Noisy Decent Graphics

Diddy's tattoo + Bierut's Facebook wall

Diddy got the New York Magazine logo tattooed on his arm.

 

Graphic designer Rick Slusher spotted this and complemented Michael Bierut on his Facebook wall.

 

To which Michael replied.

Which is, of course, BRILLIANT.

"I am of the opinion that the boldest measures are the safest" Horatio Nelson

From a book on Churchill, who quoted this when asked if he would consider a "safer" course of action to the radical one he was proposing.

Dot Matrix Haiku

Pictures from friends, images linked through to Flickr. Is there a tag for this stuff yet?

Messing about at Newspaper Club

You can read more here

The Ministry of Justice are hiring

At the very end of last year government departments announced three big transactions they were going to transform digitally, with some help from GDS. That's what we call the Government Digital Strategy.

You can see what each department has agreed to do here.

There's some big stuff in there, putting the Log Book online, Self Assessment, Land Registry. Projects that will make a difference to millions of people in the UK. It's one of the reasons why being at GDS is so exciting right now.

Each department is going to have a slightly different approach to how they do these transactions, but one of them has already made a start. Ministry of Justice are setting up a digital service division and are hiring designers and developers. Read more about that here. You won't be working AT GDS but you will be working WITH GDS. 

If you're interested in the work we've been doing at GDS. If you like our Design Principles, if you want to work on huge public sector design projects with the scope and ambition to affect millions of people, you should apply.

Oh, also, MoJ have this funky sculpture in their atrium.

 

“The world is fucked… We’re not going to kern our way out of this one.”

"But he knew there was a fight to be had, and that designers had to move away from self-satisfied ‘smiles in the mind’ or the obsession with type as fetishised object. Or, as Nic once put it to me so eloquently:

“The world is fucked… We’re not going to kern our way out of this one.” "

From My favourite Flatlander: remembering Nic Hughes by Matt Ward.

 

 

Action 5

There are 13 others. 

"what you need isn't graphic design it's whatever else. Or maybe nothing."

I love this and I also love Michael Bierut's quote in the previous post. "...beset with factors with have nothing to do with design excellence. You know, real life."

The thing that annoys me most about most graphic designers is their inability to think outside of their own sphere of reference. The client, or customer, user, human, whatever, will have many things on their mind, graphic design is only one of them. A problem that requires graphic design to solve it will seldom ONLY require graphic design to solve it. It's just one weapon in the amoury. As Ken says, what you need may be less graphic design, or maybe even no graphic design at all. Something else. Or as Michael says, "you know, real life."

This also references (at least) two our Design Principles. Do less and Do the hard work to make it simple.

I guess the crux of what Ken is saying here, is that the problem with graphic design and graphic designers is that they aren't willing to say "You don't need this." And this is more than just making design simple, it's about questioning whether we actually need to do this project in the first place. User needs, if you like. 

And there's loads more I could write. But, you know.

Picture taken from Richard's Instagram which is a picture of the new Unit Editions book on Ken Garland. Ken Garland, not Kenneth Grange. Both good.

 

Michael Bierut on Design Criticism as a Spectator Sport

"And like any business situation of any complexity whatsoever, that process may be smothered in politics, handicapped with exigencies, and beset with factors with have nothing to do with design excellence.

You know, real life."

Good. Worth a read (although I wish Design Observer was easier to read.)

it's not complicated; it's just hard

A good blog post from Russell. He's right.

 

Back Good Night Lamp on Kickstarter

When I wrote about Good Night Lamp last year it got a lot of postive reaction on Twitter.

You can now back it on Kickstarter.

Good Night Lamp on Kickstarter from Good Night Lamp on Vimeo.

 

New message style for Little Printer

There's a fab new message style available on BERG Cloud for Little Printer. Sadly it's not called Wham! it's called Poster.

I don't have a Little Printer, but I do like sending my friends messages via BERG Cloud. Like this one.

Congratulations Sir Kenneth Grange

Fantastic to see him honoured in the New Year Honours list. Richly deserved.

