Studio & Entrepreneurship
Week 5: Collaborative Mix
The Challenge
- Research, discover and analyse the different ways in which graphic designers produce work collaboratively. Demonstrate through posting onto the Ideas Wall and your blog.
- Research and analyse the essential components of collaborative practice. Demonstrate through posting onto the ideas wall and your blog.
- Design, write and deliver an editorial piece illustrating a collaborative project that has led to an exemplary and historically significant piece of work (300 words plus imagery) on your blog and post the link onto the Ideas Wall.
Different Ways
Through the examples given in the lecture, I’ve looked at some different kinds of collaborations and have drawn out three common lines a project can follow. Read more about them here. Here are some other collaborations…
Helen Nicoll and Jan Pieńkowski
For me, the Meg and Mog series of children’s book by Nicoll and Pieńkowski is exemplary and historically significant collaboration in my life. The illustrations and colours are simple, bright and punchy with funny stories involving Meg the witch and her cat, Mog.
Nicoll and Pieńkowski met when they worked at the BBC together on a children’s art show, Watch!, where he was commissioned to provide live drawings. They developed a technique where the images appeared on screen as if my magic, but were a trick of the light, and they learnt how to create a narrative through illustration. When Nicoll left the BBC in 1971, she suggested that they created a children’s book series.
As a condition of being illustrator, Pieńkowski insisted that the spells that the witch cast could never work, and this rule creates the madness and mayhem around which a narrative can be woven. After showing their first book to the editor Judith Elliott at Heinemann, she commissioned more and they have been loved since then.
Their collaboration was a distant one: geographically apart in Wiltshire and South West London, but in pre-internet times meant that they have to be inventive in how they worked together. Pieńkowski wrote that they …
“… had to develop a way of working together. We hit on the idea of meeting at the Membury service station on the M4. This became our routine. We were regulars, the friendly staff didn’t seem to mind and I always brought a little bunch of flowers to put on our table. We spent many frenzied hours struggling with stories and pictures, accompanied by any number of cups of tea.” (Pieńkowski, 2012)
They identified that space away from their everyday lives, with Nicoll saying that “one of the biggest difficulties … is getting rid of the rest of your life, if you’re going to do it together … Because we do it in this curious way, where we battle over every page” (Rabinovitch, 2004). What is more away from everyday life than a service station, a transitory place only visited in places.
Working together out of the studios, they developed a new process “on a big white pad. Nicoll would dictate some words, they would both scribble. Loosely, she writes the stories, he does the pictures, and the spells they make up together.” As the stories are short at 32 pages long, there is little space for a complex story. “The way we work is, we do the beginning, then we talk about the middle, but then do the end. So if there’s a squash it will be in the middle – but we must have an elegant beginning and end” (Rabinovitch, 2004).
Collaborating in this way obviously worked. Between them, created 23 books in the series, many of which are still in print and have spawned theatre productions and audiobooks. Since Nicoll’s death in 2012, Pieńkowski has continued to produce a few Meg and Mog books with his partner, David Walser. The collaboration was strong, though not without its difficulties, as parties have remarked!
Pieńkowski: “Each time we start on a new book it becomes a struggle and a battle – the course of collaboration never did run smooth – but somehow in the end our Muse has not deserted us in our hour of need – so far!” (An Interview with Jan Pieńkowski | Playing by the book, 2020)
Walser says of Pieńkowski: “We have been together for 56 years but he isn’t at all easy to work with. [He] works much better on his own,” he added. (Flood and Lee, 2019)
Pieńkowski of Nicoll: “Helen was an inspiring but merciless collaborator and usually managed to get her way with her innate charm.” (Pieńkowski, 2012)
Perhaps the separation allowed the collaboration to flourish, as they definitely seemed to work better on their own day-to-day.
The stories were drawn from Polish witch tales told to Pieńkowski by his next-door neighbour in childhood, and the colours draw both from Polish traditional folk colours and the bright pop-art of the time.
The books have earned Nicoll and Pieńkowski many awards across the book industry, but more importantly, they have been treasured by generations of children in Britain and they continue strong in print and memory.
Resources
Pieńkowski, J., 2012. Helen Nicoll Obituary. [online] Guardian. Available at: <https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/oct/09/helen-nicoll> [Accessed 2 July 2020].
Playingbythebook.net. 2020. An Interview With Jan Pieńkowski | Playing By The Book. [online] Available at: <http://www.playingbythebook.net/2010/10/25/an-interview-with-jan-pienkowski/> [Accessed 2 July 2020].
Flood, A. and Lee, S., 2019. Jan Pieńkowski: Inside The Mind Behind Meg And Mog – Picture Essay. [online] Guardian. Available at: <https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/may/09/jan-pienkowski-meg-and-mog-booktrust-award-picture-essay> [Accessed 2 July 2020].
Rabinovitch, D., 2004. Authors Of The Month: Helen Nicholl And Jan Pienkowski. [online] Guardian. Available at: <https://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/jan/28/booksforchildrenandteenagers.dinarabinovitch> [Accessed 2 July 2020].
Editorial Design
Building Blocks of collaboration
Trust
A learned, and/or implicit, trust that the people involved have the successful completion of the project as their focus
A Sweet Spot of numbers
Sometimes a project needs greater numbers of people to weigh in to make sure that it is well received, at the same time too many people can cloud the water. I don’t think there is a hard and fast rule of numbers, just experience and numbers!
Communication
How the collaborators communicate and how openly they do so can make a break a project
Understanding of practice
Does everyone understand where the other collaborators are coming from, and who the project is really for? Will it work for the intended audience? Are the collaborators the best place to fulfil these roles?
Common Goals
but also skills that complement each others
Afterwards, Alex challenged me to put them in order. Here is my response:
Week 5: Critical Research Journal
Weekly Learning Objectives
By the end of this week you should be able to:
- Research and analyse the different ways in which graphic designers produce work collaboratively;
- Research and analyse the essential components of collaborative practice;
- Design, write and deliver an editorial piece illustrating a collaborative project that has led to an exemplary and historically significant piece of work (300 words plus imagery).
Collaboration comes in many forms
It was nice to revisit the Migrant Journal by Christoph Miller of Offshore: the glistening metallic inks and the swooping arrow that forms the G. This is what I would term more of a traditional collaboration, and I’ll explain what I mean by an untraditional one further down!
Usually, in publishing or any project, the content is followed by the design in the schedule, the what comes before the how. Migrant Journal messes with this timeline and the content, the words, are conceived simultaneously with the design. I would anticipate that in a publication so rich and full of infographics that its both a necessity and product of editorial/design collaboration. It helps, I think, that each issue has one theme tying it together to give razor sharp focus to the contributors.
