He went on: “I left professional practice after 30 years and became an ‘exit-level designer.’ I still continued to work but just to not take commercial jobs and compete with the next generation for the remuneration. And now I want to do the same thing with teaching. I’ll continue being around CalArts and in my studio, not as a faculty with a paid teaching position, but as a sort of free floating, available—but not mandatory—‘exit-level educator.’” And he sent me the above work as a visual reflection on his transition.

Ed’s Cal Arts retirement party is this Thursday evening, March 16th. And, just like his faculty room door, it’s open to everyone. You’ll find details at this Facebook page.

As for the future: “I have two practices,” he says. “One is my ‘counter-factual history’ art career: I pretend I went to art school in 1957 and became a painter instead of a graphic designer, and this is the work I would have done back then. I only make ‘drawings for paintings;’ no point in making the actual paintings, of course. And the other is my ongoing ‘Potential Avant Garde Graphic Design for Begone Eras,’ which is mainly collage and drawing lettering and almost always done in my sketch books.

“I also love taking digital photographs and blogging. I have two blogs and post almost every day.”

I just couldn’t let the occasion pass without asking Ed’s friends, former students, and other associates for their thoughts and feelings. Please feel free to add your own remarks in the comments section below.

.

Rudy VanderLans
Designer; Photographer; Co-Founder, Emigre magazine and font foundry

“Ed’s formal explorations opened up so many new avenues within graphic design. He showed us that the boundaries of graphic design were just a figment of some other people’s narrow imaginations.”

.

Lorraine Wild
Graphic Designer, Los Angeles

“This is from my introduction to Ed Fella’s last official CalArts lecture last month: ‘I cannot imagine my life as a designer without Ed. And I can’t imagine American graphic design in the late 20th century outside of the context of Ed. But most of all, I can’t really imagine the education of two generations of CalArts students without him.’”

.

Michael Worthington
Co-Director, Graphic Design Program, CalArts

“Here’s the poster I made as one of a series for Ed’s last lecture.”

.

Louise Sandhaus
Faculty, CalArts

“In so many ways Ed is the emblem of the CalArts Program, the energy, engagement, and devotion to making and talking about making. Or in the case of Ed: making, making, making and talking talking talking.

“As faculty we orbit with Ed, illuminated by his incessant visual and verbal chatter, sometimes feeling, perhaps, as if we’re walking in the giant shadow of his massive, exuberant production.

“Ed has a big ear and open door. Whether student or faculty, everyone is invited into his studio: a windowed haven overlooking and tucked into the grad work spaces, which seems all but constructed of books and boxes of his work and the work of others.

“‘What’s what’ is never in doubt when it comes to Ed, and he will never fail to tell you how it is. Working with him in the classroom is a wonder, as along with the multicolored pen he wields the sword of sharp criticism.

“Ed is the opposite of a man of few words: a verbosity that echoes in the hearts, heads, and hands of so, so many.”

.

Katherine McCoy
AIGA Medalist; Alliance Graphique International elected member; Fellow of the Industrial Designers Society of America

“The studio is Ed Fella’s natural environment. Ed takes the studio with him wherever he goes, continuously creating his own work and provoking design discussions. I suspect Ed’s official retirement from Cal Arts will be just a formality, because Ed can’t resist teaching art and design any more than he can resist making art and design; so he will likely remain a big presence at Cal Arts.

“My encounter with Ed’s design and teaching began in 1970 at Designers & Partners, a Detroit advertising design studio. There, Ed conducted a daily ‘symposium’ of vigorous – and often outrageous – discussions and debates at lunch, mid-afternoon breaks, and afterwork bar sessions. When I left Designers & Partners to co-chair Cranbrook’s Design Department with my husband Michael, Ed spent many hours in the design studios with our grad students and was a major influence on our work and thinking. Eventually Ed made it official and spent two years at Cranbrook earning his own MFA, and then joined the CalArts Graphic Design faculty.

“When I first came under Ed’s spell, I was working within a design framework based on Swiss Modernism and George Nelson’s industrial design functionalism. Ed’s interest in vernacular design went far deeper than the standard American graphic design eclecticism and became a major influence for me. This was circa 1971 and I was also reading Robert Venturi’s ideas about vernacular architecture and postmodernism. Both Ed and Venturi understood that American commercial vernacular embodied rich formal languages that resonated with the public and was readable by them. These ideas greatly enriched my own design, the design projects I assigned, and the output of our students.

