JKR

Note – this blog has been somewhat trimmed and amended since it went up, in the light of developments!

The ever excellent Brand New site features the new, and potentially new identity work for Hewlett Packard. To shorthand a complex story, the brand is looking a bit fusty comparative to its innovative proposition. Moving Brands did a massive amount of work designing a possible future identity. However in a statement yesterday,  the client confirmed that they will not launch the new logo, but will use much of the supporting work on logo application, tone of voice etc.

Here is the vision…

Personally I love the bolder marque. But this isn’t about designers subjectively loving things, this is about big business. The project illustrates wider realities about identity work, big clients, and the design process generally.

The task is massive, complex and has to work on many many levels. But it all comes down to something quite simple – the logo on which the identity hangs. In its simplest form, does it cut it? There were those who quickly noted that the logo read as BP or LIP. I guess the debate turns on whether it has to ‘read’ as HP or is intended to be an abstract symbol. I believe the latter, but both positions are valid.  So the first reality is that no matter what rigour is used and what depths are delved, such projects tend to hang off a basic core expression, which must convince without whistles and bells.

The second reality is that any creative proposal featuring options tends to present a range of work that covers a spectrum from ‘safer and practical’ to ‘very bold and challenging’. The former tends to be a safety net, the latter will be where the agency’s heart lies. The real question is how much does the client want the mark to act as a catalyst for change? To quote an old joke: “How many psychoanalysts does it take to change a light bulb? One, but the light bulb really has to want to change.”

The third reality is that safer does not necessarily equate to average. I would say that the ‘fallback’ work offers a textbook example of a complicated system made wonderfully simple and clear, that improves the overall identity and gives it depth and meaning.

There is a smart core idea that propels all the work: ‘HP = Human Progress’. This informs the angles and much more. The foundations have ensured a greatly improved image and more effective expression for the client.

Words are half of what graphic design is. Yet it’s odd how rarely copywriting is used as part of the design process as opposed to being part of the design’s content.  This itself is separate from how typography uses words to the design’s advantage. Plymouth University has recently re-branded to add a sense of a collaborative nature and in the hope of driving students to proclaim ‘I’m studying x with Plymouth University.’ In other words the new design element is the word ‘with’.

The design itself is a collaboration between two agencies and you can read more here.

Compared to the University’s old logo it feels like a breath of fresh air:

As you can see, it’s one of those flexible rather than fixed identity solutions and I am sure this helped the University feel it was getting all its ‘values’ out there within the identity work. Some thoughts on kerning aside I like it. It’s bright, modern and looks nice on the homepage:

Which made me think that in these competitive times, presumably Plymouth is aiming to look appealing to prospective students who might be considering taking on a lifetime’s debt to attend the place. One imagines the famous universities can afford to coast a little on this score and so it proves. Amazing how unbelievably dated and dull the famous institutions below are on their home pages:

Now, I’m not suggesting they need to get all jiggy and ‘with it’. But really, what a let down they all are – on graphics alone, Plymouth stands apart. I had expected that, with all those great sweatshirts and lettermen iconography one sees over the years that at least our American cousins might have had a little more personality.

Anyway, back to copywriting as a design ingredient. A favourite example of mine is this ‘does what it says on the tin’ example from Habitat in the 60s…

Today’s post ties together a couple of recent Gazette strands; limited edition and design PR. Illy has produced a range of crockery by artist Anish Kapoor, as shown above and below. The brand is clearly going head to head with Lavazza in the arty stakes but that’s Italians for you.

The crockery design is a beautiful encapsulation of his trademark style, the mirrored surfaces recalling his Cloud Gate sculpture in Chicago (also nicknamed “The Bean” because of its shape). Great design that apparently carries no branding which is an impressively confident act on Illy’s part, more know than show.

However the brand has explained the design thus: “By placing the platinum saucer with the hole in the centre on the top of the cup, which is also platinum, an impression of diffuse light is created whose dimensions are hard to fathom. The flickering reflections prevent the hollow space from being perceived instinctively. A cup, like all of Kapoor’s work, moves from art to life and synthesizes in form some painful mental states such as doubt, ambivalence and error, but also happier states such as mystery, surprise and the desire to understand what we are looking at and to discover who we are.”

For me, this reads like the worst kind of pretentious art bullshit. How sad that the confidence seen in the design does not extend to a confidence so that we the audience can appreciate the work for itself. This is another example of how injudicious design PR shines daylight on magic (or in this case waffle on brilliance) and in so doing makes pedestrian the very thing they are intending to inject with excitement.

Perhaps design PR would be more effective if it described the brief or question rather than over explaining the answer. What do you think?

It might sound like stating the bleedin’ obvious, but where you view design from can make a huge difference. It took me about a year of working in packaging to realise that scrutinising a proposed design at my desk or mounted on white polyboard gave little indication about how effective it was when seen from ten yards.

Most clients ask for and research on ‘shelf shots’ these days, or within the super-duper virtual reality, shop mock ups. But still the initial rounds of presentations will review proposed work that floats in splendid isolation on white boards, viewed across the meeting table. This process is even more unrealistic given that packs are often seen a few pixels high on an internet shopping page.

All of which is neatly illustrated by these great shots of the new Citroën logo going up in Brussels. On closer inspection, the new logo looks pretty contemporary (or at least it did when reflective sculptural metal rendering was the hot new thing). But up on a building, to my eyes, it has only a fraction of the impact and gravitas of its predecessor. I guess if you really want to judge the quality of your work, it pays to stand well back and squint, rather than pore over every detail up close.

Three things I like about the packaging for Selfridges’ ‘retro’ sweets:

1.     Aesthetically they are really nice. The simple packaging evoking the giant glass jars from which shopkeepers of old used to dispense sweets by weight into paper bags (helping deliver us Brits a global reputation for appalling teeth). The black strings, bright tags and yellow caps make these designs just ‘Selfridges’ enough and modern enough, with a light touch.

2.     These packs are a great example of the power of the brand. The actual sweets are of a generic and arguably cheap nature. I can pick up such supposed ‘vintage classics’ from my grubby local corner shop or in garish ‘penny dreadful’ packaging, for far less cash. But I wouldn’t want to gift them to anyone. Selfridges’ design is the definition of the “vessel is more important than the content” principle.

3.     Finally, if you buy a jar, I don’t think you are really purchasing sweets here – you are purchasing a totem of a visit to a cool store. That Selfridges the shop can sell itself in this way is payback for a decade of great branding that they have invested in.