Designers in Britain - 1947

Advertising posters

Some things don't change after 60 years; posters advertising the benefits of eating vegetables daily for good health, and a current topic about growing your own food rather than shipping in overseas produce.  

Packaging design - I love the stylish simplicity of the graphics used for the butter and biscuit packaging (no nasty product images, primary colours or gimmicky advertising slogans!)

Beautiful script, fonts and embellishments used in these advertisements for women's shoes and apparel shops 

Decorative fonts

Fabulous examples of current domestic furniture!

Some time ago I picked up two old English design books from a second hand shop .  The books were part of a series about Designers in Britain, compiled by the Society of Industrial Arts in order to review the commercial and industrial design being produced in Britain at the time.

This first book showcases the commercial and industrial design from post-war Britain in 1947 and is divided into themes covering posters, advertising and the media, book illustration and cover jackets, packaging, illustration for publicity, lettering and domestic furniture etc.  It's fascinating to look at the designs and graphic arts from this period - not only for the style of the designs and illustrations, but also what was being advertised and publicised at this particular time. 

I'm also captivated by the hand-drawn aesthetic across all sectors of design.  This was a time before the use of digital photography and desk-top publishing, so pretty much everything was created by hand from scratch.  The majority of posters and advertising material, book jackets and illustrations were all created as hand-drawn artworks.  No CAD technology or digital equipment to speed up the process - but painstakingly created with pen and ink.  However, far from being naive or simplistic, I think the designs created in this style are beautifully decorative and often quite sophisticated in comparison to some of today's commercial design. 

My first mothers day!

 Card and envelope from Kikki K

 

 
 

 'Modern Vintage Style' by Emily Chalmers

Wow, I've just had my very first mothers day! Whilst not yet officially a mum, at nearly 7 months pregnant I don't have long to go before I will be one!! 2011 is turning out to be a big year for me, I celebrated 10 years of living in Australia a few months ago, then me and Mr B celebrated our 14 year anniversary last week, and in a few months I'll be a brand spanking new mum - eek!


No doubt lots of big changes ahead (one of them being to make my house a little more baby friendly) and its quite overwhelming to think of the responsibility of being a mum, without the support of family around me. Anyway, I received a lovely card and book to celebrate my first (almost) mothers day!!

The card is from Kikki K - how cute is the graphic retro inspired kitchen theme, with a coordinating patterned envelope to boot! And I got a great book called 'Modern Vintage Style' by UK stylist Emily Chalmers (owner of the fabulous London boutique Caravan) - full of inspiration images, style ideas, and gorgeous house shots of people living with modern vintage style. It shows great examples of how to mix modern pieces with vintage elements, with lots of colour, pattern and personality. I love it :)

Ink & Spindle - open studio

I had the pleasure of visiting local print studio Ink & Spindle at the weekend, run by the very talented duo Lara Cameron and Tegan Rose.  I went as part of the Creative Women's Group which brings together women working in creative industries and establishing small businesses to share information - and best of all be inspired and learn from other women setting up or running businesses within the creative field.

Working from home and trying to develop a small business can be isolating and a little lonely at times, so it's great to have the opportunity to get together with other creative peeps and learn how they have set up a design business.

After the talk Lara and Tegan had an open studio session where they gave a yardage screen printing demonstration - you can find details of open studio dates on their blog!

Exposed screens ready for printing, and above the fabulous Young Husband building
Ink & Spindle set up their boutique screen printing studio in 2008, with the aim of specialising in high quality and environmentally-friendly textile printing for designers and independent labels. They work from the fabulous Young Husband Wool building in Kensington, hand screen-printing their designs and creating ethical as well as a sustainable range of textiles.

Lara and Tegan hand printing on their 10m print table - but hand screen printing also means hand cleaning screens!

Some of the cushions and fabrics designed and hand printed at Ink & Spindle.
Images courtesy of the Ink & Spindle website

It was a great experience seeing Lara and Tegan hand print their designs in their fabulous studio (very jealous of their studio environment!!) and to hear about how they set up Ink & Spindle, including their great environmental commitment which is very inspiring.

I can highly recommend visiting one of their open studio sessions - dates and details on the Ink & Spindle blog and also check out the Creative Womens Group blog for future meetings.

Cassandre

I was lucky enough back in London to find this book about the life and work of A.M. Cassandre in a second hand shop, I didn't hesitate to quickly snap it up and couldn't believe my luck in finding it!

It is actually my dad who introduced me to Cassandre and we both love his work and graphic style. Cassandre's work is instantly recognisable and typified by bold graphic imagery, strong geometric forms and use of typography. Along with designing for theatre and creating typefaces, Cassandre is probably best known for his poster designs and commercial advertisements produced during the 1920's and 1930's. Here he cleverly integrated 'experimental' artforms, in particularly cubism, into his mainstream commercial designs.
Below: 'Borwick's' 1935 (gouache)

The typeface 'Bifur' designed by Cassandre in 1927; simplified geometric characters and the elimination of any solid horizontal or vertical lines that were not completely necessary, filling the left spaces with thin parallel lines.

It was Cassandre who was responsible for the famous logo and typeface for Yves Saint Laurent back in 1963.
Below 'Nord Express' 1927 (oil on wood)

Most people will probably know Cassandre's work from the series of travel posters he designed advertising trains and ships such as the 'Etoile du Nord' and the famous 'Normandie'. These perfectly demonstrate his strong use of geometric forms, integration of text and powerful graphic nature. His clever use of perspective in these posters is a dominating feature, along with simplified colour palette and employment of a lot of black.

Below another design for 'Nord Express' 1927 (lithographic poster)

'L'Atlantique' 1931 (lithographic poster)

'Normandie' 1935 (lithographic poster)

Unfortunately I think the book is sadly out of print now, so worth checking auction sites or ABE books if you want to get hold of a copy.