The Internet

This week we covered several aspects of the internet and how it has affected Graphic Design. One thing that particularly interested me was in this class was the discussion on www.99designs.com and www.stocklayouts.com. We were asked:

(For this I’m going to talk about 99designs specifically).

What services do the sites provide? 

99designs offers people a design service, a logo, packaging or even a website layout. Designers have to pitch their design, sometimes 100s of designers take part and only one will actually get chosen and paid. The person requiring the design can pick a package depending on the quality of design they require.

Why would a client want to use these services?

If they use one design studio or an individual they will probably offer a few routes to go down with a logo and offer variations. 99designs they could be looking at 100s of different design ideas for a logo.

What impact might the existence of sites like these have on the graphic design profession?

I believe that it undermines the role of a Graphic Designer and saturates the industry, people are expecting 100s of versions of a design. They also expect all of those designers to work for free. You wouldn’t expect your plumber to work for free so why would you expect a designer to do so?

As students studying design, what is your opinion about these sites?

I worry that as more of these types of sites are created, less people appreciate the role of a Graphic Designer and we are potentially being put out of a job buy more online designers willing to work for low pay and for free. However, there are some quite large differences between these two ways of working. The 99Designs approach is a very un-personable output. Communication between designer and client is minimal. They read a brief and create an output. Some communication might be made in the final stages and if so via e-mail. Many design agencies have had to step up their game to ensure they offer something more than just a design. They meet their client a build a relationship with them. They won’t just answer the brief, they will often create the brief with the client once they have understood their needs. Many have become design strategists to really create something that is completely tailored to their needs. These are two different design approaches but I also feel the clients are quite different too.

I believe that in life no matter what the product, you get what you pay for. If you wanted a nice new chair made for your living room and found a carpenter who said they would build you the chair you want for half the price of what you had been quoted by a recommended carpenter. You would probably be a bit concerned about the quality of the final chair. The same goes for design.

St Bride Library Visit

This week we had a visit to the St Brides Library near Fleet Street. In 1891, St Bride Foundation was established to provide a social, cultural and recreational centre for London’s Fleet Street and its burgeoning print and publishing trade. Now, this historic site is a living and breathing community once again, with new projects, facilities and programmes expanding its central mission: to excite and inspire.

We were shown a selection of items kept in the huge archives of St Brides. For all the typography nerds like myself out there this was fascinating. These items included some of the earliest printed newspapers, some sketches of Eric Gill’s early Versions of Gill Sans and some of Louis John Pouchée decorativee typefaces.

Pouchée established his Type Foundry in 1818 and it was here that his decorative alphabets were made. 23 of Pouchée’s decorative alphabets are now held at St Bride Library. After spending World War II in a store in London they were moved to Oxford University Press. Then in 1966 they were identified by St Bride Librarian James Mosley, as being from Pouchée’s foundry.

It’s incredible to see such beautiful details on each of the letters, the craft and skill into making these letters is fantastic. One of our guide’s Bob said that every now and them some of Pouchée’s letters appear on eBay. One was recently sold for just £27.50 by someone who probably didn’t know exactly what they were selling as it was titled ‘Decorative Letter’. Another more recently sold for over £300 by someone who knew the value of what they had.

Type as image and bespoke lettering is something we see quite frequently in design and illustration today however in traditional methods of printing, something like Pouchée’s typefaces is rarely seen.

Ideology

Ideology:

A system of ideas and ideals, especially one which forms the basis of economic or political theory and policy (and to this we can also add design).

Synonyms for ideology:

Beliefs, ideas, ideals, principles, doctrine, creed, credo, teaching, dogma, theory, thesis, tenets, canon(s); conviction(s), persuasion, opinions, position, ethics, morals.

In what way are our lives affected by ideology?

Overall 84% of the human population identify with a religion. Many religions follow some sort of belief or ideology that you must do well and be kind in your life to be rewarded after death. This may be the idea of going to heaven/hell or reincarnation.

People vote for political leaders based on ideology, it is the idea of change. Brexit has happened, the UK voting to leave the European Union was based on the ideology that we will be better alone and have control. As we have never been in this situation before we have no way of knowing exactly what this means. The propaganda that Brexit will make the UK a better place, heavily aimed at immigration, was enough to convince many. I think this vote shows how so many people are not happy in their current situation, whatever it may be. People chose to vote for something that is a wild card and a complete unknown future. The same was seen in the Scottish referendum, it was a very close vote but shows that many people aren’t happy with their current situation and are willing to vote into an unknown future. If you have nothing to loose then why would you vote for things to stay the same?