“Congratulations, Ed on this next big career move!”

.

Debbie Millman
President, Design, Sterling Brands

.

Sean Adams
president, ex officio, AIGA; partner, AdamsMorioka, Inc.; faculty, Art Center College of Design

“I’d love to say that Ed was a wonderful mentor and guided my life as a designer. But Ed came to CalArts after I left. I was luckier: I spent a wonderful summer working in a small space with Ed, listening to his stories. And Ed has come defended Noreen’s and my honor multiple times over the last 20 years.

“In 1988, Ed, Lorraine Wild, and Jeff Keedy set up a loose collaborative studio downstairs from Jeff’s apartment. I worked with Lorraine on the first Morphosis book. Bruce Mau was staying in the guest room upstairs while he spent a term teaching at CalArts. Ed shared my knowledge of L.A. tragedies. Every day when Bruce wasn’t teaching, he’d sit on the steps and hang out with us. At lunch he’d walk to Bob’s Big Boy on Wilshire. We told Bruce that this was the ‘death’ Bob’s. Ed jumped in and knew the whole story about the late night hold-up, staff and customers being shoved into the freezer, and everyone murdered. I was amazed and thrilled that someone else shared my bizarre and useless knowledge about ‘death’ places in L.A.

“Years later, in 1995, when Noreen and I first began AdamsMorioka, Lucille Tenazas asked us to speak at a student conference in San Francisco. Ed was the other speaker. We did our lecture, which was met with silence. There was a palpable sense of hate in the room. When the Q&A began, we understood the problem. ‘Your work is very bright and colorful. Don’t you feel that you’re not showing the world as it is and addressing the dystopia we inhabit?’ Or, ‘Does it bother you to work with purveyors of American popular culture colonialism in the entertainment industry?’ and ‘How can you stand L.A.?’ Lucille suggested we be less funny in the future.

“If you don’t live on the west coast, you may not know that there are San Francisco people that think Los Angeles is a hell-hole of superficial people. Which it may be, but that’s the fun part.

“Ed started his lecture by saying, ‘Those guys are great. They’re taking critical thinking and multiple concepts and veneer them with seductive form. They make more with less.’ How can you not love someone who defends you in a room of hostile, serious, and humorless students?

“Postscript: a decade later I spoke in San Francisco again and had a great time. The students were smart, funny, inquisitive, and a true pleasure. Times change.”

.

Kenneth FitzGerald
Educator; Writer; Artist

“I’ll always cherish the memory of chatting with Ed – well, he did most of the talking, and that was great – during a night drive around L.A. He gave me one of my most treasured design artifacts: a hand-drawn map on how to take the buses to the Getty; I still got lost, but it was on me. And years later, he spontaneously recalled and complimented my drawings. It’s pretty obvious why he’s beloved.

“Oh, and then there’s his great artwork, too.”

.

Gunnar Swanson
Designer; Writer; Educator

“Ed is a lot like his work: complex, sometimes a bit twisted, not always clear, but generally a source of joy and inspiration.

“Ed and his work are, as Martha used to say, ‘good things.’ But perhaps more importantly, his work has inspired a generation or two toward formal exploration. The products of this exploration have not always been wonderful but the net result has been vital to the development of graphic design over the last decades.”

.

Alissa Walker
A Walker in LA

“I’ve only met Ed in person once although I’ve written about him for years. But here’s one thing people who aren’t from CalArts might not know about him: he keeps fortunes on his office door at CalArts.”

.

Jonathan Barnbrook
Graphic, Typeface, Industrial, and Motion Graphics Designer; Activist

“Ed Fella: simply the best example to everybody who is a designer or who wants to be a designer.

“He has been there, done everything, worked for years doing the toughest of commercial work, clients that I wouldn’t have the stamina to deal with, and yet come out of it with a truly unique, innovative, incredibly creative approach to typography and design, something which is truly authentic in its integration of his surroundings and experience. Many have copied him, but they lack the intellectual input and the craft that have gone into making his work what it is.

