Aqua Manda: OMG! Mexborough Grammar School 1975!

Why was I watching Jack and George batter down some "slag's" door at 6.30am? Sarah Montague. It was her turn to sit in the big chair and her over-enunciation and total absence of interrogation skills (like witnessing a hamster 'offer-out' next door's Rottweiler) makes both my teeth and hair curl, which would be self-defeating, since at that time of the morning I'm usually running the GHD's through it. It was company I didn't have to share the facilities with.

The Sweeney: a socio-economic photo-fit. Every domestic adornment: the Crying Blue Boy; Auntie Betty's house in Harlington; Joker's Wild; Homepride flour graders; Caramac biscuits; Embassy coupons; Heinz Beans and Pork Sausages; and avocado green - lots of it. Every car: the Ford siblings, Granada and Capri - did we really think they were so cool and play that spotting game? Every item of clothing: cheesecloth shirts and flares - never throwing them away - can't anyhow; they're the boomerangs of high street couture. And on the "slag's" dressing table sat the distinctive Deco brown glass bottle of Aqua Manda.

Aqua Manda: Mexborough Grammar School 1975. We all wore it; our skunk-like trails merging to form one giant invisible stink-cloud that permeated the entire school. Why did we all want to be the same?

So many memories were being let out on day-release.

And then came the most persuasive exhibit illustrating just how far we've come and why we'll be in no hurry to go back: a branch of MACE in all its GUM-esque glory (it made we feel very moist eyed about Tesco) complete with a hanging banner near the checkout proclaiming, "We give Green Shield Stamps."

Green Shield Stamps: Doncaster Watergate Centre; ABC Cinema; Chelsea Girl; The Arndale Centre and that mad semi-pornographic gold statue of 'The Lovers' we used to take the 'p' out of.

For those not of a certain age, Green Shield Stamps (GGS) were a kind of prehistoric Clubcard. You had a book into which you stuck the stamps, how many you got each shop depended on how much you spent, and the books became progressively Dairylea-shaped as they got full. These were then exchanged for whatever you had set your heart on in the GGS catalogue. The barmy bartering rate meaning that a new cruet set would require the pulping of forestland the size of Bluewater to provide the necessary books. Night's in flicking through the GGS and Embassy catalogues!

There are those who think that the use of retro references is lazy. I disagree. Used creatively even the haziest reference can prove to be very clever and effective indeed. (Check out Gordon's 'Yes you can' campaign. See what I mean?) They provide us with a direct channel to the heart and the means with which to tap into the emotions locked within memories. 

I remember reading a quote from a well-known comedian in which he slated (rather peevishly) Peter Kay. He said that Kay doesn't do comedy; he does 'remembering'. There's something in that, but it works. And it continues to work. His shows sell out as soon as they are announced and his DVD's and books are record-breaking best sellers I seem to recall. It seems everyone wants to re-taste Rolla-Cola.

Sometimes our best memories are the things we can't remember. We need a spark, someone or something to draw them out, just like the newspaper and shovel my gran used to put across the fireplace to draw the fire. (What would HSE make of that today?) That's Peter Kay's genius.

And it’s no accident that his material is heavy on brands, because brands are the very best accelerants. They are conversational firelighters. They make people glow, just as Jack and George made me glow, all day, just like the Ready Brek Kid: Reginald Molehusband; Pineapple Chunks...

Threadbare

Benetton. Get another idea. You're not shocking us, you're boring us. Plus, it's not an idea anyway.

Designed to confuse

You want to be a good citizen, a diligent and considerate patron and a polite and responsible member of the public. You want to dispose of your rubbish.

Easy, isn’t it? You just find a bin, don’t you?

Should you find yourself at the Royal Festival Hall you’ll find the bins come in litters of two - only be prepared to loiter.

The following is what you’ll see. 

A dark grey bin and a light grey bin, each carrying the following type:

. food scraps                                                            

. fruit cores                                                              

. crisp bags and sweet wrappers                               

. anything contaminated with food                             

. tea bags and coffee grounds                                   

          

                                                                    

. paper (white, coloured, newspapers, magazines, books and hand towels)

. cardboard

. empty aluminium and steel cans

. empty plastic bottles

. empty plastic and cardboard cups

Makes your head spin, doesn’t it?

I’ve witnessed people studying this stuff for minutes at a time – 3 minutes being the current record. I kid you not.

Information design is design that’s designed to inform. Aid understanding. Make things accessible. It shouldn’t be design that confuses. It could be so much more direct and simple, since around 70% of the words are superfluous. No wonder some just give up and plonk their stuff on the nearest surface.

Compare and contrast with Pret’s economical, direct and user-friendly approach. Go to the bins and you’ll see this:

Bottles and Cans Only                    Liquids                   Everything else in here

Job done. Clear, simple and quick with no margin for error.

No need for any more wrapping.

Let's go round again...

According to The Independent (13/11/11), vinyl sales are at a 10-year high. No shit Sherlock! 

Everyone should have worked out by now that the minute something is decreed dead, defunct, past it, it springs back to life. For every action there is a counter action. Brands are built and revived on this principle.

Retro is big. Everyone knows that, don't they?