The team behind Migrant Journal worked remotely in different countries none of them held passports for, and before C-19 struck. This only emphasises that collaboration is possible to matter what obstacles are in our way.
In a similar vein, Danielle Pender and Shaz Madani of Riposte magazine are a collaboration of designer and editorial, how and what. Print seems to be the chosen medium of collaborations of this type – it forces the creator to produce work in a slower way.
Anna Lomax and Jess Bonham are collaborations, but they do not differ in disciplines, rather fundamental approaches to graphic design. Their yin and yang of maximalism and minimalism, high culture and everyday life seems to balance out well, tempered by years of working next to each other at art school. I’m inclined to wonder at the chances that brought the right two people together that could work together with opposites without it imploding! Solid.
Liv Siddal for the Rough Trade magazine, collaborates with one main designer, Bruce Usher, but to keep up with the hectic publishing schedule has regular contributors. This collaboration works on trust, in that she has to trust that her contributors will supply suitable material each month, for example the bands with disposable cameras on tour. I like this form of collaboration because it has a solid base with her and her designer, and has a structure of contributors yet still has freedom.
Now onto the non-traditional types! The previous examples are where collaboration occurs before the point of official publication, The next practitioners, on the other hand, have collaborated differently.
Morag Myerscough creates her concepts with a partner, Luke Morgan, but her most consistent collaborators are her audience. Whilst she was designing the dining rooms in the Royal London Hospital, Whitechapel, she and the poet Lemn Sissay created visual workshops. The children could participate in the workshops and from there she created a typeface to display their poems and their favourite word DAZZLE. Although the bright colours match her signature, the content was drawn from the children so that they could see themselves reflected in the space they were staying in.
In another hospital setting, she presented her bold designs to the nurses of the children’s ward that were met with initial reticence. When she sent up models of how the rooms would look, the nurses showed their patients who reacted positively and from that she gained their trust. She took their idea of a blue room for some patients, and with their support the project was a mistake. She continues to collaborate with them by listening to feedback and suggestions from the patients and their families.
In the project Club Under My House, Myerscough collaborated with the community and South London Gallery to create a space in which children from the building above could come together to make art. From workshops where children and teenagers drew patterns that were featured on the walls, she learnt that they wanted a space they could dance, sing and perform. Hence, the name of the project.
I could go on about Myerscough amazing projects, however I think that key to her work is her engagement with the communities she creates in and her listening to people informs her work so that it becomes their work too.
Hato and Kellenberger White also have fascinating projects… I haven’t forgotten them but they have sparked ideas that I will go on to reference in later weeks…
Building Blocks of collaboration
Trust
A learned, and/or implicit, trust that the people involved have the successful completion of the project as their focus
A Sweet Spot of numbers
Sometimes a project needs greater numbers of people to weigh in to make sure that it is well received, at the same time too many people can cloud the water. I don’t think there is a hard and fast rule of numbers, just experience and numbers!
Communication
How the collaborators communicate and how openly they do so can make a break a project
Understanding of practice
Does everyone understand where the other collaborators are coming from, and who the project is really for? Will it work for the intended audience? Are the collaborators the best place to fulfil these roles?
Common Goals
but also skills that complement each others
Resources
GDE730: Redux
I’ve struggled with this module and to pin down the essentials of who I am and what I want to do. I went back to Week 1 to better articulate that because it’s up to me to show the world how to define me.
Using my wardrobes as a backdrop, I’m going to plan out projects so that I can see things ahead of me before I write them down. Three doors = three briefs. Expect those post-its to be a-fluttering in the breeze!
I’m going to go re-do a lot of work, because I’m not happy with where I started from and what I turned out.
Week 4: Critical Research Journal
Weekly Learning Objectives
By the end of this week you should be able to:
- Research and analyse client / practitioner relationships and the service they provide;
- Research and analyse the format and structure of a business plan;
- Write, communicate and deliver a 3,000 word business plan (speculative and personal);
RESOURCEs
What a scary week. No, seriously. The resource that had the most effect on me was Chris Do’s “The Client is not Your Enemy” video because it broke down how to be a good designer in business.
The reminder that the client is not their to build my own portfolio is definitely a useful tip, as although I don’t think I’ve been guilty in the past, I have felt dismayed when a client has moved away from an idea that I think would showcase my skills to fill a portfolio hole.
Coming in as a designer can give the client a fresh perspective, but to educate their customers on what they will want is insulting, as the client, funnily enough, knows their audience. It’s important to understand the clients’ objective and from their draw a clearly defined goal to work towards.
One pitfall is that of hearing what you want from the client, and that can be avoided by starting as broad as possible and asking questions to filter out possibilities down to the best path, ensuring the face the same direction as the client.
A tool to help narrowing down the possibilities is to ask why three times. I’m definitely going to do that, as I hit a tough point in the business plan.
In a Linkedin Learning course, I found some more useful tips.
What problem am I looking to solve?
Typography is a specialist skill that needs care to ensure that the design of the type does not adversely affect how people absorb the content.
What is my product?
Typesetting books and printed products
SWOT Analysis
How will I reach my market?
Direct with business card and website, and social media posts on Instagram, Twitter and The Dots
Business Plan
There are many different ways to structure a business plan, but they all need to communicate the business idea to a client, investor or an outside party. The common parts seem to be:
- Executive Summary: an overview, succinct description of the business that shows what the document contains
- Details of people involved
- Services provided
- Market Segmentation
- Clients, and examples
- Marketing strategy
- Start-up Costs
- Financials
I did have an original business plan, which you can see here, but I am going to work it into a community based project.
Resources
Week 4: Business Plan (original)
Executive Summary
Working as at a publishing house and having strong ties to others, I am able to
Low start-up costs of working at home
For six months to a year, it will be up to 20 hours a week. Beyond ths 40 hours
With extensive experience in publishing, Anna Robinette budgets and schedule projects like a queen with many contacts with suppliers to negotiate on prices and
After a thorough grounding in typesetting and artworking, Anna Robinette embarked on an MA Graphic Design at Falmouth University that allows her to study and further her skills at the same time. She will finish her
She has taken on paid and pro bono personal projects as her schedule allowed, including packaging for a local drinks business that was featured in the Guardian, a sustainable living zine and . Setting
Objectives
The objectives for the first six months are:
- To establish myself and build clients through networking in my industry and local area
- To continue serving current clients beyond their expectations.
The objectives for the first year are:
- To further my skills in animation and kinetic typography
- To work on larger-scale projects for companies and institutions
- To create stunning graphics and typography that will surpass the clients’ briefs and expectations.
