Black, Yellow, Wood and Graphite – D&AD introduces new Pencils
From next year, D&AD is introducing new Wood and Graphite Pencils, which will be awarded alongside its traditional Black and Yellow Pencil prizes.
The new pencils replace the previous “In Book” and “Nomination” categories, which D&AD says have been “often undervalued or simply misunderstood”.
The new Wood Pencil will replace the “In Book” category and is, D&AD says, equivalent to a bronze award. This will be awarded to every project featured in the D&AD Annual.
The Graphite Pencil will replace the “Nomination” category and act as a silver award. This will be given to “standout work”, D&AD says.
The Yellow and Black Pencils remain, alongside the White Pencil, which was introduced in 2011 to recognise “the power of creative communications to effect change for good”.
The new range of Pencils will sit alongside two special awards, the Most Awarded category, the winner of which receives a Gold Pencil, and the President’s Award.
They will be used across all D&AD awards schemes, including the New Blood programme.
D&AD chief executive Tim Lindsay says the move follows feedback from D&AD members and entrants that there was “confusion” around the awards hierarchy.
Lindsay adds: “Our aim was to make things clearer, but we also didn’t want to default to a conventional system.
“We wanted a system that was unique, but instantly recognisable, with each Award’s place within the hierarchy apparent. Wood and Graphite both felt like the right logical extension of our existing Pencils and symbolic of the craft at the heart of creative excellence.”
The new awards will come into effect from May 2015 at the next D&AD Awards ceremony and all historical awards will now be referred to using the new system.
The new Pencils have been designed by Turner Duckworth.
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This is good news and about time! The pencils have become iconic in their own right. I wonder if we can get back-dated pencils to replace all the flimsy pieces of paper we have received for the many “in book” and nominations we have achieved over the years?