Trump being elected is one of the most worrying events seen in recent history. However extreme his presidency may seem it also says a lot for the American system. So many people voted for the ideology of making ‘America great again’. What does that even mean? Does building a wall across the boarder of Mexico make America great or just show that it has a lot of racist people there? Mexicans taking the jobs of the people who can’t be bothered to work in the first place. The same is said for the UK. People chose to vote for the unknown rather that what they have right now, they were filled with belief of a better future but they may even end up worse off in the long run and with a leader like Trump who doesn’t appear to have a genuine interest in the good of others it seems likely.

When Hitler was voted in his intentions were not fully known. The only advantage we have on Hitler is hindsight. In my opinion to have a leader of the USA who is sexist, racist and believes all muslims should be banned from the USA can not lead to anything positive.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/18/unaffiliated-third-largest-religious-group-after-christians-muslims_n_2323664.html

Education

This lecture was on Education. We began by writing and discussing our own personal reasons for attending university. My reasons for attending a university:

• A learning environment
• Great facilities, LCC have fantastic printing resources and skills workshops including software training, screen printing, letterpress, book binding and other forms of relief printing. I
• A huge library and archives collection
• Meeting people and creating your own working environments. Relationships made with peers and tutors could lead to future ventures or collaborations.

What factors have shaped your educational experience at LCC so far?

• For me the tutors have been a great help and influence. All from varying backgrounds with different experiences always helps to encourage ideas generation and gaining different insights and views I find helpful and interesting.
• Many of the tutors are also practicing designers so you can learn from their real experience. Learning from a great designer like Hamish Muir.
• Learning how to use traditional printing methods.
• Making my own hand bound book that are beautifully presented. I designed, printed and hand bound a photo album for my Dads 60th birthday, which he absolutely loved. I used skills learnt at LCC and the facilities to turn it into a real book.
• I have learnt about print production through use. One of my projects last year was printed using offset lithography.
• Through showing an interest in letterpress I was invited to participate in a workshop with Anthony Burrill. During this workshop we made posters for a series of talks being held at Central St Martins (posters below). I have also been invited to another workshop in March which will be with designer and educator Andrew Osman.

There are many online learning resources now for just about everything, including Graphic Design. Corsera to name one. Shillington College in London is another which offers a three month intense course to become a Graphic Designer.

Self taught designer Karen X. Cheng hacked together her design education in six months and she states ‘I’m nowhere near as good as those design prodigies that come out of a 4-year education at an elite school. But I’m definitely good enough to do my job well.’ Cheng (2013). She shows that you can make a career using alternative methods and has an impressive body of work, although she defiantly needs dome work on her website as currently it’s a blog and looks like a blog rather than a professional platform.

As a mature student I did consider some alternative options for a faster route to become a designer but quickly decided against it. I personally don’t understand how anyone could possibly gain a good level of skill set and understanding in such a short space of time. To gain a good understanding of the Adobe software could take three months alone. Of course the pace of courses like this would be very fast in comparison to what I’m doing but I feel learning about Graphic Design is something that does require much more time and often refection.

Looking back at my course so far I have learnt huge amounts and not just design theory or history but in discovering myself as a designer and what interests me the most. All of this is invaluable for me in order to help me discover the route I wish to take in the future and what type of designer I would like to be.

Graphic Design is a very competitive industry and companies want the best they can get. I feel even more confident in my decision to study at university now. So far I feel I have a fairly descent portfolio of work and this will continue to develop and improve over the next year and a half. I have also been gaining work experience in my summer breaks. Last year working at navig8.co.uk and cre8te.london all adding to my experiences and learning along the way. By the time I finish at LCC I feel I will be in a good position to find the job I want and be desirable to potential employers.