“Fine to be a genius, but for me being a nice person is almost as important. Every conference I have been to with Ed, he marks it with his own piece of work and gives it to people. When I lectured at CalArts he made sure to take time to take me out and just walk and talk about life. A great example of not only one the greatest innovators of typography of this era, but also of a kind generous, gracious, fantastic, humbling human being, too.”

.

Ellen Lupton
Senior Curator / Contemporary Design, Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum

“Ed Fella showed designers a different way to work. He took what existed in the culture and turned it into his own strange thing. And then he shared it.

“Thank you, Ed!”

.

Steven Heller
Art Director; Educator; Author; Editor

“One of my happiest memories as an art director was having Ed Fella’s lettering on – and overwhelm – the entire ‘New York Times Book Review.’ He redrew—or shall we say ‘undid’?—the ‘Book Review’ masthead and made a lettering concoction that was like nothing seen on its covers and interiors before.

“To this day, I am amazed we got away with so flagrant a flaunting of ‘Times’ style. And yet Fella’s contribution was within the ‘Times’ standard of excellence.

“The artifact remains. And I remain grateful to have it.”

.

Ric Grefé
Executive Director, AIGA

“In nearly two decades and encounters with over 40,000 designers, I can say personally and on behalf of AIGA that Ed is uniquely inspirational to designers across the arc of their careers.

“He defies age—despite his retiring early—and has an impish insouciance that fits nicely with the jeans and t-shirts of open-minded, optimistic, excited young fetishists, while capturing the admiration of the elders, because he is always imaginative, loves designing, seems to have learned to pirouette around The Man, followed his heart, and still gets to play with crayons.

“Thank you, Ed, for all that you have done for generations of designers.”

.

David Shields
Chair, Department of Graphic Design, Virginia Commonwealth University

“The first time I met Ed was at Cranbrook Academy of Art in the fall of 1992. Ed was visiting Detroit and part of his time in the city was scheduled to spend a few days with students. The three days on campus were a whirl of activity. Ed spent seemingly all hours with us in the studios, I’m inclined to remember that the students got more sleep than he did over those three days.

“The few days of work was all fueled by a simple prompt from Ed: ‘Do something you haven’t done before.’ It set off a nice little explosion of activity, and was great fun: working furiously through broad interpretations of the prompt, racing towards the deadline. Desk crits, group crits, chatting, and at least several meals in the Boy’s School Dining Hall. All of it amazing, and eye-opening and expanding. I remember thinking that someday when I grow up I wanted to have that level of energy, and provide that intensity of focus.

“All this buzz of activity and energy, all with the simple prompt of ‘Do something you haven’t done before.’ It’s a prompt I adopted, and use to this day with students, always with fresh results … if maybe not the energy Ed provided. Assigning it now always makes me think of Ed. I just hope that someday when I grow up I’ll be able to have that level of energy, and provide that intensity of focus.”

.

Haven Lin-Kirk
Area Head of Design, USC Roski School of Fine Arts

“I remember first coming across an Ed Fella image back in the early 1990s.

“At the time, I was a young working designer, fresh out of grad school. I was struggling to pay back some hefty student loans, juggling freelance work at a publishing firm and working in-house for a large, very rigid and conservative corporation … trying to find relevance in theory and practice. I was judging my dual interest in both art and design and the thought that these worlds could merge was just starting to seem plausible to me. In my mind, Ed was a young creative, starting off just like me and exploring the boundaries of what design could be. The deconstructive way that he approached layout challenged everything that was happening in my professional and creative worlds. I had never seen typography approached in that manner. I knew from first sight this is where I lived!

“It was only much later that I learned that Ed was actually several decades older than I was and had already traveled down a similar professional path, completing an MFA from Cranbrook only four years before me. This only elevated him higher as my “design hero.”

“When I began teaching years later, I would pull out examples of Ed Fella layouts to challenge students’ ideas of what graphic design would be. I remember it was a litmus test: how open were they to the potential of design? And years later, when I finally had a chance to meet him through one of my former students, now his grad student, I have to admit that I was a little star-struck. Our conversation was about being in the “exit phase” of his career, an expression he used to describe being an influencer and not a competing force with his students. Amazing! Again he left me thinking not only of the role of a designer but of a design educator, lessons that I still carry to this day.

