It is impossible to tell the story of late twentieth century Britain without reference to The Sun. For right or wrong, the tabloid newspaper is central to the narrative of a country that, in the 1980s particularly, was more divided than at any time before or since. On its pages – and most especially on its front pages – The Sun embodied the dominant political and social spirit of the times. Seldom can graphic design have been used to such dramatic effect.
Pop artist Sir Peter Blake has painted a portrait of the late and much-lamented John Peel to feature on the sleeve on a new compilation of the DJ’s favourite tracks, John Peel-Right Time, Wrong Speed:1977-1987, the first of a trilogy celebrating Peel’s career.
Wallpaper* has thrown everything but the proverbial kitchen sink at the cover of the magazine’s tenth anniversary issue, out today. The result is a cornucopia of print finishing.
MySpace is the new DTP. More than 100 million users, each with their own page – each designing their own page. The desktop PC, digital fonts and basic layout software famously turned every headteacher and every accountant with a 40th birthday party to organise into Alexey Brodovitch: MySpace is the same, but with flashing, twinkling, scrolling knobs on.
Last year in the magazine we wrote about design group FUEL’s initial forays into the world of publishing with books The Music Library and Fleur. Now FUEL is about to publish a new book, Ideas Have Legs…
Faced with coming up with a stand-out campaign for British Airways’ latest “World Offers” sale, BBH in London has hit on a ingenious solution: to do a tie-up between the airline and Google, whose account is also held by the agency.
Straight outta Cape Cod and keepin’ it real is Prep Unit, a trio of New England gangsters, or “prepsters”, whose video Tea Partay has been notching up a massive amount of hits since its recent online release. BBH New York are behind this well-produced viral for Smirnoff’s Raw Tea which essentially takes all the clichés of blinged-up gangster rap at its finest and adorns them in pastel knitwear and boat shoes.
Here we go again. Today’s Observer Magazine proudly proclaims itself to be “The Design Issue” and yet, with wearisome predictability, we search its glossy pages in vain for any acknowledgement that design can, just sometimes, be about the organisation and dissemination of information and ideas. Unless, of course, those ideas are rendered in ruinously expensive polycarbonate.
Graphic design’s invisibility in the British national press long ago ceased to be a surprise. Now it’s just downright rude.
With just under two years to go, the The Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (or, mercifully, BOCOG for short) have released what, for many designers will be a result far more interesting than the efforts of a few thousand sweaty athletes.
Yes, the winners of a competition to design the new set of Olympic Pictograms have been annnounced. And very cool they are too.
Academy director Kim Gehrig helms this charming new video for indie rockers Gomez. Gehrig places us in the role of the protagonist as we travel the world, eating bad plane food, flirting with strangers and generally having a fine time. Guaranteed to cause itchy feet.
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Special projects commissioned by Creative Review and our partners
Rushes Soho Shorts Festival 2009 is free to enter and open for submissions across six categories: Short Film, Animation, Documentary, Music Video, Newcomer and Broadcast Design
Designing through the recession: Michael Bierut has some advice for 2009
There’s probably no God… The atheist bus campaign is to appear on 800 buses across the UK
Objectified, the new documentary film from Gary Hustwit, looks interesting. Marc Newson, Jonathan Ive and Karim Rashid all feature
The Vignelli Canon, a “little book” – available as a 50 page PDF – “for a better understanding of typography in Graphic Design”
The Wellcome Collection’s excellent exhibition War and Medicine has a website, Remembering War, which encourages people to post up their own memories of war
So what is the art of the Bush era? Well, Kevin Drum reckons its Damien Hirst and Jack Bauer in 24… (link: Andrew Sullivan)
Bizarre marketing image of the week: MillerCoors’ entire 1,200 person sales and marketing team come together to form the brewer’s new Pentagram-designed logo.
Playboy Mexico says its latest cover is nothing to do with the Virgin Mary, honest
Mojo is the name of a new software that allows you to share the content of your iTunes with friends…
Burger King launches meaty perfume
Santa’s Beard competition. Download the beard. Cut it out. Take a pic of yourself wearing it and send it to the guys at Un.titled. You could win a prize!
Something’s very wrong with the cover of January’s Tatler (and not just the subject matter). Clue: count the legs…
Eric Baker’s “images of the day” is always an intriguing post over at Design Observer
Framestore CFC’s new Christmas game is based on their forthcoming feature animation, Desperaux. Addictive (be warned!) platform fare starring a little mouse with big ears…