The objectives for the first three years are:
- To develop a start-up graphic design business that is profitable within the first three years
- To move from a home setting to a shared studio setting
- To provide an invaluable service to clients, whether in-house or remotely, and to give the studio work that is creative, fun and flexible
- To grow sustainably within the community to provide a service that is local as well as able to act further afield.
Mission
Sew My Type is a graphic design firm that specialises in typography and craft-based design across media, from print to mixed reality. From the inception of a project, SMT will provide services for typesetting books and printed matter, art direction, to project management of scheduling and budgeting and final delivery. Clients will come from small- and medium-sized companies, primarily from the publishing and theatre and arts industries. With extensive skills and wicked organisational skills, SMT will distinguish itself with its wide range of innovative projects, delivered within budget, on spec and on time.
Keys to Success
My keys to success are:
- Creative solutions
- Well-crafted execution
- Professional insight
- Playful attitude.
Background information
Owner details
Anna Robinette of Walthamstow, London, born in 1991
Education
- BA English at Queen’s University Belfast
- MA Graphic Design at Falmouth University.
Technical and Vocational Skills
- Mac and Windows operating systems
- Adobe Creative Cloud, including InDesign, Illustrator, Photoshop, After Effects, Dreamweaver, Lightroom
- Glyph and Processing
- Digital photography and photo editing
- Riso and screen printing
- Letterpress and bookbiniding
- Print production, budgeting and scheduling experience.
Professional Experience
- 5 years’ experience in project management in publishing for academic and children’s publishing houses
- 3 years as artworker/typesetter at Walker Books, a children’s publishing house
- Freelance design work including packaging, website, zine, photography and branding
- Screenprinting prints and cards for personal Etsy shop.
Services
Overview
Sew My Type provides graphic design and visual communication services to publishing and arts-based companies. Some of the services offered are typesetting, branding, and packaging.
The pricing of the projects are typically estimated as a project-based cost. The project cost will be estimated by the approximate number of hours needed to complete the project. SMT will charge an average of £50 per hour across the projects.
The majority of services will be provided remotely by SMT working in a home office or in-house at the clients’ place of work. This set-up will reduce the amount of overheads while the business is setting itself up and allow Anna Robinette to work flexibly where she chooses and where is convenient for a client. By year two, SMT aims to be working in a co-working space to network with other creatives and allow for more space.
Detailed services
The studio provides the following services:
- Typesetting books and printed matter
- Kinetic type and animation
- Art direction
- Logo and branding design
- Layout and book design
- Artworking and image processing
- Packaging and point of sale merchandise
- Pre-press and print production.
Clients
My client will initially be overall
Client One
Client one is starting a small business and needs
Client Two
Is from a cultural institution who wants branding for their exhibition and a record and interesting snazzy
Company Summary
Sew My Type is a start-up graphic design studio that serves the publishing and arts industries. The firm will be based in Walthamstow, London and will operate across the London area.
Start-up Summary
Sew My Type is a sole proprietorship owned and operated by Anna Robinette.
Start-up Costs
Sew My Type will be located within the rented residential property to incur fewer start-up costs. Most start-up costs have already been covered through Anna Robinette’s personal practice, and the reminder will be covered by personal savings for the first year. Requirements for Sew My Type are:
- Licenses for the following software: Adobe Creative Cloud, Glyph, Font Explorer and Quick Books (a scheduling and billing software)
- Cloud based storage and offline backup hardware
- Portion of internet connection
- Subscriptions of requisite magazines and journals: Creative Review
- Website maintenance, domain renewal and Wix subscription
- Assorted office supplies
- Promotional materials: business cards
- Legal fees regarding business formation, creation of standard client contracts, and other general advice.
| Description | Quantity | Unit Price | Cost |
| Adobe Creative Cloud (yearly subscription) | 1 | £596.33 | £596.33 |
| Glyph app (one-off) | 1 | £230.00 | £230.00 |
| Font Explorer | 1 | £99.00 | £99.00 |
| QuickBooks Simple Start plan | 1 | £108.00 | £108.00 |
| GoogleOne 2TB (yearly subscription) | 1 | £79.99 | £79.99 |
| 2TB hard drive | 1 | £100.00 | £100.00 |
| Internet connection (share of) | 12 | £10.00 | £120.00 |
| Creative Review (yearly subscription) | 1 | £175.00 | £175.00 |
| Web domain | 1 | £12.00 | £12.00 |
| Wix subscription | 1 | £102.00 | £102.00 |
| Office supplies | 1 | £100.00 | £100.00 |
| Promotional materials | 1 | £80.00 | £80.00 |
| Start-up legal and accounting fees | 1 | £500.00 | £500.00 |
| Business insurance | 1 | £350.00 | £350.00 |
| Emergency I-didn’t-budget-for-this Fund | 1 | £2,000.00 | £2,000.00 |
| Total | £4,652.32 |
Market Analysis Summary
Sew My Type will target a range of business sizes so that
Target Market Segment Strategy
Publishers
Small business
Institutions
Networking.
Pricing Structure
Pricing will be priced by hour for some projects, whilst hours worked will be a tool used to estimate a total for a project where appropriate.
Typesetting
For typesetting, the rate will be £22/hour. This is 10% less than comparable freelancers in London (LM) and typesetting companies outside London (UD) so that I can win work and establish myself across companies.
- Kinetic type and animation
- Art direction
- Logo and branding design
- Layout and book design
- Artworking and image processing
- Packaging and point of sale merchandise
- Pre-press and print production.
Work breakdown
On any given week for the first six months, I will be doing the following work:
| Scope | Hourly Price | Hours | Total |
| Typesetting | £22.00 | 10 | £200.00 |
| Business insurance | £40.00 | £350.00 | £350.00 |
| Emergency I-didn’t-budget-for-this Fund | 1 | £2,000.00 | £2,000.00 |
| Total | £4,652.32 |
Strategy and Implementation Summary
Sew My Type’s marketing and sales strategy will utilize networking and referrals to develop visibility for the company. Prospective customers will be turned into qualified sales through a professional showing that displays Robinette’s portfolio of past work.
Marketing Strategy
As noted in the target market segment strategy, Sew My Type will rely on three activities in their marketing efforts. These include:
- Networking: leveraging relationships to build more relationships within London’s design and publishing community.
- Client referral: by providing outstanding customer attention, current customers are more likely to become a long-term customer and are more likely to refer their friends.
- Targeted customer acquisition: the first step of this process is to target who the ideal customer is, determine how Sew My Type can offer them value, and then network to come into contact with the decision maker at that company.
Sales Strategy
The sales strategy will be to utilise Anna Robinette’s portfolio of past work to qualify a sales lead. Using a portfolio is very common within the industry to show past examples of work.