“My most recent encounter was this past semester. Ed was invited to come to the Roski School as a VIP guest speaker. Again it was through another one of his former students, now a USC professor, Andrew Kutchera. The room was filled with young designers and artists – or more accurately, packed to the four walls – all there to hear the iconoclastic designer speak.  He showed images of his prolific collection of work and talked about learning and breaking rules. And he charmed everyone.

“Several weeks later, I was incredibly touched when he sent me two little collage pieces in the mail. This came at the end of an incredibly difficult semester for me. Those beautiful little pieces now sit framed in my office and remind me every day how important design still is to me.

“As I move through the world these days I notice Ed Fella pieces and his influence everywhere. On a recent study tour with my students to New York I found his pieces at AIGA’s headquarters, in Ric Grefe’s office alongside Fredrick Goudy’s gavel, and behind Steven Heller’s desk at the School of Visual Arts. Much like the first time I encountered one of his works, I’m reminded how lucky I am to be in world with someone like Ed Fella.”

.

Andrew Kutchera
Adjunct Faculty, University of Southern California

“Ed’s guidance during graduate school was invaluable. He was thoughtful in his critiques, as well as demanding and fun! He relished visual and conceptual surprises, and he vigorously defended work that took risks.

“Additionally, Ed has been an incredible role model regarding the joy of making work. His incredible production and experimentation continue to inspire me.”

.

Stefan Bucher
Designer; Illustrator; Writer

.

Jonathan Notaro
Creative Director and Director, Brand New School

“Ed was the first person to teach me the benefits of being culturally aware and how this knowledge could help shape a point of view. He once made a topical news reference, and could tell I had no clue. The following classes, he allocated a portion of his lecture time teaching me how to ‘speed read’ ‘The New York Times’ for things I should find relevant as a designer.

“He was absolutely one of the people who contributed to the general ‘where the hell is this all going’ sense we had in school, which has evolved into a working process most of us couldn’t have imagined obtaining otherwise.”

.

Lucy Virginia Cook
Designer; Educator

“After graduating with my MFA from CalArts in 2010, I was packing up my books in the grad studio. I came across my treasured Edward Fella: Letters on America. It was a birthday gift from a few years earlier. I opened it up to find an inscription and a card that fell out. My friend had filled the title page with remarkable words about Ed, closing with, ‘And I hope this book inspires you for a lifetime.’ A startling moment, to look back at my life before personally knowing Ed Fella. How apparent and even dramatic that stars aligned in such a way, to see that this art book had transitioned into a reality for me personally: an endearing relationship with a design hero.

“To know now that I worked with Ed, and that he was a mentor to me for three years in the design program, leaves me overwhelmed. He gave me a new perspective on beauty in the everyday and has left me inspired for a lifetime, indeed.”

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David Cabianca
Associate Professor/Associate Chair, York University

“I have an image that I think suits Ed. It was supplied by Ed for a piece I wrote that never published. It is a photograph of Ed and Lucy [Bates]‘s living room wall. I like it because it encapsulates Ed’s respect for the uncelebrated artist and designer. Ed will often buy folk art at garage sales and add to the image before hanging them in his home. I think the innocence they exhibit is equal to Ed’s respect for the sense of craft they display.”

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Jason Tselentis
Designer; Writer; Educator

“When I rediscovered Ed Fella’s work in college, it reminded me about the exuberant and sculptural typography I made during my adolescent years. Like most youngsters, I rendered letters by hand: drawing, layering, bloating, painting, cutting, and carving them into heroic, intimidating, comical, or adventurous messages and phrases. They could be comic book mastheads, a movie’s opening title sequence, maybe my own name, or just my initials. That’s what I did as a child, and I now see my own children do the same.

“Ed’s work shows us that we can interpret our own typographic universe, with or without a computer’s operating system to tell us what’s available and what isn’t. In Ed’s design, letters are a playground, and play can have purpose. Today, I instill that outlook in the university classrooms where I teach, inspiring my beginning through advanced typography students to create playful, expressive, and meaningful designs.”

.

April Greiman
Designer; Artist

“Embarrassed to say, but I barely know Ed. And, OMG, how could I not know Ed, with a nickname like ‘Big Daddy’? Maaaaaybe saw him for five minutes once in his CalArts office 25 years ago, and then again at his RedCat art opening. But, he’s a big talent. And his artwork that I saw at RedCat touched my heart.”

