Hasta La Ideas

The pared-down logos found on vintage Japanese cameras inspired Istanbul-based design consultancy Antrepo to create conceptual minimal logos for web brands like Facebook, Google and YouTube (+ slideshow).

Antrepo, led by designer Mehmet Gozetlik, based the Made in Japan project on 35mm SLR cameras manufactured in the 1970s and 1980s.

The designers noticed that cameras made by Canon, Nikon, Pentax and Minolta in that period all featured simple line drawings in place of the brands’ logos, which were normally much bolder.

The line drawings cut production costs by making them easier to apply to the metal camera bodies, Gozetlik explained to Dezeen.

Antrepo took the colourful logos of contemporary web-based companies and services like Instagram, eBay and Twitter and turned them into stark monochrome designs.

The new logos appear to be etched into metal, echoing the appearance of the vintage cameras.

We previously featured Antrepo’s minimalist take on well-known food packaging designs.

Earlier this month we reported that famous brands including Heinz, Marmite and Levi’s had produced “unbranded” versions of their products for sale at London department store Selfridges.

Last week American Airlines unveiled a new logo and livery for its aeroplanes, while designer Yves Béhar recently revamped the packaging of skincare brand Nivea – see all graphic design on Dezeen.

Here’s more information from Antrepo:

Made in Japan

Canon AE-1, Nikon FTn, Ashai Pentax ESII, Minolta XG-1 – these cameras are some of the Japanese 35mm SLR cameras from the vintage ’70s and ’80s, the “Made in Japan” era, when Japan set the global standard of producing quality.

When we take a look at the vintage 35mm cameras, we notice that almost all of these brands used the same style for their logos and typography – line-based logos and extended-outline fonts.

Almost all of these brands used bold logos on their packaging or advertising in the ’70s and ’80s.

The production industry created line-based logos for the metal bodies, probably to cut down the production costs. So we try to see the digital world in the same perspective of this vintage style.

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by Antrepo appeared first on Dezeen.

The classic blue Nivea tin inspired an overhaul of the skincare brand’s packaging by San Franscisco-based designer Yves Béhar and his studio fuseproject.

Yves Béhar chose to reflect Nivea’s trademark circular blue tin in the rounded contours and simplified blue and white colour scheme of the new packaging. It can also be seen in the round lids, which tilt upwards and are embossed with the Nivea logo.

“I was particularly drawn to this design project by the vast emotional potential of the Nivea brand and its 100 year heritage,” explained Béhar.

In Milan last spring, Nivea collaborated with British designer Faye Toogood to create an installation populated by mysterious helpers dressed in white.

Last year we also reported that Béhar’s SodaStream TV commercial was banned in the UK for allegedly “denigrating” rival products – see all projects by Yves Béhar.

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Here’s the full press release from Nivea:

Hamburg, January 15, 2013 – The blue tin has embodied NIVEA’s brand values since 1925. It is the brand ‘face’ that consumers around the world associate with trust, closeness and expertise. Now Beiersdorf AG has introduced a new global design language based on the iconic blue tin. The new design consistently translates the successful NIVEA brand’s values into a product that consumers can see and feel, thereby making products in all categories immediately recognisable. Beiersdorf has consistently developed the NIVEA brand with a focus on its global core values.

The gradual introduction of the new design for the entire NIVEA skin and body care portfolio will commence in more than 200 countries in January 2013.

‘NIVEA stands for skin care, trust, quality and value for money. These are the values that our consumers all over the world appreciate. We have to ensure that our brand identity reflects these values, one aspect of which is our product design,’ explained Ralph Gusko, executive board member for brands at Beiersdorf. “Around two-thirds of all purchase decisions are made at the shelf. The new NIVEA design’s high recognition value will make it easier for consumers around the world to find the NIVEA products they are looking for. The consistent design language across all channels – from product packaging, through point of sale to advertising – also increases consumer identification with the brand and encourages them to additionally use products in other categories,” continued Gusko.

