Hasta La Ideas

Liverpool’s Designival conference is this Friday – speakers include Lance Wyman, Simon Manchipp, James Jarvis and Sara De Bondt, plus there are open studios, workshops and architecture tours

Designival is a two-day festival from November 22 to 23. Organised by Liverpool creative agencies Smiling Wolf, Black & Ginger and Uniform, and supported by ACME/Liverpool Vision, it is the new name for the Design Symposium.

Day 1 features free open studio visits with various Liverpool creative companies opening their doors for a spot of networking and nosiness. From 2pm, there will also be a tour of Liverpudlian architectural highlights hosted by RIBA and, in the evening, at Blabmini Meets Kin, six creatives, including Marcus McCabe of Uniform and Gemma Germains of Mercy will each talk for 15 minutes on a subject of their choice.

Day 2 starts with a design breakfast at Camp and Furnace with DBA CEO Deborah Dawton as guest speaker. Thre Liverpool studios – Apposing, Milky Te and Uniform will then run masterclasses through the day. The main conference begins at 11am and runs through until 8.15pm. hings will be rounded-of with an after-party from 9pm hosted by design studio Mercy.

Tickets cost £65 for professionals, £25 for students.

All details are here

CR for the iPad

Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month. Try a free sample issue here.

CR In print

In our November issue we look at ad agency Wieden + Kennedy in a major feature as it celebrates its 30th anniversary; examine the practice of and a new monograph on M/M (Paris); investigate GOV.UK, the first major project from the Government Digital Service; explore why Kraftwerk appeals so much to designers; and ponder the future of Instagram. Rick Poynor reviews the Phaidon Archive of Graphic Design; Jeremy Leslie takes in a new exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery dedicated to experimental magazine, Aspen; Mark Sinclair explores Birmingham’s Ikon Gallery show of work by the late graphic designer, Tony Arefin; while Daniel Benneworth-Gray writes about going freelance; and Michael Evamy looks at new telecommunications brand EE’s identity. Plus, subscribers also receive Monograph in which Tim Sumner of tohave-and-tohold.co.uk dips into Preston Polytechnic’s ephemera archive to pick out a selection of printed paper retail bags from the 70s and 80s.

The issue also doubles up as the Photography Annual 2012 – our showcase of the best images in commercial photography produced over the last year. The work selected is as strong as ever, with photographs by the likes of Tim Flach (whose image of a hairless chimp adorns the front cover of the issue, above); Nadav Kander (whose shot of actor Mark Rylance is our Photography Annual cover); Martin Usborne; Peter Lippmann; Giles Revell and more.

Please note, CR now has a limited presence on the newsstand at WH Smith high street stores (although it can still be found in WH Smith travel branches at train stations and airports). If you cannot find a copy of CR in your town, your WH Smith store or a local independent newsagent can order it for you. You can search for your nearest stockist here. Alternatively, call us on 020 7970 4878 to buy a copy direct from us. Based outside the UK? Simply call +44(0)207 970 4878 to find your nearest stockist. Better yet, subsc

Wish I could make it out to Cali for this one: Rapha San Francisco Cycling Club is pleased to present All Chips On the Table: The Bicycle Art and Design of Garrett Chow, an exhibition featuring Chow’s work as Lead Graphic Designer at Specialized, as well as his graphics for MASH, the urban cycling brand which he co-founded. Per Rapha:

From the co-creation of MASHSF to bicycle paint schemes for cyclocross star Zdeneck Stybar and Tour de France winner Alberto Contador, Garrett has been a continual inspiration in the bicycle industry with designs, illustrations and paint jobs over the years. The exhibit is your chance to see all of this live and direct.

While the exhibition opened two weeks ago, a couple image sets hit the web earlier this week—shots from Mike Martin of MASH (reproduced here with permission) and Bike Rumor as well—a welcome dose of pure bike porn to supplement the tantalizing teaser photos from Rapha.

We had the chance to talk to Garrett about his inspiration and what drives him in the studio and on the road.

Core77: You’re clearly as passionate about cycling as you are about design. Which came first for you, bikes or design?