But they didn't back in 1998 when I created a raft of stuff to present to a former client with the intention of letting them ride the wave of what I knew was coming.

We arranged a meeting, but on the morning of the meeting his PA rang to say he wouldn't be arriving. No explanation was forthcoming and he didn't reschedule. More fool him. Why did he do it? Because it meant moving his ass out of his chair to meet an unestablished and fledgling company and he couldn't be arsed. What did he miss out on? Just about everything that has been lauded as new, innovative and fresh ever since. (Zip disks with dates available for the doubting Tommies and Pansy's out there.)

So what's the moral?

Well this is one for client's, innit.

Don't ever say no, because you have no idea what you're passing up on. 

And the client in question? They make beer in Anglia.

PC: Preferred Crap.

So, leading on from yesterday.
Today we discover that a poster entitled 'the London 2012 experience is coming your way' is minus one of the biggest tourist attractions and most meaningful landmarks for Londoners and all related to the forces and, well, just about everyone en route has been erased.
Yes, HMS Belfast has been photoshopped out.
Quote: "There has been an error in production." What a load of crap. It was taken out because someone thought that it would offend some of the participating countries. Boo, hoo. And what a cock-up especially at this time of year.
This all just gets worse. What are they doing over in Stratford? Are they thinking at all?


http://www.thedrum.co.uk/news/2011/11/09/hms-belfast-airbrushed-out-london-2012-campaign-poster


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/olympics/article-2059345/London-2012-Olympics-poster-HMS-Belfast-removed-image.html

Thank feck for the architects...

First we had the 2012 Olympic brand identity, which is really very, very bad - appalling in fact - and therefore a national disgrace not to mention an embarrassment given our collective creative credentials. And now we have the Olympic posters and I really want to write that their appearance has eased the embarrassment, but I can't.

I've swallowed another chunk of my tongue and I can't afford to lose anymore, so chocks away.

It's not an original concept - getting different designers and artists to 'do' a poster - Los Angeles did it in 1984...badly. Nor does its unoriginality make it a bad idea. We have world-famous artists - let’s underscore our creativity. I get it. But it becomes a bad idea when a) ideas are thin on the ground b) there is seemingly no direction c) the authorship is so subtle it's almost invisible d) when the images (or the art as must call it) is mostly piss-poor.

Some of the offerings are so lame (yes I'm talking about you Michael Craig-Martin and Anthea Hamilton and Martin Creed to name but three) that they wouldn't make it onto the wall of a GCSE art room.

What seems to have happened here is that the scared cows have been allowed to present any old tosh because of who they are. 'It's Tracey so it must be good.' Bullshit.

That the sporting activities are not the main feast is not the issue, since the spirit, aspirations and philosophy of the games is just as valid. But when one thinks of all the brilliant designers contained within this island and the wit they could have brought to this body of work it makes you want to reach for the Wilkinson Sword.

If they really wanted to use artists, then this work would have been so much better had they been paired with great designers. Double whammy.

Whoever briefed, directed and sanctioned this should have taken a look at the London Transport Museum poster collection before briefing and made 'them' look at it too. And if they did, they weren’t really paying attention, were they.

So it's down to the (already) award-winning Olympic architects, engineers, landscapers, construction workers and Danny Boyle and Co to save the creative day, because I’m afraid that the communications stuff would struggle to win the egg and spoon.

Links

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2011/11/04/london-2012-official-olympics-and-paralympics-posters-unveiled-which-is-your-favourite-115875-23537494/

http://olympic-museum.de/poster/poster1948.htm

http://www.ltmcollection.org/posters/index.html

"You wouldn't think there was anything wrong with him."

On the return leg of my morning run last week I stopped for a breather in the square at the west end of Gt.Ormond Street.

I saw a couple having a fag in the recess of the entrance of a building. They had a wheelie case with them. As I drew alongside I saw that they had a small boy of no more than two sitting in his buggy with his toy Grilla - both a responsible distance away further up the ramp. A smiley, cute, flaxen-haired mop-top.

I stopped to say hello.

One is used to seeing anxious parents in that part of London and so I asked if their son was going to be a patient at the hospital. They told me that he had kidney stones and would be going under the knife later that morning; that they were from, Thirsk, North Yorkshire; and that they had travelled down the previous evening - hence the case.

So there they were, far away from home, puffing away and occasionally betraying the depths of their anxiousness by dint of the looks they flashed at each other and the lip-biting looks they both directed at their son. He, of course, was totally unconcerned.

"You wouldn't think there was anything wrong with him," said mum. I said that he was in the best possible place and that he would be fine because of it. They agreed and the sharp intake of breath that accompanied dad's reply was very tangible indeed. So having blown a kiss to the little chap and having said goodbye to the parents, I went on my way.

How much trust can a brand inspire? Where else are perception and reality so well realized?

Few are unaware of the hospital, what it stands for and the groundbreaking and record-breaking GOSH appeal, with which I'm happy to say I have a connection. The late, great CDP created the brand identity and advertising campaign and we, The Fine White Line, worked with our then parent company on 'thank you' materials when the appeal reached its target of £42m within two years of its launch.

But as fantastic and successful as the 'crying child' logo has been, I've always felt that there was something wrong with him. Because it's never the children who cry. It's everyone else around them.