Wonderful designer, wonderful man, wonderful work. The Inter City 125 train, the latest version of the Black Cab, the Kodak instamatic camera, parking meters, Wilkinson Sword razors, Parker pens, Kenwood food mixers... and lots more. Proper work.

All that and he founded Pentagram. 

The book of the recent Design Museum exhibition is worth buying. The Design Museum also has a decent biog.

I guess this is a thing

#lastprintissue and here on the Newsweeek blog

Stuff from 2012 - the best blog post I wrote

I re-read this the other day and got a bit emotional. It generated more feedback than any other post this year. I wrote it in June. I still like it. Here it is, reproduced in full.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Some time ago Anthony Burrill very kindly gave me a print. This one.

Picture from Anthony's site.

It's a lovely thing and I remember thinking, oooh that will go nicely in the space at the top of the landing. I intended to get it framed and hang it up. The weeks passed by and I started to worry about the message.

The top of our landing is a place the kids walk past every morning, the sun shines through the window and fills this space with light. This print, with it's bold, clear message would be unmissable. I started to worry that "you know more than you think you do" wasn't the right message for children, ages 0-7, to be faced with every morning.

Sure, I know what it's getting at. I understand the point it's making, but I'm not sure it's helpful advice to a three year old. A jaded 30 something adult - yes. A sponge like brain just starting school - not so much.

IT IS POSSIBLE I'M OVER THINKING THIS.

Yes, it is. I'm aware of that. But once a thought gets in your head, you can't let it go, can you? So I started thinking about what message I would like to greet my children every morning for the next 20 years or so. Tough brief.

I've been meaning to blog this next bit ever since I started blogging but have never got round to it. The Roald Dahl book, Danny Champion of the World has, I think, had a huge impact on my creative career. This passage has always stuck with me. 

 

"Ours was just a small village school, a squat ugly red-brick building with no upstairs rooms at all. Above the front door was a big grey block of stone cemented into the brickwork, and on the stone it said, THIS SCHOOL WAS ERECTED IN 1902 TO COMMEMORATE THE CORONATION OF HISROYAL HIGHNESS KING EDWARD VII. I must have read that thing a thousand times. Every time I went in the door it hit me in the eye. I suppose that’s what it was there for. But it’s pretty boring to read the same old words over and over again, and

I often thought how nice it would be if they put something different up there every day, something really interesting.

My father would have done it for them beautifully. He could have written it with a bit of chalk on the smooth grey stone and each morning itwould have been something new. He would have said things like,

DID YOU KNOW THAT THE LITTLE YELLOW CLOVER BUTTERFLY OFTEN CARRIES HIS WIFE AROUND ON HIS BACK?

Another time he might have said,

THE GUPPY HAS FUNNY HABITS. WHEN HE FALLS IN LOVE WITH ANOTHER GUPPY, HE BITES HER ON THE BOTTOM.

And another time,

DID YOU KNOW THAT THE DEATH’S-HEAD MOTH CAN SQUEAK?

And then again,

BIRDS HAVE ALMOST NOSENSE OF SMELL. BUT THEY HAVE GOOD EYESIGHT AND THEY LOVE RED COLOURS.THE FLOWERS THEY LIKE ARE RED AND YELLOW, BUT NEVER BLUE.

And perhaps another time he would get out his chalk and write,

SOME BEES HAVE TONGUES WHICH THEY CAN UNROLL UNTIL THEY ARE NEARLY TWICE AS LONG AS THE BEE ITSELF. THIS IS TO ALLOW THEM TO GATHER NECTAR FROM FLOWERS THAT HAVE VERY LONG NARROW OPENINGS.

Or he might have written,

I’LL BET YOU DIDN’T KNOW THAT IN SOME BIG ENGLISH COUNTRY HOUSES, THE BUTLER STILL HAS TO IRON THE MORNING NEWSPAPER BEFORE PUTTING IT ON HIS MASTER’S BREAKFAST-TABLE "

 

So that's the goal, right? "put something different up there every day, something really interesting."