The new design delivers additional functional and emotional value

Internationally renowned industrial designer Yves Béhar joined forces with the Beiersdorf Design Management team at his San Francisco-based fuseproject studio to create a new, unique and innovative design language that embodies the NIVEA brand values. The blue NIVEA tin wasn’t just the basis of the design, but also a source of inspiration to the designers. The crème tin is used as a logo, reflected in the rounded contours of the new packagings and in the reduced blue and white colors of the new design. The round lid, which tilts towards the consumer, embossed with the NIVEA logo, has obvious similarities with the iconic blue tin and it provides customers with a “familiar face” on the shelf.

“Design is important because it adds value to an object’s function,” said Béhar. The multiple award-winning industrial designer is committed to “developing products that aren‟t just functional, but which also enhance the consumer experience and appeal to their emotions”. “Unlike many other skin care brands, NIVEA isn’t geared to a specific culture, gender or age group. I was particularly drawn to this design project by the vast emotional potential of the NIVEA brand and its 100-year heritage,” continued Béhar.

The first consumer tests confirm that the development team’s efforts were worthwhile because consumers – especially in the growth markets of Asia and South America – rated the new design line as very good.

A consistent NIVEA design language increases brand identification

“The new NIVEA design language was created from the ground up to offer consumers a tangible experience of our brand values before they even open the packaging. It’s pure and authentic – like the brand itself,” explained Ralph Gusko.

Since 1911 consumers around the globe have associated NIVEA with skin care and it is one of the most well-known brands in the world. More than half a billion people around the globe trust in NIVEA, the highest-selling skin care brand of all. Skin care is the fastest growing segment in the global cosmetics market. The new design language is an aspect of the new overall brand strategy focusing on sustainable and profitable growth for the NIVEA product family which was recently announced by CEO Stefan F. Heidenreich.

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Yves Béhar and fuseproject appeared first on Dezeen.

News: graphic design studio Barnbrook has defaced a classic David Bowie album and upturned a 1970s photograph of the musician to create the covers of his new album and single.

Jonathan Barnbrook, head of the London-based studio, explained in a blogpost why the cover for The Next Day, due out in March, recycles the artwork for Bowie’s 1977 album “Heroes” by placing a blank square over the pop star’s face.

“The “Heroes” cover obscured by the white square is about the spirit of great pop or rock music which is ‘of the moment’, forgetting or obliterating the past,” he said. “If you are going to subvert an album by David Bowie there are many to choose from, but this is one of his most revered.”

“We know it is only an album cover with a white square on it, but often in design it can be a long journey to get at something quite simple which works,” he added. “Often the most simple ideas can be the most radical.”

The studio also took a picture of the musician from the late 1970s and turned it upside down to create the cover for new single Where are We Now?, Bowie’s first release in a decade.

A new typeface called Doctrine was also created for the covers, and will be released soon by Barnbrook’s font-producing wing VirusFonts.

Barnbrook previously designed the covers for Bowie’s 2002 album Heathen and 2003’s Reality, and has also been working on the upcoming David Bowie is exhibition at the V&A.

We previously featured a selection of work by Barnbrook shown at the Design Museum in London in 2007.

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album and single covers appeared first on Dezeen.

Product News: clouds, umbrellas, flying machines and suits of armour are among the motifs in this collection by Italian design house Fornasetti for English wallpaper brand Cole & Son (+ slideshow).

The collection also includes architectural friezes and borders and is designed so that different papers and motifs can be combined.

“I was thinking of doing something a little more than a normal wallpaper, to give the opportunity to have something to stick on the wall with some more fantasy,” Barnaba Fornasetti told Dezeen.

“So I decided to do vertical rolls and horizontal rolls, and rolls that can be combined together. For example, we have the clouds that can be combined with balustrades and flying machines. You can choose to make only clouds with the balustrade or only a piece of the flying machine with clouds.”

The motifs are taken from the Fornasetti archive of drawings created by Barnaba’s father, Piero Fornasetti: “I chose things and I mixed them together, and I changed the colour, I changed the dimensions.”

This year is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Piero Fornasetti.

English hand-made wallpaper brand Cole & Son will launch the collection at Maison et Object in Paris later this month. It follows an earlier collection created by Fornasetti for the brand in 2008.

Here’s some info from Cole & Son:

Cole & Son presents the Fornasetti II Collection at Maison et Objet in Paris 18^th– 22^nd January 2013.

