Lizzy Stewart: Cardigan Heart Zine

A a 28 page book of short, illustrated stories written and drawn by Lizzy Stewart. The book is full colour, litho printed (it smells nice) on smooth, heavy weight paper and staple bound. I picked it up as at the time I had a huge illustration module, and at the time I didn’t draw very often.

I bought Cardigan Heart at the Graphic Design Fair ‘Pick me up’ in London in 2011. The book is litho printed on smooth heavy weight paper and staple bound. On opening the first page Lizzy writes;

‘stories, Half stories and illformed ideas. They are mostly about Love.’

Stories are usually about love’. The rest of the book consist of collections of Lizzy’s memories, some with colour others in black and white, including ‘Viewed from a train, ‘Thursday’ where she appears to have turned into a wolf of sometime and howling and fighting in the dark, and ‘Ultimatum’ including quotes like ‘If I reach Kings Cross before this song finishes he’ll call’. I love the way she has left some pages with no description at all, and the use of space on the pages.

Reading Cardigan Heart is like being inside Lizzy Stewart’s head, but at the same time the words and captions make this book extraordinarily relatable. This book is a huge inspiration to me, it’s taught me not to be afraid to make my work personal. I also really like this style of illustration, some aspects are simple and a bit rough round the edges. Which creates a bold handmade feel, almost like a diary.

Brand Identity: Suite

Modik has performed the naming, brand design, and various applications: business card, posters, basic stationery, signage outside for Erotic shop SUITE. This is a great branding design, I love the minimilistic approach and the symbols that are used are recognised globally. Bold and sleek design, very inspirational.

Curated By Part 1: Morag Myerscough

Designer Morag Myerscough started the award-winning Studio Myerscough in 1993. Best known for their work in the integration of graphics within architectural settings, acclaimed projects include Westminster Academy, the Kentish Town Health Centre and the Barbican Arts Centre. Myerscough believes that letter forms are amazing, expressive and beautiful.

Discovering Morag Myerscough for the first time 2 years ago, I rose at the opportunity to hear he talk at Curated By. Hosted at my University (Sheffield Hallam) Morag began by telling us a background about herself, her grandfather was a clown, her mother was from France and her English dad was a classical musician. She explained her growing up as 'A strange mix up of things". I enjoyed getting to understand her history, as personally I'm very inspired by my Chilean mother and my Irish dad, and yet growing up so close to London. I also am inspired by strong women and relate to how a mixture of cultures growing up has effected my design and the expression.

What I specifically remember is that Morag said she never gets a creative block, she described how living in an inspiring place like London maintains a long list of constant ideas."where do you get your inspiration from? Work is all about understanding whats around you. You have to go out and look at things" Traveling was key, she explained as she showed us pictures of her travels but not the usual photos, there was photos of patterns and repetition.

Which went into the next point of collections, I love making my own collections and love discovering other peoples too. Morag described the reason she collects things is obession, which is also a nice word to describe things. One of the obsessions she used to have was neon color, which I could tell with my her work. Another was chairs/stools and she once made an exhibition on the chairs she owns, and the stories behind them, which I thought would be a really interesting thing to document, discovering the characters of each furniture piece and so on. Additionally she collected tomatoes and documented their growth. This made me really expand the way that I collect already, opening my eyes to using something that I would have never thought of before.

When starting up Supergroup in 2010, she said it was not about being heavy moneywize but about being responsive. Here she works with artist she has worked before and have the same kind of experience as her. Within Supergroup she continued on her obsession with chairs, one of the first things that caught my eye was her stools. She said "I just had fun playing with words, putting silly words on stools".

I was really captivated by her work within hospitals and schools, she showed a strong enthusiasm in the fact that the schools grades went up in being in a nice environment and how and environment can have an effect on happiness. Below is a photo from the dinning room from the children's hospital. I love the colours and patterns with this typeface, I think it's absolutely amazing. "If you want to make people belong, you have to understand who they are" 

To conclude, Morag was a great start to the day. I have learnt a lot from her, and she has made me look at some parts of design differently. She has a really great way of capturing my attention not only on paper but in her lecture as well. I also have really been inspired by the way she has really brought together many different inspirations, like 70's patterns with modern white space and fonts. A great start to the show.

