professionals from across the leather and fashion industries in France. “Craftsmanship and ‘savoir faire’ are its main focus and so the brief was centred on creativity and quality, especially on the digital part of the project,” says artistic director Alain Vonck. The design team created distinctive branding with a mixture of serif and sans-serif typography, and a colour palette that reflects the natural materials. Vonck says that, “We imagined a series of 10 bespoke patterns referring to various leather textures as the core of the visual language.” The branding is used for printed business materials, a magazine and an online platform.
com pu ter ar t s .cr e ati v ebloq .com - 29 -
sp ec i al r e p or t
june 2019
JULIAN GLANDER
ELENOR KO PK A
JERON BR A XTON
P H I L I P PA RICE
the character design workout From cartoons to crochet, stop-motion to 3D models, Emily Gosling reveals the secrets to strong character design cover image | muscleman by julian glander
c o mputera rts.creati vebloq.com - 38 -
june 2019
Ch ar acter de si g n w or kout
I N CONV E R S AT I ON
june 2019
La nc e W ym a n
june 2019
sign of the times Throughout Lance Wyman’s 60-year career, all his iconic work has adhered to the ethos: “Good design is like good poetry — you can’t change it one way or the other…” l a n c e w y m a n is the owner and creative director of Sideshow Sign Co., a Nashville-based team of designers and fabricators who specialise in custom sign manufacture. Wyman is also the creator of the Church of Sign Tology, a comprehensive online guide to sign making. www.lancewyman.com words: beren neale n photograph: Jerry Buttles
c o mputera rts.creati vebloq.com - 59 -
P R O J E C T DI AR Y
june 2019
PROJECT diary
CIRCUITO PLASTICO Discover how Parámetro Studio designed a fresh identity for Circuito Plastico, a major art festival tying together the galleries of San Pedro Garza García in Mexico
co mputera rts.creati vebloq.com - 82 -
Pa r á m e t r o St udi o
june 2019
Cristina Arreola Co-founder & creative director, Parámetro Studio As creative director, Arreola oversees each project and the daily operations of the studio. She cofounded Parámetro Studio five years ago to focus on branding and web design after working as a graphic designer at Anagrama.
Getting started
By Cristina Arreola and Vanessa Santos Circuito Plástico is a new event held each year in San Pedro, just south of Monterrey in Mexico. It takes place over two weekends and visitors are taken around the city, going to participating galleries on a guided bus tour. Each gallery holds special exhibitions as part of Circuito Plástico and it’s a great way to see and learn about a broad variety of art. This was its second year, and the festival director KRSTO wanted to attract more visitors with a vibrant identity that would stand out and get people who are unfamiliar with art excited. At the same time, our client didn’t want it to clash with each gallery’s existing brands. For us, the brief was a great opportunity for Parámetro to become involved in the art scene in San Pedro and Monterrey. Even though the event is only in its second year, we aimed to create something that would make a big impact and set a high standard for Circuito Plástico in years to come. The identity created for the previous year was quite serious using sober colours. Even so, students and young people really liked it, whether or not they were studying art. We
PROJECT FACTFILE Brief: Sponsored by local government, Circuito Plastico takes visitors on a free, guided tour to participating galleries in San Pedro. The goal was to create an identity that would stand out and attract people who are familiar with art as well as making it accessible to those who aren’t. The client: KRSTO, www.krsto.net studio: Parámetro Studio, www.parametro.studio Project duration: Four months
co mputera rts.creati vebloq.com - 83 -
P R O J E C T DI AR Y
June 2019
PROJECT diary
Blast off with a box of delights How branding agency NB Studio turned Petit Pli’s clothes packaging into a reusable jet pack for kids to play with
01 c o mputera rts.creati vebloq.com - 92 -
9000
NB Stud i o f or P e t i t P li
June 2019
01 Creating reusable packaging for Petit Pli children’s clothing was one of the most challenging parts of NB Studio’s branding project with the company.
Alan Dye Creative director, NB Studio Co-founding NB Studio in 1999 with Nick Finney, Alan Dye believes the secret to great design is not in your kerning, how many late nights you work or how much caffeine you consume, but in how much you love your work. In addition to identity design, he specialises in information design and typography.
02 The space-age nature of the clothing – being able to unfold and expand to fit a growing child – means an origami rocket pack makes perfect sense.
The brand concept
By Alan Dye Petit Pli is a company that’s designed a revolutionary new way of making children’s clothing. The fabric the clothes are made from expands as the child grows, as the pleats within it unfold. Instead of replacing your child’s clothes two or three times a year, you simply let Petit Pli garments expand as they grow. Thanks to its innovative, sustainable approach, not to mention great design, Petit Pli won a D&AD Impact Award in 2018. Following that, we were introduced to its founder, Ryan Mario Yasin, via D&AD and were asked to create a new visual identity for the company. Our approach to the new branding focused on four themes: sustainability, fashion, aerospace engineering and, of course, kids. The look and feel we developed is fun, simple and very human, while the logo we created is inherent to the folding, expandable nature of the fabric technology the company has invented. When it came to the packaging, we wanted to take things even further. Children love playing with empty boxes and so we thought, ‘Why not turn the packaging into a plaything?’ In line with the branding, the packaging is a unique Petit Pli take on this idea.
PROJECT FACTFILE Brief: To create a new brand identity for children’s clothing company Petit Pli comprising a logo, brand design guidelines, photographic style, website and packaging for shipping. agency: NB Studio, www.nbstudio.co.uk client: Petit Pli, https://shop.petitpli.com Project Duration: One year for all branding, three months for the packaging aspect. launch date: December 2018 02 c o mputera rts.creati vebloq.com - 93 -