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Terry Lee Stone
Writer; Creative Strategist

“Ed Fella: the real deal.

“Generous, iconoclastic, sophisticatedly kooky.

“The greatest exit-level designer ever.

“Best wishes for new adventures, Ed.”

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Kali Nikitas
Chair, MFA Graphic Design Program, BFA, Communication Arts, Otis College of Art and Design

Dear Ed,

Many people will comment on your guidance and talent. In my case, it is more important to tell the world the following: that you sent me an special gift at a time when I really needed a friend.

And…

Since I have worked at Otis, you have attended every special event that I have hosted. Your support has meant the world to me and you have been more of a teacher since I graduated than during school. That is the best kind of teacher.

I wish you all the happiness in the world.

.

Marian Bantjes
Designer; Typographer; Writer; Illustrator

“Ed does it better.”

.

Warren Lehrer
Writer; Designer; Educator

The post Words – and Images – on Ed Fella appeared first on Print Magazine.

If you’ve missed not having George W. Bush to kick around, heeeeee’s back. First, the opening of his presidential library. Second, news that he’s joined the likes of Winston Churchill and has become a painter. There is an impulse, of course, to be a snark about the former President’s new found talent, but in all fairness why shouldn’t he enjoy the pleasures and fruits of art.

Photo: Gawker.com

Bush is specializing in dogs at the moment and signs his work “43.” While there is a level of self-parody here, it is also quite charming too. Go for it W.

+ + + + + +

Ladislav Sutnar: Comic Book Character

He invented modern information graphics, he designed the area code for American telephones, he organized Sweet’s Catalogs and now he’s a comic book character. Ladislav Sutnar’ life and work is told by the students at the Institute of Art and Design / University of West Bohemia in the Czech Republic in a comic titled “Ladislav Sutnar: Pilsen native and founder of graphic design.” Here’s the cover.

+ + + + + +

Jonathan Harris: Interactive Director

Digital maestro Jonathan Harris (who makes projects that reimagine how humans relate to technology and to each other) has just released an interactive documentary about the private lives of nine women who make lesbian porn, called I Love Your Work.

For 10 consecutive days Harris followed around nine different women, spending 24 hours with each one, and taking 10-second video clips every five minutes, filming whatever was happening. The project contains 2,202 of these 10-second clips (around six hours of footage), and he built an interactive environment for browsing through all that material.

As part of his experiment, Harris is limiting traffic to ten viewers per day. Viewers must purchase tickets ($10 per day) and wait for their turn “in contrast to the instant gratification of typical internet porn,” he says.

Harris admits this is “a bit racier than things I’ve made in the past, but it’s handled with a lot of sensitivity, and I think it provides an intimate and revealing portrait of a community that’s usually pretty marginalized.”

This is graphic and not for everyone, but Harris has taken a courageous step with what is sure to be a controversial documentary in this digital age.

+++++++

For more Steven Heller, check out Citizen Designer: Perspectives on Design Responsibility, one of the many Heller titles available at MyDesignShop.com.

The post Weekend Heller: Bush’s Paintings, Sutnar’s Comics, Harris’s “I Love Your Work” Video appeared first on Print Magazine.

 

Location
London Bridge, Bermondsey, southeast London

Year started
1998

Size
3,000 square feet


Number of employees
Ten

Specialty

Design in the 
broader sense

 

 

Can’t work without

Peppermint tea, music, clients, designers, and books

 

Current projects

It’s been a very busy year for the studio, with the majority of the work being digital and moving image. Work includes a global-branding project for Invesco, ongoing identity work for the art consultancy John Jones, and the Wapping Project Bankside.

 

We’ve just started a new book 
for a photographer, Dave Stewart, which we’re designing and publishing. We’re also in the middle of redesigning our own website, which has been neglected for some time.

On the art side of things, I’m currently working on a commission from Mulberry for their new flagship store on Spring Street, in New York City, which is to open later this year. The commission consists of three large-scale, sculptural brass pieces.

 

 

 

 

Best mistake you’ve ever made
I’ve never learned to type, so the studio has taken the mickey out of me over the years for my one-finger approach.
But now it’s all changed. With 
the arrival of the iPad, I think my 
one-finger approach will be seen 
as progressive.