Garrett Chow: The tired cliché that as a designer, one’s job never really “shuts off” sadly holds more truth than a lot of us would prefer to admit. Devoted cyclists seem to hold a similarly unflagging sense of commitment and allegiance to their two-wheeled pursuits—whether it’s through constant training, watching one’s diet, or wrenching on bikes, it seems like there never enough hours in the day. I’d say that both pursuits intertwine to occupy the larger focus in my life, and seemingly in equal measure.

I’ve been doing both for as long as I can remember. I grew up riding and drawing and making/publishing a skate ‘zine as a kid—these inclinations precipitated in my study of Illustration and Graphic Design in college. I was tangentially involved in the bike industry for many years having worked on corporate-identity and branding for a friend’s bike shop, Wrench Science, but it wasn’t until MASH and then Specialized that I ‘formally’ entered the industry.

(more…)

In 1837, the world’s first publicly funded design school opened in Somerset House on the Strand in London. Later, the Government School of Design was to change its name to the somewhat more grandiose Royal College of Art, change its location, and, just for good measure, change the world. A major new exhibition shows how

To celebrate its 175th anniversary, the RCA is staging The Perfect Place to Grow: 175 Years of the Royal College of Art, an exhibition of the work of its distinguished former students and staff (past and present) which opens to the public today. And it’s quite a show.

Composition (Thrust), David Hockney, 1962, Mixed media on board, © Royal College of Art Collection, painted while Hockney was a RCA student, and as it appears in the show (below left)

Hockneys (above) jostle with Hepworths and Rileys with Rhodes. Could any other institution put together such a star-studded accumulation of alumni?

Underground Roundel from Westminster Station, Edward Johnston, c.1930, © TfL, from the collection of London Transport Museum [Calligraphy staff 1901-39]

Originally, the School of Design was set up in order to train young craftsmen and artisans for work in the ceramics, textiles and ornamental crafts of Britain’s manufacturing industries. The show (co-curated by Dr Paul Thompson, Rector of the RCA and Robert Upstone of the Fine Art Society) is split into four sections, one of which, Art and Industry, examines these links and the tension they came under due to the emergence of fine art at the institution.

The Politial Expression section of the show features Bladerunner, directed by former student Ridley Scott

Stop the War campaign, David Gentleman, 2003, © David Gentleman [Graphic Design student 1950-53] and, below, as it appears in the show, alongside work from Jonathan Barnbrook

The Victorian notion of art in service to industry is contrasted by a Personal Expression section which looks at how those ideas were challenged in the 20th century. Political Expression (above) covers artists and designers whose work is overtly aligned to causes, including work by suffragette Sylvia Pankhurst who was jailed while a student at the RCA. The fourth section of the show, Public Purpose (below), concentrates on the RCA’s role in transforming Britain’s health, transport and built environments.

The Public Purpose section of the show features posters by Abram Games and Kinneir Calvert’s road signs (far wall)

Why Not Associates’ Sensation poster sits alongside its Comedy Carpet project and posters by RCA professor of illustration Andrzej Klimowski

Rolling Stones logo screenprint by John Pasche, who was commissioned by the band while still an RCA student

Ilustrations by Ian Dury (right) alongside work by Sir Peter Blake

Dany Bubbles, Ian Dury, 1966, Graphite and coloured pencil on paper, Courtesy of The Dury Family © Estate of the artist

Tracy Emin installation

The exhibition was designed by Casson Mann and Research Studios. An accompanying book, also designed by Research Studios, is published by Abrams & Chronicle

The Perfect Place to Grow is at the Royal College of Art, Kensington Gore, London SW7 2EU until January 3, rca.ac.uk.

Exhibition photography supplied by the RCA

CR for the iPad

Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month. Try a free sample issue here.