Sales Forecast
The first months of operation will be used establish clients, negotiate projects with existing clients and maintain current projects. The business will be part-time for six-months to a year to establish clients that allow for a full work week of billable hours. By month twelve Sew My Type will have developed larger projects and will continue to grow steadily.
Milestones
Sew My Type will have several milestones early on:
- Business plan completion
- Establishment of the first major account
- Profitability
Competitive Edge
Web Summary
The website will be used as a way to show past examples of work, and provide potential clients with several ways of contacting Sew My Type. In today’s day and age, a website is a given, a standard source of information regarding the company. as are social media channels. Weekly posts on social media will showcase the studio’s work to encourage interaction and boost engagement with potential clients.
Website Marketing Strategy
The marketing strategy for the website will be based on inclusion of the Internet address in all materials that Sew My Type releases. Wix provides SEO services with its website plans to increase traffic from web searches.
Development Requirements
Anna Robinette already has a CMS-based website onto which she uploads her projects. This will be rebranded as Sew My Type for continued use and regularly updated.
Social Media
Channels on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and The Dots will be set-up under the company name with weekly posts on projects so that profiles are driven to the top of the algorithms. Engagement with other creatives and industry professional will increase name recognition and interested clients.
Week 3: Songwriters Fonts
The Challenge
- Research and analyse naming and copyright issues, the basic pitfalls of illegal practice and the common areas of the copyright process, and the ethical and legal factors most frequently affecting graphic designers. Demonstrate through posting onto the Ideas Wall and in your research journal.
- Communicate clearly the key areas that may infringe copyright or require IP protection in relation to a chosen designed object. Present as a designed piece, incorporating an image of the chosen design and a typographically designed list of key areas.
Typography is one of my graphic design interests and so I thought that it would be appropriate to cover typefaces for this project. I am going to look at the specific example of Songwriters Fonts, how it was taken down due to copyright issues and through that look at typeface copyright law.
WORDS HAVE MEANING & TYPE HAS SPIRIT
Paula Scher
It is well established that typefaces immediately give the reader a flavour of the piece of writing before the content is absorbed, and subtle changes in leading, kerning, line length and a myriad of other factors can greatly enhance or impede a reader’s experience with the piece. One subset of typefaces are esteemed overall as inviting the reader into the writer’s mind: handwriting.
The choice between Calibri and Garamond might tell something of a personality, but still comes with a set of expectations from the type designer and other examples where the typeface has been used before. Handwriting, though, is something more special. Whether or not you believe in the ‘science’ of graphology, which Wikipedia describes as “analysis of the physical characteristics and patterns of handwriting claiming to be able to identify the writer … or evaluating personality characteristics” (before noting that “it is generally considered a pseudoscience), handwriting draws the reader into the words. That someone has taken the time to write or annotate their words on paper is intoxicating when compared to mindless tapping on touchscreens. Annotations in the margins of books and poems similarly give us insight into famous people’s minds unadulterated by outside edits.
Take a look at Wilfred Owen’s draft for this seminal poem Anthem for Doomed Youth, annotated by Siegfried Sassoon, revealing their shared war experience and effort to convey that to their audience.
Tying into the world of design, take a look at one of Paula Scher’s maps:
Her hand-painted type gives these pieces spirit that would not be the same if the words were formed on a digital screen. Letraset would have the charm of appreciated craft and hard work, but not the same personal effect.
For millennia, humankind has sought to make their writing as uniform as possible so that it can be read by the literate – through scribes and then movable type. Now that with the ease and ubiquity of desktop publishing, the prestige falls on handwriting and handcrafted type. To use our own is personal, but with the weight of authenticity that handwriting undoubtedly conveys, what responsibility do we hold to use others’?
Handwriting is more connected to the movement of the heart.
Natalie Goldberg
Songwriters Fonts was a short-lived project in April 2018 that digitalised songwriters’ handwriting to create typefaces from people such as John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, Serge Gainsbourg, Leonard Cohen and David Bowie. Here are some images of handwritten lyrics by these songwriters:
The typefaces were free to download and the project was featured on many websites, for example It’s Nice That, NME and Dezeen. The creators Nicolas Damiens and copywriter Julien Sans said about the project:
“Write songs as the ones who inspired you before. The Songwriters fonts have been created to give musicians inspiration. Writing lyrics with the handwriting of influential songwriters helps imagination to develop. Being in the mood of Bowie, Cobain, Cohen, Gainsbourg, Lennon, might be purely imaginative… but that’s precisely the point.”
After one week, the pair were instructed to take the website and download links down, saying in a statement that they had “been contacted by intellectual property rights owners, and are sad to announce that we have shut down this website because of legal issues. We’re sorry to have to say goodbye.”
I feel that the project was done out of love for music and wanting to inspire others, but can see how it is crossing the line. In the case of intellectual property law my feelings are beside the point, so what are the legal issues with this project? Some of this is going to depend on the jurisdiction that the design was created in: the designers identity as French and the website is registered as a .com with a Canadian company. The songwriters are a mixture of American, Canadian, British and French so the designers are likely to have come across lawyers from all over the world with differing copyright laws.
For the purpose of this work, I will consider UK copyright law as this will be the territory in which I work most often.
Handwriting vs. typeface
The original material used for the typefaces was taken from the handwritten lyrics of the songwriters and from what I can see, UK law on handwriting is unclear at best. The content of what is written would probably fall under UK copyright law, in particular the song lyrics which would be covered under the The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 which states that gives the creator rights “70 years from the end of the calendar year in which the last remaining author of the work dies, or the work is made available to the public, by authorised performance, broadcast, exhibition, etc.” (Copyrightservice.co.uk. 2020) However, Damiens and Sans don’t share the lyrics of the songs.
Also included in the source material were letters, “including Kurt Cobain’s suicide letter, on websites and public libraries to collect examples of the various glyphs” (Morris, 2018). As we have seen in the UK with the Daily Mail publishing excerpts of Meghan Markle’s letters to her father, the rights would stay with the creator and could only be shared if the work was published with permission of the creator. Again, a moot point because this covers content rather than design, and to go back to the source material I question whether it is appropriate to use a suicide letter for this project. Why not, if it were published already, but the use of it makes me uneasy.
Typefaces could be considered to fall under another section of legislation, computer programmes which the Copyright (Computer Programs) Regulations 1992 extended the rules covering literary works to include computer programs. In a 2001 case, GreenStreet Technologies was successfully sued by Linotype Library and parent company Heidelberger Druckmaschinen in the High Courts of Justice. Linotype Library claimed that GreenStreet was infringing the copyright of the design of four typeface families by including copies of the typefaces in its own software library without proper licensing or permissions. The court ruled in favour of Linotype Library as the company had gathered substantial evidence of the copyright breaches (Typeface copyright decision in UK High Court, 2001).