Comprising fifteen designs, Cole & Son’s new collection follows the success of the first Fornasetti range, launched in 2008, delivering a repertoire of magical themes within a collection of designs that are at once iconic and covetable.

Fornasetti II takes a bold step in wallpaper design, transcending the obvious and transforming eclectic and whimsical drawings into a truly stunning array of co-ordinating wallpapers in an exciting range of colours and styles. Eccentric motifs of fantastical flying machines, architectural details, playful monkeys, keys and owls all evoke a theatrical and magical space, while the use of wide width friezes, borders, digital panels and double width papers gives this collection an unparalleled diversity in the way in which it can be used.

Commenting on the new collection, Barnaba Fornasetti stated: “Pablo Neruda once described my father as the magician of precious and precise magic and I think that this decorative collection beautifully captures the magic essence of the Fornasetti world”.

Macchine Volanti

Floating on a new version of Nuvole, these wondrous flying machines hang amongst the clouds evoking the romantic New World of scientific exploration.

The three colourways are drawn in two shimmering versions of silver and bronze on pale blue and midnight skies and a third more playful colouring of red and yellow on a neutral sky.

This design has been devised so that it directly co-ordinates with both Nuvolette and Balaustra and is a total of 137cm wide, thereby being sold as a set comprising two wide width rolls of 68.5cm each.

Nuvolette

Nuvolette, a beautifully rendered cloudy sky effect has been designed as a smaller more manageable version of Cole & Son’s existing Nuvole design.

Presented in three tranquil colourways of neutral, pale blue and midnight to coordinate with Macchine Volanti and Balaustra, a fourth colouring of black and white creates a more striking and stormy effect.

This design has a total width of 137cm and as such is being sold as a set comprising two wide width rolls of 68.5cm each.

Balaustra

Balaustra creates a striking trompe-l’oeil effect of a marble or stone balustrade sitting against a backdrop of Nuvolette.

Designed to be hung horizontally along the bottom of a wall, this is the first of Cole & Son’s friezes and is an exciting and novel approach to using wallpaper.

Conceived as a direct coordinate with both Nuvolette and Macchine Volanti, in neutral, pale blue and midnight, this border offers intriguing opportunities for interior decoration. Balaustra is 68.5cm high and sold on a 10 metre roll.

Chiavi Segrete

Introducing two popular Fornasetti motifs, Chiavi Segrete combines mysterious gold and silver keys hanging within a dense privet hedge. At once lyrical and surreal Chiavi Segrete has been produced as a pattern easily useable on four walls. Three softer, more neutral colourways with gold, silver and ghostly white keys suspended within frosty white, grey-blue and pale neutral leaves create a cooler more elegant feel, whilst the more dramatic dark grey and forest green leaves with their gilver keys add a touch of theatre.

This design repeats on a single roll at 68.5cm wide.

Nottambule

Featuring a family of wide-eyed owls, (a favourite theme of Piero Fornasetti,) Nottambule is a charming and humorous frieze, which can be hung either at the top of a room, or above a dado rail. Offered in 5 colourings of ink engraved owls with backdrops of lively red and yellow, as well as two sophisticated neutrals and a more secretive midnight.

The border measures 40cm high and is sold on a standard 10m roll.

Promenade

Featuring a variety of umbrellas, riding whips and walking sticks collected by Piero Fornasetti over the years and depicted on umbrella stands and various other decorative products, Promenade is the second of Cole & Son’s wide width friezes, designed to be hung around the bottom of a room, or beneath the dado rail.

Sold as a single 10 metre roll at 68.5cm wide.

Uccelli

Originally created as a decorative folding screen, Uccelli was first devised as a wallpaper for a luxury hotel on the on the Argentario Peninsula in Tuscany. Due to popular demand we have reproduced it here in two seasonal colourways of bright summer colour and cooler wintery tones.

Designed as a repeating panel at 1.04 metres wide by 2.8 metres high, the wallpaper is sold as a 52 cm wide paper that joins to create the full width and height.

Procuratie

The first of two architectural designs, Procuratie, which takes its name from the well known building facades of St Marks Square in Venice, is composed of two rows of classical arches drawn in a simple intaglio style. Produced in four neutral shades Procuratie repeats at 68.5cm wide and is sold on 10 metre roll.