CR In print

In our November issue we look at ad agency Wieden + Kennedy in a major feature as it celebrates its 30th anniversary; examine the practice of and a new monograph on M/M (Paris); investigate GOV.UK, the first major project from the Government Digital Service; explore why Kraftwerk appeals so much to designers; and ponder the future of Instagram. Rick Poynor reviews the Phaidon Archive of Graphic Design; Jeremy Leslie takes in a new exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery dedicated to experimental magazine, Aspen; Mark Sinclair explores Birmingham’s Ikon Gallery show of work by the late graphic designer, Tony Arefin; while Daniel Benneworth-Gray writes about going freelance; and Michael Evamy looks at new telecommunications brand EE’s identity. Plus, subscribers also receive Monograph in which Tim Sumner of tohave-and-tohold.co.uk dips into Preston Polytechnic’s ephemera archive to pick out a selection of printed paper retail bags from the 70s and 80s.

The issue also doubles up as the Photography Annual 2012 – our showcase of the best images in commercial photography produced over the last year. The work selected is as strong as ever, with photographs by the likes of Tim Flach (whose image of a hairless chimp adorns the front cover of the issue, above); Nadav Kander (whose shot of actor Mark Rylance is our Photography Annual cover); Martin Usborne; Peter Lippmann; Giles Revell and more.

Please note, CR now has a limited presence on the newsstand at WH Smith high street stores (although it can still be found in WH Smith travel branches at train stations and airports). If you cannot find a copy of CR in your town, your WH Smith store or a local independent newsagent can order it for you. You can search for your nearest stockist here. Alternatively, call us on 020 7970 4878 to buy a copy direct from us. Based outside the UK? Simply call +44(0)207 970 4878 to find your nearest stockist. Better yet, subscribe to CR for a year here and save yourself almost 30% on the printed magazine.

For its third annual exhibition, Creative agency Mill Co has once again teamed up with a sponsor and tasked a selection of image makers to create new work. This year it has teamed up with The Co-operative and the brief to the 25 contributing artists was ‘Co-operation’…

The resulting exhibition runs at the Mill Co Project  until November 23 and features work by Calverts (its contribution, shown above), Patternity, Tom Frost and Kavel Rafferty, and more.

Here are a selection of images

Many Hands by Claire Scully

by Toby Stevens

by A Two Pipe Problem

Working Together by Tom Frost

This piece by David Hazell of Curious Projects “looks at the creation of new colours through the co-operation of coloured blocks”.

Above, TwoSomes by Patrick Fry and Tom Willis is, they say, “a series of prints bringing together similar sounding words that, when all said and done, are worlds apart. A contextual juxtaposition is used to illustrate the distinction.”

Hive by Rebecca Maeve Manley

Visit millco.co.uk for more info and to see more of the work on show which encompasses illustration, graphic design, photography, film and 3D/set design.

The show runs until November 23 at the Mill Co Project, Mandarin Wharf, 70-76 De Beauvoir Crescent, London N1 5SB.

CR for the iPad

Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month. Try a free sample issue here.

CR In print

In our November issue we look at ad agency Wieden + Kennedy in a major feature as it celebrates its 30th anniversary; examine the practice of and a new monograph on M/M (Paris); investigate GOV.UK, the first major project from the Government Digital Service; explore why Kraftwerk appeals so much to designers; and ponder the future of Instagram. Rick Poynor reviews the Phaidon Archive of Graphic Design; Jeremy Leslie takes in a new exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery dedicated to experimental magazine, Aspen; Mark Sinclair explores Birmingham’s Ikon Gallery show of work by the late graphic designer, Tony Arefin; while Daniel Benneworth-Gray writes about going freelance; and Michael Evamy looks at new telecommunications brand EE’s identity. Plus, subscribers also receive Monograph in which Tim Sumner of tohave-and-tohold.co.uk dips into Preston Polytechnic’s ephemera archive to pick out a selection of printed paper retail bags from the 70s and 80s.

The issue also doubles up as the Photography Annual 2012 – our showcase of the best images in commercial photography produced over the last year. The work selected is as strong as ever, with photographs by the likes of Tim Flach (whose image of a hairless chimp adorns the front cover of the issue, above); Nadav Kander (whose shot of actor Mark Rylance is our Photography Annual cover); Martin Usborne; Peter Lippmann; Giles Revell and more.