What other profession would 
you like to try?
Boxing or drumming

Best place for a coffee break
Monmouth Coffee (2 Park Street) 
and Allpress Espresso Roastery 
(58 Redchurch Street)

Favorite piece of decor
London brick

What are you listening to?
Right at this moment, Blur

Biggest distraction
My Cornish rex cats who 
live upstairs


One word that describes 
the space

Bermondsey

 

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The post In the Studio: Browns appeared first on Print Magazine.

 
Process 6 by Casey Reas for Maharam Digital Projects

I first became aware of Maharam through your revival of midcentury-modern textiles—pillows for instance. How did that come about?

 

When we took charge of Maharam, our collection was haphazardly assembled, and we needed to create order. I was an avid collector, and at the time midcentury modernism was emerging from a cyclical slumber. I realized that nearly every 
noteworthy midcentury designer had designed textiles, virtually all of which had vanished into obscurity. Thus began my international treasure hunt—seeking clues, tracking down aging family members and bits of fragmented knowledge, and rummaging through dusty archives. Since we typically do not produce finished products, the pillows were merely an extension of this effort, intended to create access through MoMA, Moss, Design Within Reach, Vitra, and various other design venues.

 

 

City of Words by Acconci Studio

 

Type by Polly Apfelbaum

 

Are you a manufacturer, a designer, an impresario—what?

 

We do not manufacture but rather work with mills across the globe based on our project and product requirements, as married to their specific area of production expertise. We sell to commercial architects and interior designers and recognize that we are essentially in the business of 
narrative—telling interesting stories through the products we choose to develop.

 

Floral Explosion by Post Typography

 

Wood Wall as Safari by Phoebe Washburn

I take that to mean “storyteller.” As a graphic designer, I never gave much thought to textile design. And yet many graphic designers I admire—Paul Rand, Alvin Lustig, Massimo Vignelli, Milton Glaser, Maira Kalman—
designed for fabric. Who makes the best textile designer—someone trained to be one, or someone who dips in?

 

By nature, woven textiles (unlike printed textiles, which are little different from printed paper) are complicated to engineer and produce. They’re conceived on multiple parallel tiers; the yarn, pattern, texture, and color are all tied together through weaving and finishing. Extreme expertise is essential. We choose to collaborate with non–textile designers because they ask questions that we often no longer ask of ourselves. Often, revisiting these questions yields new and innovative results. So the answer is both.

 

Spaceman by Marian Bantjes

 

New York Times Headlines (1990-2005) by A.J. Bocchino

Many of your recent projects have come from digital technology. What is possible now that wasn’t five years ago?

 

I’d love to say anything is possible, but I’m sure a whole new “anything” will be at our disposal five years from now. On the 
textile-design side, CAD is an increasingly powerful tool in its sensitivity and ability to communicate with production. The utopian model would permit us to produce short runs of immediately generated design on a moment’s notice—even randomly generated patterns that would be both arbitrary and predictable, an idea we’ve discussed with John Maeda (of course!) and others over the years. More concretely, our Maharam Digital Projects are large-scale wall installations created by artists, photographers, and fashion, graphic, and industrial designers. Scaled and produced to order, they’re printed using water-based-pigment inks on a latex-saturated cellulosic ground, which yields excellent color rendition and near-archival quality. These are uneditioned works and are all sold at the same price, and each of our contributors is compensated equally, whether they’re seven-figure artists or graphic designers working at an hourly wage. It’s extremely egalitarian and very gratifying for all. In the graphic design world, collaborators include Cyan, Casey Reas, Marian Bantjes, Karel Martens, Post Typography, 2×4, Abbott Miller, Harmen Liemburg, Niesen and DeVries, and Charley Harper (our sole deceased contributor).

 

Alphabet by Alexander Girard

 

Circles by Ray and Charles Eames

You’ve engaged the offbeat designer Claudy Jongstra, among other textile avant-
gardists. What do you look for in designers of untraditional, handcrafted materials?