Karen X. Cheng (2013) How to become a designer without going to design school. Available at: http://www.karenx.com/blog/how-to-become-a-designer-without-going-to-design-school/

https://www.shillingtoneducation.com/uk/

Modernity

This lecture was heavily focused on Jan Tschichold and an overview of his styles/work. After he had discover the Bauhaus his work was heavily influenced by the styles and hierarchy. After the war he found his rules and restrictions too comparable to the Nazis and it was even more noticeably different again. The structure was less noticeable and he almost appeared to have regressed in his designs.

Although these book covers have a more traditional appearance they still have a strong Graphic Design relationship. The image is in the same place, the typographic hierarchy is consistent and they appear to belong in the same series with only the border colour changing.

I found it interesting looking at these changes throughout Jan Tschichold’s design life but what I found most thought provoking in this lecture was the question: What are the defining features of the modern world we live in today?

These were my initial thoughts:

• The internet (everything is instant!)
• Computers
• Smart phones
• Skype
• Apple
• Everything has gone digital, the way we listen to music, the way we pay for things. Many younger people rarely carry cash as we almost have no need for it anymore with the convenience of contactless and no minimum payment by card (with the exception of smaller shops).
• Google. We all jump straight to Google for everything, shopping, spelling, design research, even our holiday destinations can be looked at on street view.
• From a Graphic Design point of view, many people jump into things very quickly (Mac monkeys I believe is the term). I have notice many of my peers jump straight to output very quickly, with little thought about the context of the project. Our computers allow things to be produced so quickly and there is less thought about an impactful outcome and more about producing something that will look nice on Pintrest.

After the class myself and a few others were speaking to our tutor JP. I can’t remember how it started but the conversation led onto this topic of things being easily produced and reproduced for the Pintrest culture. I recently read JP’s article ‘Killing joke at the expense of history’ for Eye magazine (http://www.eyemagazine.com/feature/article/killing-joke-at-the-expense-of-history). An interesting article referring to the book Swisted. A book that has reproduced dozens of Swiss posters for modern gigs.The historical context of these posters has been lost in it’s reproduction. In fact by replicating something it has lost all of it’s design context as that wasn’t it’s original purpose. I’m not convinced that this NWA poster is quite doing it’s job.

I have been wandering around the university and on several occasions have seen people just copying a book cover or poster from Pintrest or Designspiration. This saddens me in a design school, we are or should at least try to be better that this. I’m beginning to understand the frustration behind Anthony Burills poster ‘Think of your own ideas’ as much of his work is posted on these sites and something similar soon appears for sale on Etsy.

The website www.trendlist.org was also mentioned in this conversation. I was not familiar with this site up until now and I have become slightly obsessed by it since. It’s fascinating to see these trends and the repetition on the majority of the work on there. It has also brought some of these trends to my attention, making me realise how often I have seen them in recent months. It is purely a visual site, with zero context, the only text used is usually a link to the designer. I have found myself delving deeper, clicking the links to the designers and eventually ending up on a Behance page that is almost identical to the previous one. I want to know more about the projects and the makers behind them. Is it a real project? Does it have any depth? Was the client happy? Was there a client? Was it designed purely to post on Pintrest?

Are these two parallel universes of design? The people who make real, considered and effective design Vs the people who are making things to get posted on Trend List. I find myself being very critical in our studio group crits of other peoples work spotting things that look like they have come from Pintrest and work that looks like it is meeting the brief. Discovering this website has been useful for me as it helps to reinforce my will to produce work with depth and considered design. Critical Graphic Design Theories is the class, I am being very critical but still working on my theory.

Tate (2017) Modernism. Available at: http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/m/modernism

John-Patrick Hartnett (2016) Killing joke at the expense of history. Available at: http://www.eyemagazine.com/feature/article/killing-joke-at-the-expense-of-history

Graphic Design History

Graphic Design History is far to big to discuss in one session so this class so we focused on a few parts in history. The session began by asking the question, what is the point of learning about history?

This is asked in a general context not just referring to Graphic Design.

• We can understand and learn from the past.
• Measure succsess .
• To understand our background as humans and see how we have evolved.
• We can avoid wars in the future by understanding the causes of previous ones. History would show that although there have been wars since WWII there has been nothing quite on the same scale or as damaging. This could suggest that the human race has at least learnt something from it.
• In a graphic design context we can learn from the previous ‘greats’ and see what they have done well. Although it is more difficult to learn from designers mistakes as these are often not published or shown.
• We can see how trends occur and often repeat themselves. The digital age came upon us very fast, pushed printed materials to the side for a while and now print seems to be making a revival. In forms of craft printing becoming popular but also physically  printed material, vinyls for example. According to The Guardian the first week in December 2016 saw records sales hit £2.5m, compared with £2.1m for digital for the first time in history. Of course this was partly to do with the Christmas rush, never less quite impressive.

