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The Art of War

Primal Scream album cover 2000

The Economist print cover 2018

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Remember this story about a lady in Kensington who painted her house with red and white stripes because of some dispute with the neighbours? (No, just me?)

I've always wanted to see what it was like. Eyesore or delightful cheery addition to the street?

You can only tell by visiting. Yesterday I was deep West so I popped over to take a look.

That sort of ruins the effect. It looks like the dispute continues. 

Anyway.

 

Richard Rogers - A Place For All People

A rare thing, a design book I actually read. A good book but so many questions. I will write more one day but for now this is pretty close to how I felt.

JR at Lazinc

It was closed when I went. But I don't think that mattered much. Very good.

Work In Progress at the RCA

I enjoyed the RCA WIP show. As messy and as ‘in progress’ as you’d want it to be. There was an honesty that university final shows have lost, I think.

The Service Design course seems to get better every year. Some really good thinking there, although it’s hard to get that across in a ‘show’. (Again - some design course should take on the UX of the Final Show.)

Good company.

 

I popped into the automotive design bit which was split pretty hard into two sections - Vehicle Design and Intelligent Mobility. Might be my weary brain but this felt like a real moment in time. I’m used to automotive design shows being all THOSE drawings but the Intelligent Mobility genuinely felt different. (Update, looks like IM is replacing VD as a course.)

Unfortunately I don't have many pictures from this.

Three thoughts, three zoom levels.

1x Maybe Boris Bikes and Oyster cards have finally broken everyones mental model of transport for the better. In London at least. Greater adoption of electric cars seems to have given everyone the freedom to think differently. Why has the source of power caused that shift? What can you do with an electric motor that you can’t with a petrol engine?

10x Here’s a funny thing. Some sketches of cars, or of the common shapes and lines of cars, but grouped by brand. This felt really odd to me. The brand feels entirely superfluous. Especially in an environment where you are starting from a blank canvas. What’s the role of the brand here - could you really say a particular brand of car has a distinctive style of design any more? Lamborghini maybe, but Renault? Any of the other mainstream car brands?

Especially when they are all owned by just three or four holding companies.

100x As “mobility” means service more than vehicle, what’s the role of the brand? The product is the service… How many other brands + products can you say that about? The service provider will become more important the product provider which has huge implications for brands (companies) that sell physical products. Barclays Boris Bikes vs Santander Cycles? Does anyone care?

We’ve been talking about this for ages, but I’ve never really thought about through the lens of a design style. How do you replicate a distinctive design in a service? A digital (invisible) service? If you can switch service between products how can you maintain a distinctive design style? When there’s no visible interface? Much opportunity here I think. (I imagine others have written about this a lot.)

Who's the Battista Farina of service design? 

 I don't think I'm making much sense.

Anyway.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Basquiat at the Barbican

I enjoyed this exhibition a lot. It closes next Sunday 28th January. You should make an effort to go, but it's probably sold out. Sorry about that.

 You can't take pictures, like all good exhibitions.

 

 

Design research urls #8

36. No idea what rabbit hole I went down to find this, but y'know - internet. Last year Mike Ashley gave an update at the Sports Direct shareholders meeting which was held at the London Stock Exchange. Profits had dropped 59% that year. He urged investors to note down every word he was about to say. He stood up, spoke 17 words and then sat down.

“It’s clear we have smashed the ball out of the park with our Selfridges of sport concept”.

For our international listeners who haven't heard of Sports Direct here's a picture. 

Mike Ashley confounds investors with 17-word presentation

 

37. Strange goings on at British Vogue summed up well by Jeremy Leslie the king of magazine blogging. Two covers using exactly the same picture, styled by new Vogue editor Enninful. No obvious tie-up. Odd.

I’m actually excited by this. The whole sector needs a shake up design-wise and you’d think the combination of 2018 + Vogue + Enninful would be potent. Here’s hoping that’s what this is and not just circumstances.

MagCulture: What's happening at British Vogue

 

38. Muji have launched a hotel in Shenzhen. It is as beautiful and as graceful as you’d hope. Makes me wonder what took them so long. But I always think that about Muji and maybe that’s the key to their success. Not following trends or being driven by the same short term goals as everyone else. Imagine Muji as a pace layer.

(On another note, I’m now imagining Ive and Jobs staying in Muji hotels while visiting Foxconn factories. “I’d leave my bags by the door. I wouldn’t unpack. I’d go and sit on the bed and wait for the inevitable call from Steve”)

Muji offers look inside anti-cheap hotel

 

39. Frustratingly light article by the Guardian on the cover design of 2018’s must talked about book - Fire and Fury. The boring cover design does seem odd given the magazine covers Trump has inspired. Political books are supposed to look kinda boring… but this is not a business-as-usual presidency. Deserves a longer article.

Why is the cover of Fire and Fury so ugly?

 

40. Digital banking consultancy 11FS gave out their awards for 2017. 11FS are smart and have worked in proper digital banking so it makes interesting reading. Lots of good stuff and not a surprise to see BBVA “win” Best incumbent bank. Derek White and Rob Brown have built an impressive design team just like they did at Barclays (where they worked with some of 11FS.) BBVA we’ve talked about before in para 21 "BBVA has 150 designers in 11 countries, all with different specialties, not that unusual but they are also training 1000 design ambassadors."

But, the most interesting bit? Google Tez a Google payment layer for banking in India.

Google Tez

11FS Digital Pulse 2017 Awards

 

41. Fast Company wrote an “update” of Dieter Rams 10 Principles of Good Design. Some good stuff in there and it’s nearly worth a read except - beware, it's one of those annoying web pages where everything moves around for five minutes before you can start reading.

Oh and as Ben Brignell points out 

But if you can put up with all of that 10 New Principles of Good Design

 

42. Here are the Top 10 Asymmetric planes.

 

 

43. In Ben Evans’s widely read tech newsletter he points out that

“Apple's privacy changes in iOS 11 knee-capped one of the largest independent ad-tech companies. The most interesting thing about this to me is how little people in tech seemed to notice - people in Silicon Valley really don't talk about advertising unless they're actually working on it themselves.”

If that doesn’t scare ad world, nothing will.