 

It’s a challenging area, as our clients insist on production, performance, and predictability—products that perform to commercial standards and resemble the samples they select from. Claudy is an exception. She raises her own sheep, shears them, processes their wool, blends it with other fibers, and dyes the resulting textiles with dyestuffs she creates using plant material that she grows. She is our benchmark! In a more commercial realm, Hella Jongerius is gifted in finding a place where craft and manufacturing intersect. Her  unique approach to craft from the perspective of industry, and her particular combination of these two seemingly diametrically opposed modes of production in all manner of products, have allowed her to create individuality on a mass scale and to successfully navigate the pitfalls of nostalgia associated with craft-for-craft’s-sake.

 

Letters by Gunnar Aagaard Anderson

 

Living With That Person by Matt Mullican

Some of your prints look perfect for cloth bookbinding. What other products do you make using textiles?

 

MegaNano, a project with Bruce Mau, was intended to address the needs of the open-office environment, an often stultifying landscape of workstations and the loom fodder that covers them. Bruce conceived a system of compatible textiles on multiple scales that could be used together to create depth and dimensionality. Though our textiles can be used for many things—pillows, hats, clothing, and bags, most obviously—our most rewarding present collaboration is with Nike, bringing unexpected pattern, texture, color, and material to footwear.

On This Day by Maira Kalman

Mixed ## by Karel Martens

 

Maharam’s graphics are designed with great care. Did that come about naturally?

We initially relied on consulting graphic designers to create our identity, advertising, and collateral. We are an OCD-driven organization and recognized that extreme consistency and cohesiveness were critical to conveying an integrated message. We dreaded the moment when we would have to acquaint every new hire with our corporate culture, visual language, strategy, and tactics, all with the hope that they A) got it, and B) were gifted enough to do something with it. We formed A4 Studio, our in-house graphic design arm, for this reason. We love the control and the outcome, and embrace the graphic design medium with fervor equal to textile, architecture, interior, furniture, show, and interior design. We feel that expression as a corporate entity committed to design is a fully dimensional experience, and anything less is merely commerce. A4 interacts with our in-house and consulting contributors on every project. A pleasant example presently at work is a sample bin or box for our client’s libraries being developed by Konstantin Grcic, in Munich, with the Dutch graphic-designer-cum-cartographer Joost Grootens handling embellishment, all orchestrated and made harmonious by A4.

 

Transition by Kees Goudzwaard

Recombinism by 2×4

What’s the future of the textile world?

 

We’re in a slow-moving fashion business. The future is seasonal, inspired and catalyzed by the world across all media, and with a respect for the practical needs of clients, coupled with the embrace of risk and through the contributions of interesting characters we find along the way.

 

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More Resources on Branding and Identity Design

• Get an inside look at logo design from Chermayeff & Geismar
• Webcast featuring hands-on presentation of identity design from Chermayeff & Geismar
• Design TV: Improve your design skills with help from experts in the design industry.

The post Dialogue: Arachne for the Digital Age appeared first on Print Magazine.

Ryder Ripps, screenshots from a world-map interface; website in progress for M.I.A. (2011).

 

Ryder Ripps, Monster Energy for PS1 (2011).

 

Ryder Ripps, LuckyPlop, user-generated web-tiling site (2011).

 

• Get an inside look at logo design from Chermayeff & Geismar
• FREE Webcast featuring hands-on presentation of identity design from Chermayeff & Geismar
• Design TV: Industry experts share secrets and tips on identity design and branding strategies.

The post Ripps It Up appeared first on Print Magazine.

DM: Can you tell us about the creative process
working with EDP?

SS: Of course, internally we tried
out a numerous directions, but we presented just one to the client. I have
always thought that showing many directions to the client displays incredible
laziness on the part of the design/branding house. Nothing is easier than
presenting two or three dozen solutions (which often are half-baked by
necessity) and forcing the client to pick and chose.

DM: Did the client undertake any research?

SS: EDP is Portugal’s main utility, and
its digital presence plays an enormous role. They are also an avid sponsor of
cultural events, where interactive, projected versions of their identity seem
very appropriate.

DM: Did EDP’s environmental stance figure into
your design?

SS: Yes! As they are the world leader
(number one on the Dow Jones Sustainability Index) when it comes to producing
renewable energy, we did not have to go down the usual energy-rebranding route
of depicting a green sun or a leafy tree. When you actually are green, you
don’t have to flaunt it.