Then we moved onto what is Graphic Design?

• It is communication
• Making things communicate and look nice to everyday people
• Use of image and text working in harmony and balance
• Functional
• It is designed with consideration to function. The difference between an artist and a Graphic Designer is that a Graphic Designer makes things to communicate and serves a purpose. An artist makes things because they look nice but don’t necessarily serve a purpose or deliver a message.

Dubonnet – A.M Cassandre, 1932

Cassandre’s designs greatly influenced advertising art in the first half of the 20th century. He believed that “Designing a poster means solving a technical and commercial problem in a language that can be understood by the common man.”

Below is E.M. Kauffer’s poster ‘Power’. Richard Hollis, writer, lecturer and publisher claims that many English posters around this time failed to combine their words and image to express an idea and many, like this one are just as confused in appearance as the idea itself.

‘Power’, E.M.Kauffer, 1930

We read the paper Is There A Cannon in Graphic Design History? By Martha Scotford, 1991. A Canon is a basis for judgment, a standard, a criteria, an authoritative list.  Is There a Cannon of Graphic Design History?

• Identify if there is a cannon of graphic design.
• Looking at five books and comparing similarities to discover if there is a cannon.
• Male only
• European
• All dead except Brockmann

Would a designer like David Carson be included in a more recent Canon? Someone who is looked up to in the industry but does perhaps not meet certain criteria or goes against the grain in much of his work. Graphic Design has many rules that we are taught to adhere to, the grid being one. Mainly because they are tried and tested formulas and the results can be seen through the history of graphic Design.

Eddie Opara said in a talk at LCC last year that the grid is so firmly fixed into his work and Graphic Design as we know it that no matter what he does he cannot escape it, he has tried but always goes back to it. As the new wave and future of Graphic Designers if anyone can discover ways of working without the grid it is us before it gets engrained into our way of working too. He wasn’t saying that we need to escape the grid but to explore alternatives in order to progress and push forward.

Scotford, M (1991). Is there A Canon of Graphic design History?

Hollis, R (2001). Graphic Design A Concise History. London: Thames & Hudson.

What Is This Thing Called Design Criticism

As an introduction to Critical Graphic Design Theories, during the first class we read ‘What is this thing called design criticism?’ by Micheal Rock and Rick Poynor. As the title says, this piece of writing talks about design criticism and its fragmentation, for true graphic design criticism to exist it must have dedicated writers and critics as in other disciplines such as music and art. Much of design criticism is now seen online on blogs, many of which are secondary to paid work, many are designers or teaching alongside. School of visual arts, LCC and Konstfack in Stockholm now all have coursed dedicated to critical design writing and so it is likely we will see this shift in the future. Part of the problem could be that we are not educated in design and design criticism from a young age. As future generations get educated on this topic perhaps it will become more mainstream.

The general public are seen as critics of music and film but not so much in graphic design. This could be that people get pleasure and enjoyment from these but as the saying goes ‘good typography is invisible’ and it often goes unseen. Perhaps as graphic design is everywhere in our live we have become immune to not noticing it.

It doesn’t happen often but the London 2012 Olympics is one example of the general public reacting to graphic design, even capturing the headlines. The DC comics re-brand split opinions amongst it’s fans and designers, some saying it’s boring. With a large well known brand like DC it’s highly likely that you will never please everyone and the hardcore fans will be even harder to please as they don’t like to see something they love change and possibly just need to adjust and see it in use.

 

This writing also talked about what is known as the ‘hairdressers logo problem’. When you contextualise good design it can tell a story and can be quite satisfying to to understand and see why and how things are designed how they are. When contextualising and analysing design Rock states that much of recent design is too slight and doesn’t stand up to criticism.

Shoreditchification at Elephant Park

For my independent visit I visited The Artworks at The Elephant and Castle and looked into whats been happening to what was formerly The Haygate Estate and now Elephant Park in progress. Elephant Park is the new development at The Elephant and Castle which includes a huge amount of houses and flats, new shopping centre and green spaces, it is also home to The Artworks Elephant.

