Crowdfunder launched to reissue IBM Graphic Standards Manual

The campaign to revive designer Paul Rand’s graphic design system for the tech company has been initiated by French publishing house Empire.

France-based non-profit publisher Empire has launched a crowdfunding campaign to reissue a book version of tech company IBM’s Graphic Standards Manual.

The manual spans over 20 years’ worth of graphic design work created for IBM, including graphic designer Paul Rand’s 1972 eight-bar, layered strip logo for the company, which is still in use today.

The Graphics Standards Manual dates from 1956, when designer Eliot Noyes was hired by the director of IBM to reimagine the company’s entire design strategy, encompassing everything from communications to the architecture of its buildings.

Noyes appointed graphic designer Paul Rand the same year to create IBM’s graphic standards system, including the logotype; graphic and typographic rules; internal and external documents and signage.

Preface by Steven Heller

Any changes and updates made to the standards manual between the 1960s and 1980s were documented and organised into different sections within a single folder.

Now, with the support of the IBM New York archive team and the Kandinsky Library of the Georges Pompidou Centre in Paris, Empire is looking to reissue a softcover book version of the manual.

The book features high resolution scans of all the original pages from the manual, as well as a preface written by American design author Steven Heller and an optional French translation version.

The crowdfunding campaign runs until 30 June 2017, with the target of raising €28,000 (£23,900).

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