English industrial designer Kenneth Grange talks …

Massimo Vignelli speaks about the effective use of the grid in book design

Inspiring 20 minute film on designer/creator/architect Buckminster Fuller – ‘bucky and spaceship earth’.

Nivea has just had their brand redesigned by Yves Behar, from logo to the soft forms of their product packaging. I couldn’t say that I would have noticed the change at first glance since much of the original styling is in place, including the blue colour and logotype – what they have brought to the brand is a consistent look and new approach to the bottle look, drawing inspiration from the very first, and only, Nivea product – Nivea Cream in a round tin.

From their press release:

The blue tin has embodied NIVEA’s brand values since 1925. It is the brand “face” that consumers around the world associate with trust, closeness and expertise. Now Beiersdorf AG has introduced a new global design language based on the iconic blue tin. The new design consistently translates the successful NIVEA brand’s values into a product that consumers can see and feel, thereby making products in all categories immediately recognizable. Beiersdorf has consistently developed the NIVEA brand with a focus on its global core values. The gradual introduction of the new design for the entire NIVEA skin and body care portfolio will commence in more than 200 countries in January 2013.

This video reeks of a sales pitch but is a good insight into the thinking and process of rebranding an already well known and trusted product.

Tourism Australia has just launched their new logo – designed “to stay relevant and reflect the organisation’s changing culture and identity” says Tourism Australia. The logo is a stylised, simplified and colourised version of the predecessor – the designer says “There’s a lot about the existing logo that we wanted to keep. It has real vibrancy and a sense of movement. But some of the elements are unnecessarily complex and difficult to reproduce”. The logo took 6 months to develop and cost Tourism Australia $200,000.

An inspirational short film on motion graphics artist Matt Pyke from Universal Everything

Is it too soon? Let’s not let go of the olympic hype – Sochi 2014 winter olympics are just around the corner and new pictograms have already been revealed. The pressure for each country to create their own unique style every time must be overwhelming, considering how many great pictograms have been created in the past – but I love this approach – fun, playful, colourful and child-like as though it was an event for the kiddies – it’s all about playing and doing silly things in the snow – so it fits!

New Australian Bank note designs have appeared lately, designed by Australian design studio Emery. Seems the designs are change for security sake rather than improving on the current design, which is seen as one of the best note designs in the world – in relation to design, colour and print and material technology. It appears most of the change is in the design with the addition of some new security features. A bank spokesman said that the redesign was taking place to ensure Australia maintained its “relatively low levels of counterfeiting”. It’s costing $9.3 Million and is now 2 years overdue.

The designers were briefed with new portraits of the notes’ subjects and asked to capture Australian characteristics with “youthful” and “energetic design qualities. The new notes retain most of the existing design elements including colour, size and their current portraits

An inspiring talk by USA designer Paula Scher, giving us insight into her experience with design through 4 inspiring projects – the New York High Rail project; revamping MoMA’s identity into a clear and easy to use system; reinvigorating a Pittsburgh neighbourhood by making the negative landmark into an engaging trademark; and a graphic mural for a local school. The theme of her talk is ‘Do What You’ve Never Done Before’. Well worth the time to watch.

And another more recent video from her AGI talk