Hasta La Ideas

In 2007, it was the London 2012 Olympics logo making everyone sick with anger (and epilepsy). 2008 saw the start of people being upset over how much money Pepsi had spent on their new look. Last year, it was minor anger over Ikea‘s switch from Futura to Verdana, and major anger over Tropicana‘s decision to update their brand (which they ultimately scrapped a few weeks later). 2010 was shaping up to not to have any rebranding to universally despise, but just two months shy of leaving us completely free of outrage. Fortunately, Gap stepped in just in time and got the job done. By now, you’ve possibly seen their new Helvetica-based, little square box revision and decided how it makes you feel. There’s loads of talk all over nearly every design blog, so it would be difficult to miss. Brand New‘s Armin Vit said, “I’m not one to critique something by saying it looks as if it were done in Microsoft Word but this one is just too unsophisticated to warrant anything more than that.” And that’s one of his nicer comments. There’s already a Twitter feed from the new logo, largely filled with sad commentary. Even better, Scott Hansen has moved in on the controversy by launching a “Gap Redesign Contest” asking readers to redesign the newly redesigned and give the company something everyone won’t hate with a passion. As of this post, he’s received 167 entries. Given the amount of negativity out there after just a day of having the new logo in public, it’ll be interesting to see if the company sticks with it or backs down right away. Also a good hypothetical exercise to wonder if Gap would have made this move had its founder and board member Donald Fisher not passed away last year.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

With a completely over the top video (but hey, that’s what it takes to make something go viral, no?), the European Commission has launched yesterday an ambitious initiative that aims to use public sector intervention to help the private sector flourish and make Europe more competitive in a global economy.

“The Innovation Union will focus Europe’s efforts – and co-operation with third countries – on challenges like climate change, energy and food security, health and an ageing population. It will use public sector intervention to stimulate the private sector and to remove bottlenecks which stop ideas reaching the market. These include lack of finance, fragmented research systems and markets, under-use of public procurement for innovation and slow standard setting. The Innovation Union is a “flagship” in the Europe 2020 Strategy.”

Also of interest to a design audience are some items in the launch press release (available in all EU languages):

• The Commission will set up in 2011 a European Design Leadership Board and a European Design Excellence Label.
• The Commission will launch in 2011 a major research programme on public sector and social innovation and pilot a European Public Sector Innovation Scoreboard. It will launch a European Social Innovation Pilot to provide expertise for social innovators and propose social innovation as a focus of European Social Fund programmes. It will consult social partners on spreading the innovation economy to all occupational levels.
• The Commission proposes that governments set aside dedicated budgets for public procurement of innovative products and services. This should create a procurement market worth at least €10 billion a year for innovations that improve public services. The Commission will offer guidance on joint procurements between contracting entities from different Member States.

Much more information can be found on the somewhat poorly designed Innovation Union website (and on their Facebook page and Twitter feed).

We are definitely looking forward to Robert Billing’s Tales from the Future and the interactive demonstration of augmented reality.

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“Blurring the Line Between Objects and Emotion” with lorbus

Taking inspiration from nature this unique piece of furniture is handmade by UK based craftsmen and used materials all sourced in Britain.

This three-storey house in Ekoda, Tokyo, has undergone a renovation by Suppose Design Office to create six apartments, including the transformation of a rooftop conservatory into a bathroom.

House in Ekoda has two flats on the first floor, three on the second, while the third forms a penthouse with a glazed roof-terrace.

The first and second floors have independent access via external stairs, while the roof-terrace is accessed either by an internal ladder or external spiral staircase from the second-floor terrace.

On the first and second storeys the ceiling has been removed to expose the steel-frame construction.

The second floor is the most spacious and will accommodate the landlord.

More about Suppose Design Office in our special category.

Here’s some more from the architects:

House in Ekoda

This is a renovation project of a house in Ekoda, which is a third floor- apartment in old steel construction. Before, the 1st and 2nd floor was for rental, and the third floor was for an owner of the building.

Each floors have their own entrance and exit, and they all have different floor plans. After the renovation, it was planning to rent all floors for customers. Because the building was getting old, and it was not a high quality building, we proposed the project to keep the quality and create the space more attractive.

First of all, all floors at the 1st floor was took out to avoid humidity because of the continuous footing.

The ceilings at the second floor were also removed, except the one in a room at the center of the floor, with sound proof work for neighbors.

For the 3rd floor, it was added external walls insulations with water proof work. The glasshouse at the rooftop was renovated as a big bathroom.

The common points of the renovation for the all rooms was to remove something, not to add as normal renovation, without changing a big part of the plans.

We considered carefully how to remove parts of the house, and also what should be kept. The renovated house shows different faces of its new characteristics in keeping its memories of the past for the last decades.

We were seeking and challenged new ways of renovation that would be getting more demand in the society from now.

The space coexisting with the one in old and new stay naturally, which is something like a vintage denim pants with a new shirt, and creating comfortable space with well mixture of the two styles.

See also:

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House in Minamimachi 3 by Suppose Design Office	House in Kodaira by Suppose Design Office	House in Obama by Suppose Design Office