In the US it differs: “under U.S. law, typefaces and their letter forms or glyphs are considered utilitarian objects whose public utility outweighs any private interest in protecting their creative elements. However, there is a distinction between a font and a typeface. The machine code used to display a stylized typeface (called a font) is protectable as copyright. In 1992, the US Copyright Office determined that digital outline fonts had elements that could be protected as software.[9] Since that time, the Office has accepted registration of copyright for digital vector fonts, such as PostScript Type 1, TrueType, and OpenType format files.” (Intellectual property protection of typefaces, 2020).
I’m not sure this legislation applies as the source media and created media were different (from handwritten to typeface) and I am unaware of court cases that cross the media line.
In other handwriting examples, one founder of Mina Lima, Miraphora Mina found herself in a tricky position with her own handwriting. As an inhouse designer for the first Harry Potter film she had written the prop letter from Professor McGonagall in her own handwriting and therefore Warner Bros. considered it to be part of their intellectual property. This problem did not emerge for years until Mina Lima was taking on work outside the Harry Potter Universe and Mina wanted to use her own handwriting for new projects. She has only recently recovered the rights to use her handwriting in a professional capacity. I can’t find published proof of this and heard it from Mina Lima themselves at a walk. So, please internet, do not quote me.
In a more solid example, BuzzFeed designer Mark Davis created a freely available font version of US presidential candidate Donald Trump’s handwriting, called Tiny Hand. It was created for a satirical piece published by BuzzFeed, which “purported to be pre-debate speech notes written by the candidate” (Tucker, 2016). The typeface seems to be taken from similar sources to the Songwriters Fonts but has not incurred any wrath from Donald Trump. Maybe he can’t tell his own insane ramblings from the ones written in Tiny Hand?
Although we must steer away from drawing graphological conclusions, the handwriting does lend itself to “for a font whose graphic properties are external traces of their author’s inner consciousness”. The font is “characterized by an odd mixture of capital and lowercase letters and by outlandish and looping shapes”, looking oddly like Disney and Comic Sans. (Donzelli and Bugden, 2019). The paper goes on to contextualise the creation of the typeface and that is very interesting, but beside the point for this post.
By using a typeface to create protest signs and point out Trump’s hypocrisies from the man’s own insults and smears against people seems, to me, a fitting spoof for the spoof of this presidency. The typeface has not received any comment or derision from Trump, considering that the font is named after his famed insecurity over his hand size. That, and that it takes direct letterforms that to form a method to produce slander that could prove damaging to his character and standing.
Right to identity & THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS
Here I will keep with the same theme, that of identity, but return to my original example: Songwriting Fonts. The songwriters whose handwriting Damiens and Sans mimicked for their fonts had passed away at the time of release, the latest being Cohen in 2016. Death does not dissolve rights, though. Copyright laws extend past the point of publication for varying points of time, regardless of the living status of the copyright holder.
For typefaces, the copyright extends for twenty-five years “from the end of the calendar year in which the first such articles are marketed” (Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988). Some references the designers used might have fallen within this date – Kurt Cobain’s suicide note as one example. Because the songwriters are no longer with us might mean this project is much less likely to piss them off, their rights still exist and their estates hold the power to exercise them.
In the US, personality rights are more widespread than they are in the UK. If a celebrity feels that their image is being exploited in the UK, a lawyer will usually try to argue their case under traditional intellectual property law. I can’t find past precedent for typeface usage tied to personal image. Considering handwriting is personal, and how much physiognomy of typeface and the personality of the writer are tied together, I would expect that a lawyer could argue that manipulation of writing is an infraction on that person’s image.
We know from the statement released by Songwriters Fonts that the fonts were taken down after some of the estates contacted them to complain about the project. The details haven’t been revealed, and evidently, all parties felt the infringement was strong enough to warn the designers felt that the warning was strong enough to take heed.
Usage
When purchasing and downloading typefaces (here I am making the assumption this is done legally), the buyer has to agree to use the typeface within the constraints that the copyright holder sets out. One common division is between personal and commercial use, which can be further separated.
- Personal: you can use a typeface for personal projects where generally you are not working for a client and you are not making money, but boundaries can differ.
- Commercial: for a project for a client where you might or might not charge a fee, or where the client might charge a fee for the service/product
There are subtlities between the usages, as some foundaries might allow you to use a typeface for a pitch, trial or presentation so designers can reduce their costs of buying typefaces a client might not like. However, an appropriate license must be bought when the designer moves forward.
There are further points to consider, as typeface licensing takes into account how you are going to use it:
- A desktop license enables “you to install a font on your computer and use it for a whole range of offline purposes” which includes most print applications a designer might use (Webster, 2020)
- A web license means that you can use the font for online projects, and sometimes there is a viewer count: the more website or online project is viewed, the more it will cost to license. This is a good way to scale costs to allow small scale producers to access quality typefaces whilst ensuring the foundry/designers receive fair payment. For example, “Good Type Foundry charges €450 for its flagship Good Sans if page views are below 15,000 per month. The license scales up, reaching €2,600 if the site receives up to one million page views. (Webster, 2020)
- An app license: for use in applications and programmes
Within this, there are many nuances and differing types of licensing again, as can be seen on the Dalton Maag website here. Combinations between online and print, personal and business, exist, as can be seen with their end-user licence which allows you “to install the fonts on any number of devices which you own or solely control, for simultaneous use by up-to-the-number of users specified. It allows you to print and produce personal or business documents, including PDFs, but this licence does not include webfont use, ebook distribution, or app distribution.” (Dalton Maag, 2020).
Of course, you could always download that knock-off Baskerville font for free and use it without shame, or any pride for your work. Maybe your reader won’t notice, but you’re breaking “don’t be an arsehole to your fellow designer” rules. There are no copyright laws, at least in. the US, about how much a typeface must differ from an old one to be considered a new font in its own right, so knockoffs are easier to pass off as new than a direct copy. Typefaces, good ones, take many hours to conceive and craft even if they are revivals of old typefaces and it is right that designers are paid for them.
Adobe and Google both have typeface licensing software for free typefaces for commercial usage, albeit with some restrictions but for the majority of designers, the licensing is sufficient. The typefaces are more functional than decorative, but no-one needs another font crafted from snowflakes, thank you very much.
The main takeaway from this section is that typeface licensing has many facets and can differ from foundry to foundry, and that font licensing software is available for large scale audience to keep track of their typeface use.
