Richard Baird
Ambassaden by Bleed
Designed by Finnish-American architect Eero Saarinen, the Ambassaden’s angular modernist stature holds a striking presence in the heart of Oslo. When it opened in 1959, it functioned as the US embassy until its closure in the early 2000s. Fast-forward to today – the building has been reopened and its programming altered. It now operates as a multi-functional space that includes...
TwelveLabs by Pentagram
Remember when the conversation around gradients was about making ‘bad’ design look ‘better’? When RGB colours were frowned upon because you couldn’t print them? Yeah, those ideas feel a bit outdated now. HP Indigo can now run fluorescents affordably, and business card mock-ups (in RGB) are more about selling than printing. Technology marches on, expectations and standards evolve, and everything...
Ten by Paul Belford Ltd
I’ve been writing about the work of Paul Belford Ltd. (Next Chapter, Spudos & Social Enterprise) for very nearly fifteen years. Initially, and admittedly, the articles practically wrote themselves, which was ideal for a self-taught designer with very little experience but keen to take an approach to learning that was very much my own. That was to write about a...
Hip Pop by Robot Food
Running a design blog sharpens your eye for category conventions. Stick with it long enough, though, and you’ll start to see those conventions unravel. What once felt fixed begins to flex. This creates a challenge for writing about design: you’re constantly assessing the landscape, but that landscape is always shifting. Take minimalism, for example. Once the dominant aesthetic of the...
ROM by Leo Burnett
Okay, let’s get it out of the way… yes, there are elements of Pentagram’s 2018 Library of Congress in Leo Burnett’s work for the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM). In both projects, type is a frame for images of archive material. Is it BP&O’s responsibility to acknowledge similarities in all the work we publish, tracking a typology back to the start...
Saaristo by Bond
‘Saaristo’ is the generic term for ‘archipelago’ in Finnish, but – to the outside world – it’s sufficiently distinctive to refer to the entire region in Western Finland, which now makes up a new tourism brand. This brand intends to generate more interest in (and visitors to) the world’s largest archipelago: a collection of 40,000 islands. This scale makes it...
Ultraderp by Mucho
The name Ultraderp seeks to combine all things extreme (think ‘ultrafast’, or ‘ultra marathon’) with ‘derp’, which is, apparently, the face a dog makes when they don’t know what’s happening. The product that bears this name is an ultra-light, easily-packable dog leash that can be worn on the collar and deployed when needed, simply by pulling the tongue-like tab. This...
Spudos by Paul Belford Ltd
We live in chaotic and excessive times. Brands and politicians alike demand attention, clamouring for consideration and creating – quite frankly, for me at least – an unwelcome cacophony of competing voices and issues. All too often, the lines between competing interest are blurred, and even absurd. I crave clarity and simplicity, particularly when it comes to basic consumables. What’s...
BP&O Voices
Rich Baird on Design History:
CBC by Burton Kramer, 1974
The story of Burton Kramer’s logo for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation....
BP&O Voices
Rich Baird on Design History:
Esprit by John Casado, 1978
The story of John Casado’s 1978 logo for California fashion brand Esprit....
BP&O Voices
Rich Baird on Design History:
HSBC by Henry Steiner, 1983
The story of Henry Steiner’s 1983 logo for HSBC....
Antara 128 by Mucho
GT Alpina is described by type foundry and BP&O regular GrilliType as a workhorse serif that also delights in playing with the very meaning of concept, reaching into the ‘grab bag of typographic history to resurrect shapes some may falsely see as too expressive’. This feels an apt description for Antara 128, and the visual identity created by Mucho that...