Grey Skies & Pigeons & Red Shiny Buses

Have a look at this poster. Designed by Studio8 this 'London' poster is an A2 2-colour screen printed poster. Numbered edition of 250. It is printed on a hemp paper (135gsm) which I had made as a trial some years ago. They had wanted an off white material which had a tactility to it and this paper fitted the bill perfectly.

If you like the sound of the paper, sorry but that was it - the very last sheets were used on this job! Truly a limited edition!
http://www.studio8design.co.uk/

It was printed by Josh at White Duck Screeprint in Bath and he's made a lovely job of it. http://www.whiteduckscreenprint.co.uk/

Thank you to BOB

I have to say a big thank you to Tom at BOB Design. A couple of years ago BOB produced a great invitation for the fashion label TU who launched a range of Fairtrade cotton clothing. The invitation was very simply foiled on our recycled Construction, Blackstone 1500 microns - it's an invite which lands with a real thud! The Construction is a very "dense" board and the contrast of the fine foiling in a gunmetal/silver against the recycled substrate really works. I was given a few file copies which over the months I have leant to people - but not got them back (... if you're reading this, you know who you are!) So, a couple of months ago, I asked if they had any left at BOB but they didn't have any - but today I had a lovely surprise as they found some in their "tidy up" and sent them on to me - so thank you for remembering Tom.

P.S. If anyone reading this has any file copies printed on our paper, please remember to send them to me - they will be gratefully received!

Launch for Beam

I want to send my best wishes to Christine Fent and Dominic Latham-Koenig who are launching their new company "Beam" at a party tonight. Sadly I can't be there but it was lovely to have been invited, especially with such a lovely "flickbook" invitation.

Although sadly not on any of our paper, it is a really lovely idea. The flickbook is produced by Swiss bindery BuBu (http://www.bookfactory.ch/) and works really well. If I was a bit more tech'd up, I'd have put a video here flicking through it, but sadly I'm not that sorted!

Best wishes to Christine and Dominic.

www.designbybeam.com

Channel 4 Annual Report

I have just received some copies of the new Channel 4 Annual Report designed by NB:Studio.

This is a lovely piece of literature which has just the right "feel" in the hand. The size is 325x240mm - nice size.

The covers are "wrapped" in single sided posters. There are four different versions of the posters reflecting each of Channel 4's public purposes. All the posters have a sticker affixed.

This 138pp document is printed on Marazion Ultra 90gsm which some might consider a bit light - but it works really well. The paper has got a really good opacity and has taken the images really well (but I would say that wouldn't I?). The spine is around 8mm thick.

The job was printed by Push (http://www.push-print.co.uk/)

My advice is to see if you can get hold of a copy. Given the dire quality of the vast majority of annual reports that I see nowadays (unlike some of the great pieces of work produced in the 90's!) , this one is really worth seeing.

Paper Swallows

Last week, I was asked by fashion house GHOST if I know anyone who did origami! Well luckily, I remembered that Eng Su, who I first met at NB:Studio and who is now freelancing (see my post on 13/06/09) has a penchant for the papery art! ...so after a couple of quick phonecalls I put the two in touch and Eng made over 50 swallows for their new catalogue launch event yesterday.

They used a mixture of Offenbach Bible 60gsm and StarFine White 100gsm.

Everybody was happy!
Here is a pic and a lovely thank you note from Eng - thank you.
http://www.engsu.co.uk/

Letterpress Invite

Jonathan at Campbell Hay has just sent me some file copies of an invitation which has been printed two colour Letterpress. The material that was chosen was our Matrisse 450gsm which is a very heavy weight, bulky, high white, tactile uncoated board. Most importantly, it is made in a single ply and therefore less prone to warping than duplexed materials.

It is a simple, clever design, well executed.

www.campbellhay.com

...and a lovely note is always appreciated - thank you Jonathan

ISTD awards & special congratulations to Lincoln...

On Friday evening I was invited to the ISTD Student awards evening which was hosted at The Partners in London EC1 (thanks to Creative Director, Jack Renwick). It was an excellent evening and it was good to see so many people that I've worked with over the years (The ISTD is a fantastic organisation and I'm proud to have been working in association with them since the mid nineties). http://www.istd.org.uk/

Alan Kitching presented the certificates and it was a great evening.

It was particularly eventful for the Lincoln School of Art & Design (University of Lincoln) as not only did 8 of their students walk away with certificates but the Vincent Steer award (which is the highest student accolade) was presented to Chris Mahoney for his project "MP3".

...and only the evening before, at the D&AD Student awards, the team which had designed and organised "The Design Auction" were awarded a yellow pencil. http://www.designauction.co.uk/. The team are Toby Burkill, Danny Elliot, Steve Fenn and Lauren Traynor - congratulations to you all.
I have been working with some of the tutors at Lincoln for a few years now and I have done a few talks to their courses. These award achievements really are a reflection of the dedication and quality of the tutors at this particular college, in particular, Barrie Tullett, Philippa Wood and John Dowling (part time). They really are an example of a department that goes that extra mile - and the results (and quality of their students) are there for all to see...
http://www.dowlingdesign.com/
http://www.the-case.co.uk/