PRICE
Damiens and Sans released their typefaces for free and given that they had spent a month making them, they seem to have done the work as a personal project as opposed to a commercial venture. It also harks back to their intention to inspire new songwriters by making them available to everyone. That intention is laudable.
Because they sought no permissions and paid no money to the estates, I could take the view that they should only be free. That being said, fonts are digital pieces of software that can be endlessly duplicated, and their ready availability means that Damiens and Sans had little control over what was created once they released the files. The typefaces could have been used to create malicious content that would damage the artists’ reputation and income. Although they would (probably?) bear no legal responsibility for this damage, it should have been a consideration in creation because they are enabling others. Instead of realising the typefaces to the world, could they have done a collaboration with the estate holders where young songwriters could use the typefaces in a closed system, perhaps?
Intentions
In my opinion, I think that Damiens and Sans did not intend to aggrieve the estate holders for these musicians and that on face value they wanted to do as they stated: to inspire new songwriters. On the other hand, how they went about achieving that aim was tone-deaf, showing a shallowness of thinking, and that there are more appropriate ways of doing this. For example, either gaining permission to do this or hosting an exhibition (perhaps online) showing the whole artefacts from these songwriters using images with the appropriate permissions. Undoubtedly this approach would take longer than the one month they spent on this project. In balance, I think that Songwriters Fonts had noble ideas but they lacked awareness or carefulness in regards to personality rights that they should have looked into.
References
- Morris, A., 2018. Musician-Inspired Fonts Website Forced To Close After Going Viral. [online] Dezeen. Available at: <https://www.dezeen.com/2018/05/01/musician-inspired-fonts-website-closes-viral/> [Accessed 16 June 2020].
- Copyrightservice.co.uk. 2020. UK Copyright Law. Copyright, Designs And Patents Act 1988 : The UK Copyright Service. [online] Available at: <https://copyrightservice.co.uk/copyright/uk_law_summary> [Accessed 16 June 2020].
- En.wikipedia.org. 2020. Intellectual Property Protection Of Typefaces. [online] Available at: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property_protection_of_typefaces#:~:text=The%20current%20United%20Kingdom%20copyright,cover%20their%20usage%20by%20typographers.> [Accessed 16 June 2020].
- “Registrability of Computer Programs that Generate Typefaces”, 57 Fed. Reg. 6201 (Feb. 21, 1992), reproduced in U.S. Copyright Office announcement ML-443 Archived 7 November 2012 at the Wayback Machine
- En.wikipedia.org. 2020. Intellectual Property Protection Of Typefaces. Pinsentmasons.com. 2001. Typeface Copyright Decision In UK High Court. [online] Available at: <https://www.pinsentmasons.com/out-law/news/typeface-copyright-decision-in-uk-high-court> [Accessed 16 June 2020].
- Tucker, E., 2016. Donald Trump’s Handwriting Turned Into Tiny Hand Typeface. [online] Dezeen. Available at: <https://www.dezeen.com/2016/10/21/donald-trump-tiny-hand-typeface-font-design-mark-davis-us-election-2016/> [Accessed 16 June 2020].
- Donzelli, A. and Bugden, A., 2019. The “Tiny Hand” of Donald Trump and the Metapragmatics of Typographic Parody. Signs and Society, 7(2), pp.217-244.
- Webster, G., 2020. A Complete Guide To Font Licensing For Designers. [online] Creative Bloq. Available at: <https://www.creativebloq.com/features/font-licensing> [Accessed 17 June 2020].
- Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, c. 3. Available at: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/48/part/I/chapter/III/crossheading/typefaces#contentSearch (Accessed: 17 June 2020).
Week 2: Outcome
This is my first outcome for this week’s challenge of crafting a brief and devising a budget and schedule for it. The process behind it can be seen in this post.
After a tutorial with Richard I am going to go back through it and edit the amount of time it will take, as well as hourly costs, and devising the schedule as he thought I was underselling myself.
Final outcome
Week 2: Test and rehearse
The Challenge
Map a resourcing model for budget and staff allocation to deliver a project or creative initiative of your choice.
Example
You have been asked to pitch by National Theatre for a campaign to promote a new play, to include:
- Promotional poster;
- Programme;
- Digital banner;
- Print;
- Design production.
Your client has not given an indication of the budget but would like to pay you fairly. There are no existing images. Please outline the time and costs required to deliver initial stage one body of work across three concepts. Also provide an indication of production costs based on your design proposals.
Whilst it is an example, I’m going to go with it: I love the National Theatre and have been to see many of its plays from when I was a teen up to now, including the example play Small Island. I’ve been on costume tours, building tours and walked along the Shearling Walkway to see the backstage production process many times.
Small Island was a gift to my mum, as she loved the book, and also My Brilliant Friend – to make the presents more special for her I used the poster materials I found on the internet to make a giftcard. Here is my one for Small Island:
So I can ape the style, can I create one of my own?
A couple of years ago I met an Art Director at the National Theatre through a mutual friend at the ABCD awards (The Academy of British Cover Design), which is an industry event to celebrate cover designs all over London. Designers submit their covers, the organisation shortlists them and on the night we all vote for our favourites in the category. It’s a great evening of meeting up with old colleagues and making new acquaintances and is of course, a very jolly evening. Emelie, the NT Art Director, has since moved on to starting her own freelance studio and I’ve given her a message to see what it was like in her role and if she would be happy to talk to me.
First, research: What kind of images have National Theatre in the past used in the past? Is there a theme and how can I do it differently?
This webpage has a thorough history of different styles, from Keven Briggs building a strong identity using typography and a Swiss style grid in 1960s from which to base most of the photos, to his abandonment of this style in early 1970s in favour of a new design for each play:
Kevin Briggs
When the theatre moved to its current home on the Thames, Richard Bird took the designs further to have a strong typography with striking illustrations:
Around the same time, Michael Mayhew used photography with strong type:
More recently, Charlotte Wilkinson (2004–2014) has steered away from using photography already in existence to art directing photoshoots for the purpose of the campaign, with strong Helvetica type.
Since 2014, National Theatre has branded its work as Graphic Studio rather than a specific Art Director, with strong branding but wide graphic styles:
After taking a look at the history, I can see it is a useful tool to be see where the brand has come from, but I can’t fall back on that. Theo Inglis mentioned in his presentation that for one pitch he went with the constraints set, but they were safe compared to the pitch that won. Emelie Chen also puts her hiring at the National Theatre as going beyond the brief:
I was sent the script for the play Ballyturk and had one week to come up with two concepts for the poster. I went beyond the brief to show how we could turn one of them into an installation for people to interact with at the NT. They loved it and offered me a 12-month contract.