Please note, CR now has a limited presence on the newsstand at WH Smith high street stores (although it can still be found in WH Smith travel branches at train stations and airports). If you cannot find a copy of CR in your town, your WH Smith store or a local independent newsagent can order it for you. You can search for your nearest stockist here. Alternatively, call us on 020 7970 4878 to buy a copy direct from us. Based outside the UK? Simply call +44(0)207 970 4878 to find your nearest stockist. Better yet, subscribe to CR for a year here and save yourself almost 30% on the printed magazine.

There’s been a lot of great record sleeve design this year, and Art Vinyl have collected together a shortlist of 50 of the best vinyl artworks in a new exhibition in London.

Art Vinyl are showing 50 of the best sleeve designs of the year, in an exhibition at The St Martins Lane Hotel. In a bit of an X Factor twist, the public are also able to vote for their favourite designs from the shortlist, with a winner announced in January next year.

The exhibition is on until January 13, with the overall winner being announced on January 10. Scroll down to see a selection of our favourite covers from the shortlist.

Clock Opera – Ways To Forget
Art director: Richard Robinson, Photographer: Mads Perch

Carter Tutti Void – Transverse
Design by Chris Carter and Cosey Fanni Tutti

Young Magic – Melt
Design by Leif Podhajsky

White Lung – Sorry
Design by Justin Gradin

Saint Etienne – Words and Music
Map by Dorothy. Design by Paul Kelly

Peace – Delicious
Design by Sam Coldy Studio

Four Tet – Pink
Design by Jason Evans and Tazelaar Stevenson

Flying Lotus – Until The Quiet Comes
Art Direction by Stephen Serrato with B+. Photography by B+ with Dan Kitchens. Graphic Design by Stephen Serrato

Grimes – Visions
Design by Mark Khair

Laurel Halo – Quarantine
Design by Optigram. Artwork by Makoto Aida

Mark Lanegan Band – Blues Funeral
Design by Alison Fielding

Matthew Dear – Beams
Painting by Michael Cina

Ital – Hive Mind
Design by Sam Chirnside

The Antlers – Undersea
Design by Darby Ciccy

CR for the iPad

Read in-depth features and analysis plus exclusive iPad-only content in the Creative Review iPad App. Longer, more in-depth features than we run on the blog, portfolios of great, full-screen images and hi-res video. If the blog is about news, comment and debate, the iPad is about inspiration, viewing and reading. As well as providing exclusive, iPad-only content, the app will also update with new content throughout each month. Try a free sample issue here.

CR In print

In our November issue we look at ad agency Wieden + Kennedy in a major feature as it celebrates its 30th anniversary; examine the practice of and a new monograph on M/M (Paris); investigate GOV.UK, the first major project from the Government Digital Service; explore why Kraftwerk appeals so much to designers; and ponder the future of Instagram. Rick Poynor reviews the Phaidon Archive of Graphic Design; Jeremy Leslie takes in a new exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery dedicated to experimental magazine, Aspen; Mark Sinclair explores Birmingham’s Ikon Gallery show of work by the late graphic designer, Tony Arefin; while Daniel Benneworth-Gray writes about going freelance; and Michael Evamy looks at new telecommunications brand EE’s identity. Plus, subscribers also receive Monograph in which Tim Sumner of tohave-and-tohold.co.uk dips into Preston Polytechnic’s ephemera archive to pick out a selection of printed paper retail bags from the 70s and 80s.

The issue also doubles up as the Photography Annual 2012 – our showcase of the best images in commercial photography produced over the last year. The work selected is as strong as ever, with photographs by the likes of Tim Flach (whose image of a hairless chimp adorns the front cover of the issue, above); Nadav Kander (whose shot of actor Mark Rylance is our Photography Annual cover); Martin Usborne; Peter Lippmann; Giles Revell and more.

Please note, CR now has a limited presence on the newsstand at WH Smith high street stores (although it can still be found in WH Smith travel branches at train stations and airports). If you cannot find a copy of CR in your town, your WH Smith store or a local independent newsagent can order it for you. You can search for your nearest stockist here. Alternatively, call us on 020 7970 4878 to buy a copy direct from us. Based outside the UK? Simply call +44(0)207 970 4878 to find your nearest stockist. Better yet, subscribe to CR for a year here and save yourself almost 30% on the printed magazine.