DM:
You created a custom type family for EDP named Preon. How did you go about
designing it?

SS: We designed the custom EDP
typeface with the help of the typographer Ondrej Jób. Our designer Jessica
Walsh, who was in charge of much of the work done on this project, had known
and loved his typeface Outliner, a quirky monospace typeface. We liked the
regular uppercase version of the font and asked Ondrej to create a complete
typeface, custom for EDP, that worked in upper/lower with all the glyph
coverage that could work well in all sizes.

DM: What is next for Sagmeister Inc.?

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I’m working on a book for the Bard Graduate Center. Tonight is the opening of a show about Knoll textiles, and I designed the catalogue accompanying the exhibition. It’s a book of more than 400 pages, but we’re finishing it now, so it’s hopefully going to press today.

You’ve said that American designers work harder than Dutch designers, but Dutch designers are better designers.
Did I say that? We have, of course, a completely different culture. To give an artist or designer a commission is a very old habit, if you think of Rembrandt and Vermeer in the Rijksmuseum in the 17th century. I think that’s a completely different situation from here. It’s a collaborative exercise. It’s not, “You are my designer, and you have to do this.” We’re on the same level, the commissioner and me. I never say “client”; that’s really important.


What kinds of books come out of those relationships?
More specific books. I spend a lot of time on my commissioners and going back and forth. I’m a tiny, tiny office, and here in the States there are big studios. You get a better result when it’s not in this corporate environment.

I’m also on the editorial board, and for me that’s almost mandatory. To be involved from the very beginning is almost mandatory. I have maybe a sort of character problem. I cannot stand authority. I’m totally against authority. I cannot stand it, I cannot handle it. And the moment that it comes into a commission, I’m lost. And then it becomes difficult. I think we always need to talk on the same level, and not from top to bottom.

Does government support, like you have in Europe, affect how designers work?
That changes a lot how things look. I went to the States in 1990, and I really wanted to live in New York. And I went to the MoMA, to the Whitney, to the Met—any museum I thought was interesting. I went there to show my work and ask if I maybe could make catalogues, and they always said, “Your work is so Dutch.” And what does it mean that my work is so Dutch? “You don’t have any image on the cover. Your covers are not selling.” They said, “Well, maybe in the future, but now your work is too subtle.”


I almost feel like your work has more in common with artists’ books than with—
I hate artists’ books. I hate it, I hate it. I think “artists’ books,” then I think of a print run of one or two. My books are all industrially made. What you see is that the book is not simply a book; it’s also an object. That’s what makes it special. But an artist’s book I associate with handmade things, and my books are never handmade. I think a book has to be industrially made, because that’s the whole idea of a book: to spread information. That’s what interesting about it. And artists’ books—to me that’s not a book. That’s a piece of art.

Do you approach books like a product designer does?
No, I really approach books for what they are, as books, turning the pages. The object. Sometimes I see books, and I think, Well, it could have been a PDF. The regular book is not alive anymore. You can put it on a PDF on the internet, or on a Kindle or iPad, and it’s the same. But my books are something else. They have to be this three-dimensional object. Somebody once said that I’m building books. I really like that expression very much. 

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Location Downtown San Francisco

Year the studio was started 2008

Square footage The landlord says it’s 1000, but it seems smaller than that.

Number of principal designers Two


Specialty Our practice is fairly broad. We both used to work at Chronicle Books, and still do a fair amount of publishing, but part of our decision to leave our in-house gigs was to work on a wider range of projects. We get the most attention for our custom type work, and teach experimental typography at California College of the Arts.


One word that best describes your space Freeeeeeeeeezing

Best thing in the studio Perhaps the location. As a small studio, it’s good being downtown among the hum of big business—and where there are lots of places to eat.

Can’t design without We are loyal to Uni-ball pens, and constantly steal them from each other.

Current projects Two projects with the wonderful artist Allison Smith: a book on animation for Chronicle and another for the Anaheim Angels baseball team; an annual report for the Bay Citizen, a new non-profit news organization; a suite of typographic illustrations for Wired magazine; and an as-yet-undetermined art object for The Thing Quarterly.


Most fortuitous mistake you’ve ever made We’ve made all kinds of mistakes, but sadly none stand out as particularly fortuitous.

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