Emelie Chen for Lecture in Progress
Setting myself outlines
For this brief, I am giving myself the role of Art Director, where I can hire for the roles I need and be responsible for the overall look.
This brief comes at a time when National Theatre is closed, and is doing an online series of previously filmed plays to raise money on Youtube. When lockdown can lift, what will happen? Maybe plays online will be another part of the cultural programme that the National Theatre can offer to reach more people. How will the designs be appropriate online as well as print? How can the programme be displayed online?
National Theatre have founded Public Acts initiative to involve people around the country in participatory theatre. The first Public Acts was Pericles and it involved partnerships with Body & Soul, The Bromley by Bow Centre, Coram, DABD, Faith and Belief Forum, Havering Asian Social Welfare Association (HASWA), Open Age, Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch, Thames Reach for a huge cast and amazing costumes. This year’s Public Acts was The Caucasian Chalk Circle and has been postponed.
My play will be an imagined 2021 Public Acts work from an existing play and from this I will have three concepts:
Concepts
- Illustration, using hands such as Pericles and As You Like It
- Photographic, using body parts such as legs or hands so as to not single out a character in an ensemble production
- Another photographic idea I have yet to decide upon.
Within those concepts, I will play around the typography. Custom or Helvetica? In a white space created by the imagery? Fitting around the imagery? Deliberately breaking the imagery?
What do I need to do right now?
On the Ideas Wall, Richard has suggested that we focus on framing the costing process as:
- Costing of consultation, concept routes and pitch.
- Costing design development of clients selected route.
- Costing of production and implementation.
So while I need to keep in mind the deliverables to make sure that my initial stage fits I need to work on how long it will take me to
[to be posted later] Here is my final outcome, in this post.
Week 1: Outcome
I struggled with the task because I hate defining myself. I can have specific knowledge, but overall I am a generalist and have a wide range of interests and knowledge. Narrowing down has never suited me and I like to have options in my life so I can remain flexible in my life. Maybe that is now doing me a disservice.
I came back to this to craft it again, and to narrow it down. I used the following sentence starts to get my ideas flowing.
- My practice is about …
- I am interest in …
- I do this by …
- I think about …
- I question …
I drafted my response on paper and got this mess!
Coming back to the original statement I do like some parts, so I have woven it in.
Human’s instinct for language unites us, with multitudes of tongues crafts that pass from one generation to another. It flows and changes like a river through people, expressing who they are. My practice is about communication through language’s written form, type.
I question how language can be reassembled by the use of new technologies such as Mixed Reality and old craft to reach new audiences and provide insight for overlooked people in society. I present a multi-faceted practice that performs across disciplines to explore the commonalities that drive us forward and thread together a cohesive response.
Through the use of type, I seek to create work in a multitude of formats through the collaboration of visual and written language. I function as both a standalone practice and within your teams to unite your values with your audience’s experience.
Week 1: Studio and Entrepreneurship
The Challenge
How do you translate your perceived design ethos and positioning to your defined audience?
Revisit the geotagging workshop challenge from Week 2 of the Contemporary Practice module, and explore different studio philosophies through their about button and company statement.
Write an ‘about’ paragraph – an elevator pitch on either your current positioning or one you would like to establish. You may choose to take a speculative approach and envision your global dominance as a design studio superpower. Or as a more humble sole trader who works in a freelance capacity. Have your values changed since beginning the course? Is there a strategic approach your company would communicate to potential commissioners or clients?
Please consider the following in your approach:
- What is the idea?
- How does it work?
- Why does it work?
Geotagging Challenge from Contemporary Practice
The blog post can be found here, and I am going to recap my work below with updates throughout as I rediscover these practices..
Design Practices
Dalton Maag
Address: 9th Floor, Blue Star House, 234–240 Stockwell Road, London SW9 9SP
Website: daltonmaag.com
Sector: Type design studio
Office presence: London, São Paulo
Company statement: “We are an independent type design studio. Behind Dalton Maag is an international team of 40 type designers, font developers, creative directors, software engineers and support staff, spanning 20 nationalities and speaking 12 languages. With an agile team structure and workflow, we can reliably handle custom font projects that are both sizeable and complex, in collaboration with global brands and against tight deadlines.”
Own thoughts: The number of employees has consistently been around 40 people for a number of years, with growing numbers in finance and operations, which make up about 15% of the headcount. That seems, to me, a relatively small company given the huge projects that they take on for multi-national companies. They are very involved with education work, which appeals to me, as they open up their industry to new designers from different backgrounds.
In September 2019 I went to a talk they held in partnership with D&AD about the work they are doing on variable typefaces and Mixed Reality to keep the industry fresh and current and always accessible to everyday people.
Interesting work: Lush Handwritten typeface, Nokia Pure typeface
Faber Futures
Address: 12–16 Blenheim Grove, Peckham, London SE15 4QL
Website: faberfutures.com
Sector: Biodesign futures agency
Office presence: London
Company statement: “Faber Futures is a biodesign futures agency integrating design thinking with biotechnology. We believe that answers to some of the biggest challenges facing this planet can be found in nature. By learning from living systems and integrating design, biology and technology, our mission is to generate holistic models for sustainable futures.”
Own thoughts: A little gem hiding in a collab-working space in Peckham! This such an interesting cross-disciplinary company that I’ve covered later in the module because I love the way they are working with scientists to create new technologies to ecological problems.
Since I looked at their website last, I have found more information about the company – either they have expanded or chose not to share this much before. The founder & CEO of the agency, NATSAI AUDREY CHIEZA, is joined by four other members of staff who appear to be employees and their roles are multidisciplinary across design, science and strategy.
Interesting work: Colour Coded – a bacterial pigment extract to be used to dye textiles using less water
Jelly
Address: 9–10 Charlotte Mews, London W1T 4EF
Website: jellylondon.com
Sector: Production company & artist management agency
Office presence: New York, London
Company statement: “We are an award-winning production company & artist management agency… [for production services] With studios in London and New York, we are able to play time difference to our advantage – our small experienced team will respond quickly, wherever you are. Our services include: Illustration, 3D / CGI, Animation, Character, Type. [for artist management] We curate a selection of global artists, designers, and animation directors producing work for clients around the world. No matter your brief, we’re confident our talented Artists & Directors will be able to deliver truly brilliant creative work. We believe in supporting creators starting out their careers and with our expertise at spotting and nurturing new talent – we represent the very best new talent in the industry.”
Own thoughts: I love the concept behind the Game of Thrones tapestry, partly as a marketing project, and as a way to bring old creative technologies. It’s a great use of jacquard loom weaving because it fits with the fantastical theme of the show and links back to the Bayeux Tapestry. The story is literally weaved into is own fabric, with Northern Irish embroiderers adding details by hand.
