Who is the most interesting collaborator you have ever worked with?

Fiji Airways worked with a traditional Masi artist on its new branding. Who is the most interesting collaborator you have ever worked with?

Benji Holroyd

‘We get to work with some of the most talented people in the world, but hands down the most interesting is our little old signwriter, Ken. A retired sign manufacturer unable to turn his back on the industry he served for over four decades, we continue to collaborate with a man clearly in love with his trade. Each new project brings a new tale, trade tip, or more often a clip around the ear and a few choice words. A small cog in our big wheel but truly inspiring, which makes him priceless.’

Benji Holroyd, creative director, SB Studio and co-founder, Cow&Co

Gareth Howat

‘When we were designing a wayfinding system for Stockwell Park Estate, we came up with the idea of using a mix of artists to create a palette of patterns all based on the history and local connections of the site. There’s a well known grafitti area called The Pen in Stockwell, which has been used for years by grafitti artists. We were told about a local artist called Boyd. He was quite secretive, so we never got to actually meet him – it was all done via email, but the end results were great. He did all the patterns as real grafitti then shot them – it looked brilliant.’

Gareth Howat, co-founder, Hat-trick Design

Mike Alderson

‘When researching for our BT Vision rebrand in 2010 we discovered Linden Gledhill’s ‘liquid figures’ macro photography. When we got in touch with Linden to invite him to collaborate on the project the discussion unexpectedly turned to how much time off he would need to book from his day job to come over to London for the shoot. It transpired that Linden is a PhD biochemist who works for a major pharmaceutical company in Philadelphia, developing protein molecules to treat cancer and diabetes. He is the most intelligent bloke I’ve ever worked with…. and a very nice chap to boot.’

Mike Alderson, creative director, ManvsMachine

Ryan Tym

‘Collaboration comes from an ability to understand each other’s ideas; to listen and react to problems and, above all, to trust in the abilities of each other. Beyond any of the illustrators, photographers and copywriters we’ve worked with, the most interesting and important collaborators I’ve encountered are some of our clients. Their ability to work with us in the creative process, providing key business insights to reinforce a strong creative solution is what makes them great collaborators and their projects so memorable.’

Ryan Tym, senior designer, Unreal

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  • Furious November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Hey come back to reality ! Fiji Airways is not a design consultancy..and they did not mix the talent of the concerned Artist with those one of strategist brand talent – strategically what they should have normally do, and , could have magically work – They just ask the Artist to elaborate a Tevateva ornement (her personal expression and vision) and FIJI AIRWAYS decided to use the result as their future identity logo and modified very poorly a font for the logotype…there was no one single professional creative collaboration behind the job – Get your notes update please !! –
    Those people don’t respect creative neither designers THIS IS IT !! you should not make any publicity for them its counter productive for our industry and ethic.

  • Cliff November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    I worked on this. The fact that it respectfully uses an authentic local artist categorically does NOT mean an international consultancy of note wasn’t involved in both the concepting and realisation of the design. Do you think either a small airline or a local artist would know how to apply an identity to the myriad of touchpoints an airline (even a small one) has? Please grow up.

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