Design Week
31 July 2008
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A touch of glass
31 July 2008
Cast, blown, etched, engraved, slumped, fused – glass offers designers huge scope for decorative and functional forms, and that excludes its architectural potential. With several recent exhibitions and innovative, eye-catching graduate work, Hannah Booth wonders if this area is fast becoming the hottest creative discipline Blame Swarovski if you like, but years after the trend for maximalism first took hold, demand for one of its ...
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Austen bags top job at The Body Shop
31 July 2008
The Body Shop International's new creative director Nikki Austen is set to bring her retail and beauty experience to bear when she starts her new job next month.Austen (pictured) has worked in-house at fashion retailers Ted Baker and Red or Dead. In the past four years at Fold 7 as creative director, she has also designed for beauty brands Molton Brown and L'Oréal.Currently responsible for a team of ten designers, Austen will have to adjust to overseeing a much larger team ...
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Bridge bonanza
31 July 2008
What, exactly, is a bridge for? Crossing some obstruction to get from one point to another, in a functional kind of way? Don't be so naive. These days bridges are high-design objects, collaborations between architects and engineers. They frequently meander and incorporate seating and look-out platforms - like the new Castleford bridge, following the course of a weir, by McDowell and Benedetti with engineers Alan Baxter and Arup. Some of them are kinetic, lifting or rotating (McDowell and ...
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Co-design should be considered a benefit, not a threat
31 July 2008
The issue of free-pitching has again raised its head. As the national strategic body for design, we are opposed to free-pitching and always ensure that whenever we commission creative work, it is paid for. Through programmes such as Designing Demand, we actively and unambiguously promote best practice. However, what is more troubling from discussions in Design Week is the conflation of co-design with free-pitching as a threat to the industry. Co-design is a benefit, not ...
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Cog Design
31 July 2008
Cog Design has created the campaign graphics for the latest Wellcome Collection exhibition, Skeletons. This is Cog's fourth campaign for the museum since its appointment last October.
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Design Museum stages This Happened interaction talk
31 July 2008
Interaction design event This Happened will take place this month at the Design Overtime festival, held at the Design Museum.This Happened is a series of talks aimed at opening up a dialogue and creating a greater understanding of the stories behind multimedia and interaction design.The project encourages people to share information on concepts and production processes. Established practitioners, commercial companies and students are all involved.Among those taking ...
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Design openings as London 2012 partners need push
31 July 2008
The marketing departments of the London Olympics' biggest corporate sponsors could be in the firing line following the publication of research by Ledbury Group last week.Ahead of the Olympic handover to London in August, Ledbury commissioned a survey of 1000 'opinion- formers', and found that more than 40 per cent were unable to identify a single sponsor of London 2012.This is bad news for the six companies that have jointly invested £300m in the games. But it could ...
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Design4retail
31 July 2008
Design4retail is creating a new footwear merchandise system for Lacoste, to be introduced globally from August. Briefed to produce a display system that could enhance all the brand’s footwear ranges, from sports to formal, Design4retail has created high-gloss white acrylic units featuring the fashion brand’s crocodile logo.
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Designer-thinking alone will fail to tackle crime
31 July 2008
As reported in 'Criminal opportunities' (DW 10 July), Sebastian Conran of the Home Office's Design and Technology Alliance says design can tackle broader crime-related issues including youth and knife crime. Since time immemorial, the designer and thief have been in a cat-and-mouse game outwitting and out-innovating each other. We have all benefited from this and are free to choose, buy and use the end-product. But now there is an altogether different agenda going on. Here, ...
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Dublin Bus scheme by AIG and Image Now
31 July 2008
The city of Dublin is set to benefit from the creation of a major bus information system, designed by Applied Information Group and Dublin graphics consultancy Image Now.
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Eazytiger
31 July 2008
Leicester-based design group Eazytiger has designed a website for print retailer Canvas4Life, which allows shoppers to view pictures in a customised room setting.
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GlaxoSmith Kline reviews design roster
31 July 2008
GlaxoSmithKline is reviewing its roster for the first time since 2004. The pharmaceuticals giant is understood to be reconsidering its external design suppliers ahead of major investment in its pain relief and oralcare brands including Aquafresh and Panadol.
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Haunch of Venison makes New York debut
31 July 2008
UK contemporary art gallery Haunch of Venison is making its first foray into the US market, with the opening of a space designed by Steven Learner Studio.It is Haunch of Venison's first major venture since being controversially acquired by international auction house Christie's last year.Final touches are being put to the 1860m2 exhibition space located in the Rockefeller Center in New York City. 'The gallery is unique in that it is not in the traditional gallery district ...
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Head light
31 July 2008
Excess is a byword in rock’n’roll, but in these eco-conscious times can concert lighting still make an impact without damaging the planet? Bands like Radiohead are taking the lead with hi-tech LEDs to achieve more with less, says Nick Smurthwaite After years of profligacy, rock concert designers and promoters are finding eco-friendly ways of mounting shows that are visually exciting without giving the National Grid a nervous breakdown.Ther
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Hemisphere
31 July 2008
Manchester-based consultancy Hemisphere has designed an exhibition at The Lowry museum in Salford. Aimed at families, the show - So You Want to be an Artist - opened this week and runs until 2 November.