They have also created their own production studio to work on their own projects and to work with the artists that they represent, giving everyone more specialised skills and more creative control. By championing up-and-coming designers they invest in the future of their company and the industry as a whole.
Interesting work: Game of Thrones tapestry and stained glass windows
Alan Kitching
Address: 19 Cleaver St, London SE11 4DP
Website: thetypographyworkshop.com
Sector: Practitioner of letterpress typographic design and printmaking
Office presence: London
Company statement: “In 1973 Alan began his own design practice in London with Colin Forbes. In 1977 he partnered with Derek Birdsall and Martin Lee at Omnific and started letterpress printing there in 1985. He began letterpress workshops in 1986 at Omnific Studios, Islington, London. He then went on to establish The Typography Workshop in Clerkenwell (1989). From 1994 he worked in partnership with designer/writer Celia Stothard (later his wife). In 1999, in partnership with designer and teacher, Celia Stothard FRSA, Kitching purchased a large collection of theatrical wood types, now named, ‘Entertaining Types’ and housed in Kennington, Lambeth, South London.”
SOURCE: Wikipedia
The Philosophy
The resurgence of Letterpress over the last few decades has triggered a passionate respect for the craft of Typography & has reinforced its position in the visual arts. Letterpress has evolved as a natural ally to the graphic arts & identified itself as an exciting process to express ideas & an extraordinarily thorough process to examine language & typography.
As an antidote to the immediate & often dispensable nature of modern technology, the slow articulation of the technical side of Letterpress allows the designer to immerse themselves in the focus of the craft & revel in the simple joys of making.
There are very few letterpress facilities remaining in the British Isles & even fewer experts to instruct. Conceived & directed by leading typographic practitioner Kelvyn Smith & letterpress maestro Alan Kitching: The New Typography Workshop is a new – hands-on – school of design & typography with letterpress at its core. It offers art directors, artists, designers, printmakers & students the opportunity to study typography & work closely with wood letter & metal type, letterpress materials & printing equipment.
Interesting read: Interview on It’s Nice That
Own thoughts: I’m not sure you can get a more iconic modern-day typographer: Kitching perfectly bridges the gap between typography and art. I’m used to typesetting for mono books, and to see his use of bright colour to really shout the type’s message is refreshing for me! He runs workshops that I would really love to go to one day.
Interesting work: Royal Mail Millennium Stamps, The Guardian front cover
Design Resources
The Type Archive
Address: 100 Hackford Road, London SW9 0QU
Website: typearchive.org
Sector: Letterpress archive
Office presence: London
Company statement: “The Type Archive is home to the art of printed words. We hold an amazing collection of letterpress fonts in metal and wood which celebrates the joy of printing: the craft that has served as the fundamental basis of modern civilisation and graphic design. […] While modern type foundries are entirely digital (Monotype.com) the Type Archive’s collection spans the nearly 600 year period when the foundry cut letters in steel, drove them into brass blanks, and cast lead type from them in molten lead.”
Own thoughts: After the transition to desktop-publishing, I’ve heard stories about how cases of type were disposed of because they weren’t needed and companies could not longer see a use of keeping them. Now, with letterpress making a resurgence, some people are kicking themselves for putting a case of Johnston in the skip! This archive is vital in retaining the centuries of technology used to make type and educating designers (like me!) how movable type was made and why we typeset today in the way that we do.
Considering my practice
Starting the MA has meant dismantling the walls I’ve built around myself and putting them under my feet to raise my skills and my practice. The aim of completing the course has always been to build firm foundations, to work and discover areas of graphic design that I’ve never worked on and didn’t know how to start. Studying graphic design also means working on the chip on my shoulder: having segued into the industry I’ve always felt behind not being knowing the references and practices others seemed to.
I have the talent, now I need the confidence to show and market myself with honesty and integrity. It’s important to me that I don’t use overly complicated verbose language to describe myself, or hide behind words: sometimes on this course I’ve seen words that can obscure the meaning in order to sound more official and has ended in confusion! None of that please.
How do others present their statement?
&Walsh
We are a creative agency in NYC specializing in branding & advertising. We work with clients starting from the initial brand strategy phase to the design, art direction and final production of a project. We believe in creating beautiful, emotion-driven work that functions for our client’s goals and resonates with their audiences.
One of our core missions is using our skills as creatives to start dialogues and create change. Our studio spends a significant amount of our time on self-initiated projects for social causes that are important to us. We’ve created events, books, exhibitions, and entire organizations for these social initiatives.
Craig Oldham
Working across numerous disciplines, the studio creates brands, books, websites, films, exhibitions, and objects. We also teach, write, curate and consult. And we do this for clients, audiences, and sometimes just for the joy of it.
We are a young and intentionally small team of creative problem solvers, makers and doers. And with extensive industry experience, we’ve learnt that the better the relationship we have with a client, the better the work will be.
Wieden+Kennedy
Wieden+Kennedy is an independent, global creative company. We’re here to do the best work of our lives with inspiring clients. We make work that influences culture and builds business value. Our global network comprises eight offices and 1400 people, and our work spans every discipline. We have world class media, design and tech operations. But everyone and everything at W+K is driven by creativity, and a core mission of building strong and provocative relationships between companies and their customers.
Sam Winston
Sam Winston’s practice is concerned with language not only as a carrier of messages but also as a visual form in and of itself. Initially known for his typography and artist’s books he employs a variety of different approaches including drawing, performance and poetry.
Operating at the intersections of where visual culture and literature meet he has exhibited his work in museums and galleries around the world. […] All Winston’s projects look to introduce audiences to new ways of thinking about and engaging with language.
Current/Speculative
At the moment I want to move forward, and realistically that will happen when this course concludes – there seems to be little point creating an official statement for where I am now, rather I will consider my current position and use that to work out where I want to go.
Working as a typesetter/artworker means that there is a constant demand for my services in such a way there hasn’t been time to grow my skills in my role to progress on. Whilst this means that I have a secure role in a company that I love and respect, I could be doing this exact role until I retire and to push myself, I need to move on.
This course has shown me that typography is my strong suit, and what I enjoy working on the most. I’ve gone to courses on letterpress and to variable typefaces. I don’t see typography going away because the written word, whether it is on screen or paper or a new technology will always be part of what it means to be human. There are chances for it to be improved and made more accessible as emergent technologies such as Mixed Reality become more commonplace, whilst knowing the history so as not to reinvent the wheel.
So, the statement is going to be a near-future speculation: something I want to aim for and to give me focus. I want to get involved in Mixed Reality, typography, and arts and culture, like theatre and accessibility to culture.
Here is my statement and video, in this post.
Anna Robinette 