Other quotes by Morag
"Better to think deeper and carefully rather than to think trendy"
"Allways re-evalutate what your doing"
"Do excatly what you want"

Rescourses Used
supergrouplondon.co.uk/index.php/morag
www.studiomyerscough.com
www.globaldesignforum.com/speakers/morag-myerscough

Workshop - Manipulating Paper 1

The aim of this workshop was to introduce the manipulation techniques within paper.
Starting with the cone shape really made me discover the smooth shape that paper can make.
Depending on out tight it is glued, deferenciates the shale between narrow and shallow. Next going onto curves and how folding can create the paper to stand in a mountain like way, was intresting. I liked how I discovered the ability to create a curve shape freehand. Then I explored this further by creating a snake shape object. The boat came last, didn't think this quite worked as well as I was looking forward to it working.

Overal this was a good introduction into introducing the shapes in paper and the mechanics of how easy simple paper architecture can be.

Matthew shilan

Ghostly International presents Matthew Shlian from Ghostly International on Vimeo.

Paper Cuts from Michigan Daily on Vimeo.

Matt Shlian Installation from Whitney Dinneweth on Vimeo.

An Insite to Hornall Anderson's Design process

Situated in London and Seattle, Hornall Anderson design has worked with a range of big names from Marmite to Madison Square garden. (A little note is that Im throughouly impressed by their website) Considering I'm about to start my out design process, I thought it benificial to read about a successful design companies design process, to discover what I can learn from them.

The Brief: brand identify for frappuccino and to develop a unique brand identity which not only positioned Frappuccino as a new beverage but as a new beverage category in the market place.

The container was provided by Pepi Cola, a wide mouthed bottle, which was reminiscent of the old fashioned American milk bottles. The audience was for both kids and adults, and the container had to cover the ingredients inside as the liquid became unappealing in transit.

The first sketches were in black and white, as the first stage was to consider the decoration of the whole bottle. In addition to lively lettering, spritley characters. As a background to the graphics swirls, spirals and icicles were lined up. Combining all the ideas, they were shown to the Vice president of Starbucks to get feedback.

Now moving into colour, A series of bottles took the elements from the Sublime to the chaotic with dancing type and swirling backgrounds. Each bottle retained the Starbucks logo as an important feature and developed the shaded layers of milky coffee. "took much coffee and not enough focus on the milk" was a reaction at this stage.

Studio Designer George Tanagi developed the lettering separately, the green and red dot shadows were added to evoke the Italian heritage of the cappuccino. Additionally days of work was spent determining the exact shade of colour and graduation from top to bottom.

Anderson explains his tips on good design
1. Stay away from the computer - it freezes design
2. Brainstorming - we encourage "borrowing" ideas
3. Know what to change and what not to challenge. Then add creative value to it

The final product has spanned the range of market outlets and gained a loyal following, Anderson's words are "a classy looking bottle" This incite to Hornall Anderson and his design process has been very beneficial, it's made me re-think my own design process, and widened my opportunities i have in pencils. I also have realised the important of slowing myself down and starting right at the basics.


Rescourses used
www.hornallanderson.com
50 Trade secrets of graphic design

Six Creative Tea Packaging Designs

I chose to look innovative ways of packaging tea because I love the way that you can take an everyday item and turn it from a mundane object into something exciting and stimulating.  Below are just 6 of the few brilliant tea packaging designs out there, in no particular order.

 

1. Tea Cup By Jaeyoungha

'The logo symbolises the fun and comforting emotions through a thematically depicted happy face. The Tea brand Tea Cup, comes in a package that resembles the letter T and a cup, the package is indivually names by a unique emotion that is garnered from drinking the tea. The concept is to elicit fun and comforting emotions from the consumer. "

Inside each box, there is a little tip for example in the lid of the flavour JOY the consumer will read  'As you sip, make a list of ten things you are thankful for and discover joy in them". This has made the packaging personal from the brand to the consumer, which will make the consumer feel more considerd and thought about. Below is a net for the packaging, considering that the front is simple and basic with the face on it, the rest of the packaging seems quite busy but the way it has been designed makes sure that it isn't clutterd, with the use of a small font and a making sure there is enoug black space.