Shoreditchification is a term used by Telegraph writer Alex Proud which in simple terms means, make an area a creative hub, throw some empty shipping containers down, encourage small start-up cafes, restaurants, craft shops etc to set up shop and make the area popular. Once it is established bring in the developers, throw out the original residents and make way for overpriced housing. This formula has been seen in Shoreditch, Hackney, Peckham, the Elephant and Castle and now even Croydon seems to be on the hit list with a recent Boxpark popping up.

In order to make room for this new development at the Elephant and Castle the Haygate Estate, comprising 1214 homes, had to be demolished. A quote here from Southwark councils website on the demolition of the estate, ‘we agreed to rehouse residents and demolish the estate completely to make way for a regeneration of the area’ (Southwark Council, no date). So I’ll break this down  into my opinion of what has actually happened here. London is rapidly developing more unaffordable housing supposedly for Londoners but seemingly aimed at the wealthy and foreign investors. The Elephant and Castle is a fairly central location and ideal for a huge development such as Elephant Park. Residents of the Haygate estate social housing would have been paying hugely subsidised rent, if any and evidently are not deserving of such a central location without paying for it.

Although the Haygate estate was not working well with low security, very high crime and low energy efficiency, something defiantly needed to be done with it. What I find quite sad is that these low income families have all been moved on and homes demolished to make way for extortionately priced housing. According to Foxtons the average flat is £698,463 and average house £1,444,167. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that your average London wage of £34,473 (CityAM, 2014),   does not earn enough to afford one of these.

In amongst the huge development is a small area filled with shipping containers stacked on top of one and other name The Artworks Elephant. According to The Artworks themselves ‘The Artworks Elephant is a creative work hub with over 30 start-up businesses in repurposed shipping containers. Around the covered courtyard you’ll find restaurants, bars, cafes, a haberdashery shop, a yoga & osteopathy studio, a flower shop, a barbers, a library & many more creative businesses.’ (The Artworks Elephant, no date). Does naming an area a creative hub actually make it one? I’m not sure, the times I’v visited it has felt more like an abandoned courtyard of shipping containers, I feel the only thing that makes this area a creative hub would be the fact that there is an arts university a stones throw away and I know for sure that there aren’t many of my fellow students at LCC hanging around at The Elephant and Castle, other that the occasional £2.50 pint in the students union bar. I would be interested to see if the Artworks Elephant is included in the long term plans of this development, as I fear it is just part of the bigger plan to try and attract a creative crowd to the area as part of it’s Shoreditchification.

Southwark Council (no date) Elephant Park. Available at: http://www.2.southwark.gov.uk/info/200183/elephant_and_castle/1124/elephant_park

City AM (2014). Where can you earn the most money in the UK? Pay in London is much higher than any other part of the country. Available at: http://www.cityam.com/206242/where-can-you-earn-most-uk-pay-london-much-higher-any-other-part-uk

The Artworks Elephant (no date). Available at: http://www.theartworks.london

Proud, A (2014) Why this ‘Shoreditchification’ of London must stop. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/thinking-man/why-this-shoreditchification-of-london-must-stop/

Collaboration & Network in Practice

Collaborative Theory?

This session was on collaboration and the effects it can have on a working dynamic.

Collaborative working encompasses:

• Team working and leadership
• Entrepreneurial mindset
• Idea from inspiration to implementation
• Knowing your strengths
• Knowing what you don’t do well?
• Fear of sharing your ideas
• Is as important as your idea itself
• Value of diversity in groups and teams

Collaboration is not permanent, it comes and goes as thats what makes it a collaboration and not a business. An intended purpose yet their emergent benefits may be more important. By collaboration my individual outcome will have a new dynamic in collaboration with someone who has a different skill set. For example someone with a fine art or motion graphics background will have a different skill set and way of thinking and thus a new dynamic is born. You can’t know everything, knowledge brings knowledge, collective intelligence and Friction. Friction cause new ways of thinking and questioning your ways of working or outcomes.

Consider Structure

• Hows its formed
• Money
• How does it finish because they do.