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Here today, gone tomorrow
31 July 2008
Architects, designers and clients are revelling in the creative opportunities afforded by portable, temporary structures, says Henrietta Thompson
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Inspired, Bryan Clark - University College Falmouth
31 July 2008
Finding the unique, noticing the ignored and looking where others do not dare are some of the pointers that can help crack a design problem. The adventure of travelling to the places we visit to discover a solution can make for an exciting journey, opening new horizons and places for design thinking in the process; an inspiring and addictive challenge.The details we observe and people we talk to, central to an issue, will undoubtedly play their part in the design process. However, ...
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LG
31 July 2008
South Korean electronics maker LG has been awarded Business Superbrand status by the Superbrands organisation.
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London 2012 brands look for design
31 July 2008
The marketing departments of the London Olympics’ biggest corporate sponsors could be in the firing line following the publication of research by Ledbury Group last week.
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Morgans Hotel redesigns with Andreé Putman
31 July 2008
New York's iconic Morgans Hotel will next month unveil a contemporary new look created by interior designer Andrée Putman.The French designer first crafted the Madison Avenue site's dramatic black-and-white interior back in 1983, forging the brand's reputation for design-led, understated chic within the luxury hotel market.Putman's latest redesign remains faithful to the hotel's trademark monochrome palette, while adding softer, more contemporary gradations of white, grey ...
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Navyblue
31 July 2008
Navyblue is appointing Julie-Anne Afrin as its financial director.
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Nevis Design Consultants gives Letts diaries upmarket feel
31 July 2008
Diary brand Letts is looking to break into the 'exclusive market', with the creation of a new range of diaries by Nevis Design Consultants.The Scotland-based consultancy was appointed by Letts in November 2007, without a pitch, to create an upmarket ladies' diary. Graham Scott, creative director on the project, suggested that the scope be widened, so two luxury diaries were designed that would appeal to men and women alike.The project has taken nine months to finish, following ...
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News in Pictures
31 July 2008
100% Design has commissioned Lime Studio to design a bar for this year's show. The Levantina Bar will be a centrepiece at the event, which runs from 18-21 September at Earls Court, London SW5.
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News in pictures
31 July 2008
Somerset House is to become home to an installation by furniture design duo Fredrikson Stallard. Called Portrait, it will be a centrepiece for the London Design Festival in September. The work has been commissioned by champagne brand Veuve Clicquot and takes the form of a single piece of wood, which has been recreated in steel and light to replicate the grain structure of wood. The steel sections are the dominant feature in daylight, while at night the spaces in between will glow in Veuve ...
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Pitching for an industry standard we can all endorse
31 July 2008
While agreeing with the Design Business Association and the Chartered Society of Designers about changing the culture of free-pitching being an accepted norm, Anti Copying In Design is aware that critics might say it's easy for design bodies to take the moral high ground. A potential pot of gold is always tempting, but beware - many who invest in free-pitch work often find their intellectual property has been infringed because designs/ products/plans/concepts are forwarded to other ...
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Pollen
31 July 2008
London brand consultancy Pollen has appointed Lucy Protheroe as director of operations, overseeing client services. She joins from Stream Digital Media.
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Profile
31 July 2008
The cardboard creations of Australian Anthony Dann reflect his core values of sustainability and simplicity, yet still find favour in Milan. Sarah Harris tracks down the 30-something origami wizard on his home turf
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Publicity meister
31 July 2008
When it comes to self-promotion, few designers are prepared to go that extra mile taken by Stefan Sagmeister, says Adrian Shaughnessy
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Royal Institute of British Architects
31 July 2008
A Royal Institute of British Architects exhibition, showcasing previously unseen work by Swiss architect and designer Le Corbusier, opens in Liverpool this autumn. Highlights will include a mural painting from Le Corbusier’s office at Rue de Sèveres in Paris, a large-scale model of the Philips Pavilion and film footage shot by Le Corbusier in Arcachon. The exhibition is the centrepiece of Riba’s Le Corbusier season. It will open at The Crypt of Liverpool’s Metropolitan Cathedral ...
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Scott King
31 July 2008
Graphic designer Scott King has created an installation called Temporary Eyesore on hoardings around London's Native Land building development at Hopton Street, SE1, for client the Architecture Foundation. The work will aim to distract onlookers at the site until 20 August.
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Taking a stake in the future
31 July 2008
Start-ups need design but lack cash. Design groups love to work with them. The solution? Equity stakes, not fees, says Chris Tacy
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The rise of Berlin's retail gothic
31 July 2008
Long dominated by shabby chic, low-key interiors, Berlin’s retailers have lately adopted a wittier design aesthetic. John Stones takes a look at Geometry, a new menswear store which features a ‘mad professor’ look with a skeletal twist
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Tom Dixon creates Centre Point members club
31 July 2008
The summit of London’s iconic Centre Point building has been transformed into an exclusive members’ club, its interior masterminded by Tom Dixon.
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United Visual Artists meet Massive Attack for Beck's Fusions
31 July 2008
Multimedia event Beck’s Fusions will this year further develop its performance area as an interactive exhibition space and art installation.
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Voxpop
31 July 2008
Sustainable Development Commission chairman Jonathon Porritt says designers must cure themselves of 'client dependency syndrome' to further sustainable design. Is CDS debilitating, and what is the remedy?
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Work
31 July 2008
Leicester-based graphic design group Work has appointed Stocks Taylor Benson creative director Euan Webster as its creative and company director.
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Yes, design really can play a role in changing the world
31 July 2008
Chris Tacy is bold in his assertion that design can change the world (see Business Insight, page 19).His view that global greatness can be achieved by aligning brand strategy and design thinking with investment in entrepreneurial start-ups fits well with initiatives such as the ...
