The aim of Khoi’s talk was to encourage designers in Japan to “get out of their daily routines and take a new step” in their practice. He shared his slides and they give a good, quick lesson in the value of design. Here’s a nonconsecutive glimpse. Khoi mentions Uber and Lyft as examples of firms where design has been instrumental, but where change is led by technology. He then talks about the difference between change that’s led by technology and change led by design. So how can design lead change? All slides are below. I’m sure they did the trick. Via Khoi’s post The First Time I W ..read more

So, what is the responsibility of a designer when the design is impeccable but the client is tainted? Being accountable to some moral standard is the key. A designer must be professionally, culturally, and socially responsible for the impact his or her design has on the citizenry. Indeed, every good citizen must understand that his or her respective actions will have reactions. All individual acts, including the creation and manufacture of design for a client, exert impact on others. But Rand could not foresee Enron’s gross betrayal. And even if large corporations are sometimes suspect, why ..read more

One of America’s most successful poster designers began his career at the age of 20, after graduating from an illustration and design course at Pratt Institute. Gold got a job in the poster department in the New York office of Warner Bros, and his first two projects were for the hugely successful 1942 films Yankee Doodle Dandy and Casablanca (both won various Academy Awards). Gold enlisted in the army for WWII, where he created training films for the Air Corps. When the war was over, he rejoined Warner Bros., heading west to the Warner lot in LA. Just a few years later, in 1962, he returned ..read more

Pricing Creativity, Rule #2: Offer Options One of the biggest pricing mistakes that creative professionals make is to put a proposal in front of the client that contains only one option. In such a take-it-or-leave-it proposition there are only two outcomes, 50% of which are positive and 50% of which are negative. If you resolve from hereon to always put three options in your proposals, you will increase the percentage of positive outcomes by half. That increase in odds, however, is not the main reason you should adhere to this rule of always offering options. There is something far more powe ..read more

Canada Modern is a physical and digital archive of modernist Canadian graphic design, focusing on the period 1960—1985. It’s the culmination of Blair Thomson’s long-held ambition to curate a comprehensive national cache, whilst addressing the absence of any such resource on a singular thread. “Canada Modern exists to preserve, document, educate and inspire, to build a new and richer understanding of what can clearly be seen as a seminal point in Canada’s development as a nation — one of optimism, growth and modernity. At the heart of this work lies identity design, typography and graphic com ..read more

Since the Identity Designed website was launched in 2010, it’s been a bit of a labour of love sharing insights into more than 500 projects from design studios at the top of their game. Eight years later and I’m delighted to have signed a book deal with Rockport to bring the name to print. The book will take readers behind-the-scenes at around 20 studios from across the planet, giving a detailed look at one of the most interesting visual identity projects from each. It will cover workflow aspects from pricing and invoicing to generating ideas and reaching consensus on the strongest direction ..read more

Tom Geismar and Ivan Chermayeff. I was sad to hear that Ivan Chermayeff passed away on December 2nd, 2017 at the age of 85. While we never had the pleasure of meeting in person, Ivan and his colleagues Tom Geismar and Sagi Haviv have been gracious enough to share their thoughts and advice with me in my much shorter time as a graphic designer. In the words of his design partner Tom Geismar, “Ivan was a brilliant designer and illustrator, with a vibrant personal style that reflected joy, intelligence and wit. He loved surprise, large-scale objects, and the colour red. For over 60 years, Ivan and ..read more

In 1964, the late Marshall McLuhan coined, “The medium is the message.” He ushered in the notion that both the message and its medium influence how any communication is perceived. But in the Insta-culture of the early 21st century, it’s not as straightforward to find the cream of the crop. In an effort to understand, measure, and mark the brilliant, competitions have been created to determine the impact of brand messages. But these competitions charge an entry fee. And they often need entrants to fill out complicated entry forms that detail and justify the return on investment, reach, and ot ..read more

I’ve worked from home since 2005. The home’s changed six or seven times, so I only tend to hold on to what I need (and books/photos), but there’s some standard gear that sticks around, and I definitely find it easier to focus when the desk isn’t cluttered. BenQ PD3200u For years I used a 27″ iMac as my main screen, but the glare off the glass wasn’t great, and I’d always be increasing/decreasing the screen brightness depending on how sunny it was. The matt display of BenQ’s 32″ 4K monitor gets rid of that problem. It’s a lot easier on the eyes (not quite looks-wise, but absolutely with ..read more

Lady Gaga called out Glamour for Photoshopping her cover image. France isn’t the first country to legislate on image editing in advertising (Israel did so in 2012), but it’s good to see more awareness on the issue. Fines of €37,500, or 30% of the cost of creating the ad, can be given to those caught out. Studies have shown that, out of all Western Europeans, French women have the lowest average BMI, at 23.2, and 11 percent of French women are considered “extremely thin.” The new law is aimed at helping to tackle body image problems among people chasing body shapes they can’t hope to live up to ..read more