De Stil was a Dutch artistic movement founded in 1917 in Amsterdam. The De Stijl consisted of  artists and architects, the founding members were artists, architects and designers consisting of Theo Van Doesburg, Piet Mondrian, Vilmos Huszár, and Bart van der Leck, Gerrit Rietveld, Robert van ‘t Hoff, and J. J. P. Oud. Bringing together this diversity creates what could be considerd an artistic supergroup.

Four Types of collaborations:

Transactional

• Production process related to improving a chain.
• Effective efficient exchange of people/services.
• Purchasing and supply networks.
• Easy to replace with some hierarchy.

Functional

• One partner takes over an area of another to manage it– harmonise processes between the two
• High level of involvement for both sides.

Exploratory

• Suitable match to do something together to learn from each other – exchange knowledge and experience as they explore an area.
• Not with a predetermined end result but a catalytic theme, maybe problem solving, explore an issue together.

Entrepreneurial

• Need to renew/develop but cannot do it alone.
• In depth sharing to promote invention and development – focused on something like new markets, new products, new tech.
• Diverging and converting.

UAL itself is a collaboration. A combination of all the colleges, with print at the heart of LCC and fashion at Chelsea. With each of the colleges brings its own specialities. This combination of different cultures together makes an all mighty art and creative industries teaching machine!

When deciding who to collaborate with consider your own strengths. In order to help decide who will be beneficial for you or your business. Collaborating with someone in the same line of work as yourself may not bring a whole lot to your project.

Entrepreneurial and Business Start-up Ecosystem: Creative Cities

This session began by looking at business start-up Ecocsystem-UK and global. A Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Heat Map by Continent/Region by the World Economic Forum in 2013 is shown below. Now its no surprise to see that the US is top of the chart. What I found interesting was that New Zealand and Australia are under the same bracket. Australia has a population of around 23 million and seems to be producing more and more, from creative business, products and innovators. However New Zealand is a very small population of only 4.4 million and I don’t think is producing quite to the same scale, with such a small population it would be almost impossible to keep up. I would be interested to see where the two countries would fall into the table separately.

The UK is shown to be an entrepreneurial place on the table, we have good support and funding available. We also have great recourses such as The British Library’s Business & IP Centre. They support small business owners, entrepreneurs and inventors. There team are on hand all day, six days a week, to help innovators take the right steps to start up, protect and grow a business. They offer events and workshops, many of which are free or at a hugely reduced priced compared to businesses offering a similar service.

The second part of this session we were split into groups we were each given a name of a place and 15 minute to research it.

• Belgrave, Savamala
• Amsterdam, NSSN
• Stockholm, Botkyrka
• San Fransisco, San Fransisco is loosing its artists!
• Berlin, Kreuzberg
• Slovenia, Ljublianna, Metelkova,
• Melbourne, Blindside
• London, Artworks

My group were given Belgrave, Savamala. What do these places have in common? They are some the creative hubs of the world, up and coming and gentrification is also seen in almost all.

What is Savamala?

• In the 90s, it was a neglected industrial area, and one of the city’s most polluted thoroughfares.
• Heart of Belgrade’s new wave of cultural activity and creative industries.
• Began with founding of KC Grad,
• an independent art centre founded by a Savamala native.
• Quickly followed by opening of Mikser House, a prominent art centre and nightclub.
• It is one of the 10 best industrial chic space worldwide (from The Guardian).
• This triggered the cultural migration to this part of the city.

Why is it there?

Created as a platform for artist expression. In 2000, economic development became a catalyst for creative industries to develop. They needed a place—a hub—to work from.

What artists/venues/companies are on this site?

• NOVA ISKRA – A design incubator, co-working space for start-ups. Managing design and employing innovation
• KC Grad
• Mikser House

Does it fit according to locals/policy/site?

• Locals are not happy about gentrification. Savamala is still a socially-disadvantaged neighbourhood, despite these new activities.
• Nightlife is improving, but there is no cultural spaces during the daytime.
• Native wanted solutions for cleaner air and better connection to the river, and they weren’t being met.

Does it work?

• It has negative impacts, but there are also positive economic and cultural impacts.
• Locals worried about the future, debating about which direction should this part of the city take.

Who is funding it?

Dubai-based construction firm Eagle Hills are building a vast shopping mall, hotels, and luxury apartments, which drives the prices up.