Designers Journal | A chronicle of jottings, doodles & boutique design treats

Line up for Offset 2012 Announced

19/10/2011

by DJ

News

Running from 9–11 March 2012, Dublin’s creative festival OFFSET 2012 encompasses talks, gallery shows, presentations, workshops, debates, parties, interviews and Q&A’s with some of the leading creatives of the world. Did I mention parties? If all that isn’t enough to tickle your taste buds, you wait ’till you get your chops around the speakers lined up for the week. In no particular order of awesomeness; Michael Bierut, Paula Scher (both of Pentagram notorioty), Stefan Sagmeister, Kyle Cooper (Prologue), Friends With You, Jessica Hische, Eike Konig (Hort), Antoine+Manuel and Evan Hecox amongst a handfull of other industry maestros.

Run by Peter O’Dwyer, Bren Byrne and Richard Seabrooke and barely 2 years since its inception, the design festival has grown at an impressive scale and on the basic premise of 25+ creatives presenting their work over 3 days in 2 rooms.

Tickets are on sale now, with a discounted rate for early bird revellers who nip in there bright and breezey and before 31 January. Personally, I’m keen as mustard to cross the Irish Sea for the festivities, if you can make it too it’s sure to be well worth the time investment. Maybe see you there for a pint.

Tw. @weloveoffset / Fb. OFFSET2010

Liam Brazier {Essex}

19/10/2011

by DJ

Illustrators

Making the complex beautiful. It’s more or less as simple as that. Child of the eighties Liam Brazier‘s idiosyncratic style of geometric masterpieces encapsulate the accent of his generation; ie Star Wars, Marvel and cool shit.

Surprisingly, when Brazier first started dabbling in the geometry ten years ago it developed out of method; obsessively scalping out tiny triangles of different colored paper and spray-mounting them onto board – a painfully lengthy process, no doubt. These days, Mssr’s Apple & Adobe have aided simplification of the process, enabling Brazier to draw and colour each shape in Photoshop.

But he’s far from a one trick pony, both an animator and an illustrator, he’s had work appear in Dazed & Confused, Creative Review, Design Week, Glastonbury, the Museum of London, London tube platforms, international film festivals, Virgin TV, and nationwide cinemas. Check out his showreel below…

Tw. @liambrazier

Showreel 2011 from Liam Brazier on Vimeo.

A Friend of Mine {Melbourne}

18/10/2011

by STY

Awesome agencies

With so much great design work in their portfolio, I found myself having to restrain from filling this page right up. A Friend of Mine have an envious selection of work on their site, however it’s their great use of typefaces and customizing letter forms that make them really stand out. Lead by the talented Suzy Tuxen, AFOM are not afraid of getting their hands dirty and actually crafting things, making beautiful work out of paper and glue.

Fb. A-Friend-Of-Mine-Design-Studio

The Allotment pen Valerie Hoskins brand

17/10/2011

by DJ

News

Favourites of the Journal, The Allotment, have just completed a delightful rebrand of screen writers agent Valerie Hoskins Associates.

Says the Allotment;
“We created a proposition based around putting ‘Words into action’. The idea reflects their very personal, hands-on and all action approach to brokering transactions of script’s and books into movies and films. The ‘clapper-book’ logotype becomes a visual cue for a series of ‘snippets’ of dialogue taken from a wide range of their writers scripts. We carefully re-purposed the words to become witty messaging on communication pieces and to reflect personality traits of the VHA team. The language demonstrates the diversity of the writing talent on offer allowing the team to promote and cross-sell indirectly through their brand. We also devised and directed a series of short films where we asked a number of their writers to sum up VHA based on their experiences.”

Overall the solution is thoughful and elegant, the process and rationalle as enjoyable as the outcome and the Mark itself is classic and timeless, entirely suitable and superbly implemented. Lovely, understated, provoking.

VHA from The Allotment Brand Design on Vimeo.

Have you got news? Share the love!

Oneighty {Burnley}

14/10/2011

by STY

Awesome agencies

From the love of screen printing their own marketing material to the fine quality they deliver for their actual client Oneighty seems to have found the right balance. This Burnley outfit off a very comprehensive portfolio with excellence across every medium they seem to put their hands to.

Tw. @Oneighty_studio

Andy Taray {Akron, Oh}

13/10/2011

by DJ

Outstanding individuals

Continuing our entirely incidental theme of inspiring creatives-that-were-inspired-by-eighties-cartoon-heroes {see Jimmy Turrell and his fondness of Thundercats}, He-Man lovin’ design chap Andy Taray, aka Ohio Boy, held his Apple mighty mouse aloft and declared “he had the power.” And by the power of greyskull he was right. He had the power to produce a body of work just sweet enough to make even Skeletor blush. Enough tenuous introductories, behold…

Tw. @ohioboydesign

Jimmy Turrell {London}

12/10/2011

by DJ

Illustrators

It’s difficult to know where to start with this guy, so let’s start at the beginning and see where we go… London illustrative bad boy Jimmy Turrell is a Central St Martins School of Art alumni. Articulated his own words… “he combines a love of handmade collage, drawing, screenprinting and painting alongside digital techniques. He’s presently very inspired by the Locussolus album, Hudson Mohawke, Thundercats, vintage 1930′s sowing manuals, Zdenek Ziegler and good old London Town.”

Yeh, who’s not inspired by Thundercats? Thunder, Thunder, Thundercats – hoooooooooooo!

The list of clients his work has high-fived is nothing short of an embarrassment of riches and includes… Universal Music, Nike, Lexus, Pentagram, Levis, MTV, The New Yorker, Capitol Records, Conde Nast, The New York Times, Green Peace, Frame Magazine, Kyocera, Tokion, Esquire, Dazed & Confused, XL Recordings, Channel 4, The Guardian, Spin Magazine, DC Shoes, GQ, The Times, LA Times, Newsweek, Getty, Adidas, Sony Music, Little White Lies, New York Magazine, Wired, Teenage Cancer Trust, Glastonbury Festival, The Ride, Vanity Fair, Rome Snowboards, Uniqlo… so how do you like them apples? Most people retire when their CV boasts names like those.

His blog is great and he’s got an online shop coming soon which is sure to peddle prints and the like that will be sure to pimp up the drabbest of walls. So, with no further ado, Designers Journal gives you Jimmy Turrell…

Tw. @JimmyTurrell

Mr. Henry {Antwerp}

11/10/2011

by STY

Awesome agencies

On discovery of this agency I am strangely hypnotized, transfixed you might say, Mr. Henry on first glace is the playful portfolio of some fresh face all excited and energized, embarking on its first steps into the world of design. Don’t get me wrong, not a nativity at all but more of praise, admiration as Mr. Henry has managed to maintain that love and passion that can get lost amongst those less inspiring jobs, to create wonderful work for high profile clients. Describing themselves as ‘a birthplace of concepts’ and ‘a creative cave,’ it’s refreshing to find a manifesto that lives up to the quality of work… well done Mr. Henry, well done!