 

Overall I like this packaging, Jaeyoungha have created a packaging that is individual, personal, simple.

2. Royal Tea By Cincent Tourigny

Vincent Tourigny has done very exciting projects. Creative and enthusiastic about media packaging, Vincent had this fun concept powdered tea Called Royaltea. Inspired by the famous noble gesture of consistant holding the little finger high When drinking tea, Vincent designed finger-shaped pouches thesis. Once it can be used like a ring around put your little finger and it mimics the noble gesture Without any effort. Hilarious!

From the outside the box looks elegant and I was quite surprised that inside was a quirky, cute novel way to drink tea. This idea is completely unique and makes tea an experience solely because of the high quality of packaging design. The packaging seems to be aimed for upperclass, because it's in a classy box it has a designer feel to it. But would the design of having the pinky in the air have an effect on sales, would some people take offence by this? Then issues like this would also effect price and where it would be sold. Never the less I can't imagine anyone who wouldn't find this an entertaining experience let alone a beautifully well designed product.

3. Hanger : Tea by Soon Mo Kang

"I can’t think of a better or more obvious way to pack teabags than this hanger & T-shirt design. It’s a funny take on how the simple motion of hanging a used teabag on the rim of your cup, be done. Color-coded for different varieties, the hangers are rather cute and so are the tea-shirts!" -yankodesign

This product and packaging is such a great idea. The type of thing that makes consumers smile and take note. -Lovley Package

The only things I can fault in this packaging is the space it must take up, where could I store it? the product is not for the space conscientious individual.

But The packaging is clean and simple, and needs to be when the concept is so clever and the audience are the fashion lovers individuals. White space and simplicity is in right now, in all aspects of design - fashion, interior design and product design.

4. Teatul - Eco Tea Packaging by Katerina Teterkina

"The idea was to create simple and elegant packaging, which reveals eco context of the product. I used only two colours in each design to make the production more clear and ecological. Simple attractive patterns work as visual codes of the sorts of tea." Katerina Teterkina

Katerina Teterkina reminds me yet again how effective simple design can be. Maybe because I still laugh at the word sausages  But I love this packaging. Yes 'Teat' sound like 'Tit' hahaha. I think a can look past that considering how beautiful the packaging is, and lets all admit it put a smile on your face. Dissapointingly not everyone agrees with me, this is what one of the comments on a blog said "Kind of unfortunate this is called ‘Teatul’ and the illustration looks like a boob… I honestly read ‘teat’ before anything else. Thought this was a mother & baby product." 

This has none the less made my favorites, just because I am a massive fan of colour selection, having a different colour for the different time of tea may seem simple. But I think I would struggle in deciding what colour and why? I like the description Katerina used "visual codes". Another reason is because of the texture, I love the rugged effect on the type and around the packaging, this gives it an organic and earthy effect.

5. Teastar By Ashley Exton 

"There are shooting stars, rock stars, film stars, star fish, star wars, mega stars, and now there’s Teastar™. We’ve taken 10 organic loose leaf teabags, wrapped each in our philosophy and packed them in a clever star shaped box. Once opened, the box is like an old fashioned paper yap yap toy. Peer inside and choose your favourite brew. Each Teastar contains 2 x Happiness, 2 x Sleepy, 2 x Inspiration, 2 x Love Love 

and 2 x Friendship loose leaf organic teabags."

Brilliant, right? I love how the different types of tea are called and the deasign. Teastar is a clever name, this packaging is bright, colourful

6. Green Berry Tea By Natalia Ponomareva 

Natalia has designed each tea bag like a beautiful origami bird made from 100% natural ingredients the design on packaging container really represents the clean and pretty personality of the brand and the product. When I ask myself what is wrong with the design, I find it difficult to fault. But immediately I stumble upon the idea of creating a packaging that is more adventurous, to describe what is inside, although I also believe that the simple container creates more excitment for the packaging inside.

resouces used 

packaginguqam.blogspot.co.uk

www.yankodesign.com

www.behance.net

www.todaywasfun.com

www.jyoungha.com