Procuratie e Scimmie

The amusing companion to Procuratie features two monkeys wandering amongst pillars and arches.

Offered in the four directly co-ordinating colours of Procuratie, the monkeys are picked out in shades of pale blue, soft gold, regal purple and black and white.

This design also repeats at 68.5cm wide and is sold on a 10 metre roll.

Acquario

The fish theme appears in some of the earliest Fornasetti work, and this design adopts some of the motifs used on decorative trays. Picked for their whimsical and naive appearance, Acquario’s clownish fish set on soft washed backgrounds of pale cobalt, neutral, charcoal and deep-sea blue, repeat at 68.5cm wide and are sold on a 10 metre roll.

 Teatro

Comprising three colourways – black, white and neutral, turquoise and neutral and the original colouring of red and yellow, Teatro originally designed for umbrella stands in the mid 1950s, features boxes occupied by elegant theatre-goers in evening dress. This wonderfully conversational wallpaper creates a witty and flamboyant faux interior, perfectly in keeping with the Fornasetti spirit and ethos. It repeats at 68.5cm wide and is sold on a 10 metre roll.

Pennini

Featuring an assortment of old fashioned pen nibs in an array of burnished metallics, Pennini has been designed as a frieze, to be hung horizontally around a room. At 52cm high Pennini is offered in a sophisticated palette of parchment with iridescent aquas and blues, charcoal with bronze and pewter, linen with golds and coppers and powder blue with silvers, golds and gilvers.

Nicchie

Comprising a number of well proportioned trompe l’oeil niches, Nicchie was originally conceived as a decorative screen in the 1950’s. Re-structured to work as a wallpaper, this unmistakeably Fornasetti crosshatched design features a surreal assortment of mandolins, fruit, keys and hourglasses in graphic tones of black on white, charcoal and parchment with highlights of red, gold and bronze.

This design repeats at 68.5cm wide on a 10 metre roll.

Magia Domestica

The most whimsical and magical design within this collection, Magia Domestica, with its suit of armour, invitingly open door, bookcases and drawn curtains creates a world within a world. Produced as ten panels all at 52cm wide, the entire design is modular, repeatable and can be put together in any configuration.

Sold as either a complete set of 10 panels, or as a choice of two 5 panel sets.

Multiplette

Both Piero (a member of Ciclisti Milanesi) and Barnaba a promoter of cycling, have been bicycle enthusiasts from an early age, the humble bicycle has re-appeared here as a witty 52cm high frieze. Multiplette features nine cyclists pedalling along on a single multi-saddled bicycle in ‘comic-strip’ striped jerseys and caps. Produced in nostalgic colourways of red and navy, and a more colourful primary red, blue and yellow, this border is sold on a 7.5metre roll, comprising 5 complete ‘bicycles’.

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for Cole & Son appeared first on Dezeen.

Competition: we’re giving readers the chance to win one of five prints by UK designers Dorothy that feature bands and songs with colours in their names next to corresponding hues on the colour wheel (+ slideshow).

Dorothy created the two new litho prints titled The Colour of Popular Music and The Colour of Song by searching through old record collections to find as many colour-related titles as possible.

The Colour of Popular Music includes the names of 154 bands and artists like Black Sabbath, Pink Floyd, Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Smashing Pumpkins.

576 song titles such as Back in Black, Goldfinger, Brown Sugar and Purple Rain feature on The Colour of Song poster.

The posters are 100 centimetres high by 70 centimetres wide and printed on 120gsm uncoated art paper.

Open editions of the prints to be won in this competition can be bought for £30 from Dorothy’s online shop, along with signed and stamped limited editions for £100.

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To enter this competition email your name, age, gender, occupation, and delivery address and telephone number to competitions@dezeen.com with “Colour of Popular Music and Song” in the subject line, stating which print you would like. We won’t pass your information on to anyone else; we just want to know a little about our readers. Read our privacy policy here.

Competition closes 10 January 2013. Five winners will be selected at random and notified by email. Winners’ names will be published in a future edition of our Dezeenmail newsletter and at the top of this page. Dezeen competitions are international and entries are accepted from readers in any country.

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Music and Song prints to give away appeared first on Dezeen.