But what that passage also does is demonstrate the significance of walking past a piece of seemingly meaningless text every day for years. You notice this stuff, it sinks in. So what would I want to sink in?

When we were kids we had a version of this poem on the kitchen wall. I say "a version" as I can't remember the words exactly and google has hundreds of different versions. But it went something like this.

 

If a child lives with criticism,
he learns to condemn.

If a child lives with hostility,
he learns to fight.

If a child lives with fear,
he learns to be apprehensive.

If a child lives with pity,
he learns to feel sorry for himself.

If a child lives with jealousy,
he learns to feel guilty.

If a child lives with encouragement,
he learns to be self-confident.

If a child lives with tolerance,
he learns to be patient.

If a child lives with praise,
he learns to be appreciative.

If a child lives with acceptance,
he learns to love.

If a child lives with approval,
he learns to like himself.

If a child lives with recognition,
he learns to have a goal.

If a child lives with fairness,
he learns what justice is.

If a child lives with honesty,
he learns what truth is.

If a child lives with sincerity,
he learns to have faith in himself and
those around him.

If a child lives with love,
he learns that the world is
a wonderful place to live in.

 

I've always liked the sentiment there. In my head I'd like to get that properly typeset and screen printed. It could be a beautiful thing in a nice frame somewhere. But it's too long, and the advertising creative director in me says you'd never read that from the top of the landing as you move down the stairs. It needs to be something simpler.

And so I thought about Jones's Get Excited and Make Things.

I've always loved this. I remember the day Matt did it. I remember the article that provoked it. (Full story here.)

I love it's positivity. I like the fact it's a rallying cry rather than a hectoring statement. I love the warm vagueness to it. It's smiple, powerful, a nice way to start the day. Matt is a friend and it feels like an artifact of my time. So that was it. I had found a winner. Up it went.

"I must have read that thing a thousand times. Every time I went in the door it hit me in the eye. I suppose that’s what it was there for."

I can only hope.

Stuff from 2012 – best proud moment for a friend's product

Lots of friends have started things this year. The Internet of Friends' Things. It's nice.

But the best moment by far was BERG's Little Printer being featured in Avengers Assemble #9.

That is pretty crazy awesome.

No-one really knows how it ended up there, and like BERG say in the disclaimer "we know Little Printer is never mentioned by name, you don’t actually see the little fella, and Tony Stark being the super-genius he is might have built his own receipt printer subscription information device… ".

But still. Awesome.

Stuff from 2012 – best map

Easy this. Really easy.

maps.stamen.com

Beautiful. Stunning. A technical master piece. Ground breaking. Wonderful.

Which is the best one? Lots of people like Toner, but I'm a huge fan of Watercolour. Incredible work.

 

Stuff from 2012 – best moment from the Opening Ceremony

When James Bond met the Queen. Captured on a Twitter timeline by Paul Annett. Read from the bottom up.

Stuff from 2012 – best decade party

An odd one this. W+K celebrated their 30th, Pentagram their 40th and D&AD their 50th. I was fortunate to go to all three parties. I say 'fortunate' genuinely, as the 21 year old me would have been insanely excited about going to any one of them.

They were all good, but I think the Pentagram one was the best. There was a good mix of people. I met some new people, I saw some old friends. The cocktails were good. A great deal of effort had gone into the catering. The venue was suitably adorned. Kenneth Grange gave a funny speech where he refered to 'absent friends looking down on us, and Alan looking up at us'.

A good night.

Stuff from 2012 – best Bridle piece

Initially a toss up between the Istanbul drone shadow and Dronestagram but I think this just pips it, becuase of the sheer simplicity of execution, the lightness of touch that goes with all good ideas and the huge reaction it got on Twitter and in the press the day after. It even made the Shard wikipedia page.

And cos it's well funny.

Picture from joroach.

Picture from Lapatia.

So. Not this.

Or this.

Got Turner Prize written all over that boy.