New at Pentagram
Decipher: Fourteen Cryptograms
Each year Pentagram issues a small holiday book as a greeting to its friends and colleagues. The partners take turns researching and designing these books, which usually contain some kind of game or activity. The most recent edition is Decipher, designed by Harry Pearce, who chose as its subject cryptography, the science of writing, or encrypting—and breaking, or decrypting—secret code.
The book features 14 cryptograms of varying methodologies and difficulty that conceal short phrases; through symbols, numbers, patterns and simple letterspacing, the cyptograms challenge the reader to decipher their meaning. “It’s astonishing how much you can hide in type,” says Pearce.
Now we have adapted the book’s content online and are pleased to present the 14 cryptograms in a minisite here. Can you break the code?
‘Creative Review’ Names Pentagram Design Studio of the Year
Pentagram has been named Design Studio of the Year by Creative Review. The award is announced in the Creative Review Annual 2008, which represents the magazine’s choice of the highlights of the past year in visual communication. The Design Studio of the Year Award is given to the studio with the most work accepted into the annual.
Five Pentagram projects were selected by the judging panel for inclusion in the annual; images and links after the jump.
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Harry Pearce at Meeting of Minds
Harry Pearce has been invited to take part in this year’s Meeting of Minds, joining Michael Wolff, Martin Lambie-Nairn and Pentagram co-founder Kenneth Grange for an evening of discussion that will ask: “How can design not only meet a client’s commercial objectives, but also enhance our lives and the culture around us?”
Meeting of Minds is devised and hosted by Jan Casey and will take place in the Stevenson Lecture Theatre at the British Museum in London on 23 April. Further information and tickets are available by email.
Design Museum's 'Feedback' Lecture Now Available on Podcast
Harry Pearce, John Rushworth and Paula Scher’s “Feedback” lecture held at the London Design Museum last year is now available as a podcast from the museum’s website.
The talk was organized as an accompaniment to the Design Museum’s retrospective “Alan Fletcher 50 Years of Graphic Work (and Play)” and was hosted by the exhibition’s curator Emily King. In the hour-long discussion, Pearce, Rushworth and Scher frequently refer to the ways in which Fletcher influenced their work and careers.
‘Burma’ Takes to the Streets
Harry Pearce’s Burma poster has been adopted as a placard by activists in the recent international street protests against the current situation in the country.
The poster, designed in 2006 for an event organised by the New York-based charity Witness to raise awareness about human rights violations in Burma, has been appearing in news footage of the protests held in cities from Bangkok to New York.
Designing London Design Week
Monday night saw the opening of The London Design Festival at the Royal Festival Hall. The ceremony marked the beginning of one of the world’s great design events which, between the 17th and the 23rd of September, fills London with exhibitions, workshops, talks and private views. With branding and identity designed by Domenic Lippa, The London Design Festival’s organising committee is just one of the places you can see work by Pentagram partners during London’s celebration of design.
Angus Hyland has designed the identity and brand architecture for 100% Design London, the UK’s largest trade fair for the design and architecture profession and one of the longest running events in the festival calendar.
Harry Pearce has designed a poster with John Simmons as of part of 26 Posters, an installation for the festival organised by the writer’s advocacy organisation 26, which aims to demonstrate the power of language in design. The posters will be displayed at London’s Old Street and Elephant and Castle roundabouts, as well as on billboard sites in Birmingham, Glasgow and Manchester.
Pentagram will be holding an exhibition of posters from throughout the firm’s 35-year history on Thursday, 20 September at our London office in Notting Hill. Contact Leah Speakman for further enquiries.
New Work: Roy Harper, ‘The BBC Tapes’
Harry Pearce has designed the sleeve art for the re-issue of The BBC Tapes, a set of CDs by cult singer/songwriter Roy Harper, released by Harper’s Science Friction Records.
Pearce’s design for the series emulates Harper’s subtle poetry in its central motif; portraits of Harper, taken during the period the recordings were made, have been cropped so that the singer’s eyes are the same size within each image; evoking the intensity and intimacy of the recordings. The simple, vertical typography, set in Akzidenz Grotesk, and monochromatic treatment of the photographs means that the most direct way of differentiating between CDs at a glance is through Harpers’ facial expressions.
Harry Pearce at Kyoorius Designyatra
Harry Pearce is to speak at the second annual international design conference Kyoorius Designyatra in Goa, India, from the 6-8 September. “Design Empowers Businesses” is the theme of the discussion-oriented conference that while international in participants, will focus on building the value of design in Indian society and business. Other speakers include New York’s Stefan Sagmeister, Wally Olins from Saffron Brand Consultants and David Kester, the head of the Design Council UK.
Harry Pearce to Judge Prison Art
Harry Pearce has been invited to be a judge for the annual Creating a Future prize, part of an exhibition of art, prose and poetry by inmates from sixteen prisons in the North West of England to be held at The Co-operative Group’s headquarters at New Century House in Manchester from the 13th to the 18th of August 2007.
Domenic Lippa and Harry Pearce Join Pentagram
Lippa (left) and Pearce (right) outside Pentagram’s London studio
Domenic Lippa and Harry Pearce have joined Pentagram as partners in the London office.
The graphic designers founded their own studio, Lippa Pearce, in 1990. They have received numerous international design awards for their work in print, identity, packaging and environmental graphics. Clients have included The Co-operative, Boots, Witness, TDK, Unilever, Espa, Heal’s, The Science Museum London and The Typographic Circle.
Angus Hyland says, “We are thrilled that Harry and Domenic will be joining. They are the perfect fit in terms of philosophy and personality, and have built an amazing portfolio of design work that is a great complement to our own. We’re excited to have two such experienced talents going forward.”
From the new Pentagram partners’ perspective, Pearce comments: “Our outlook and work fits seamlessly with Pentagram. We stand by the same principles of design-led business and creative excellence. To be amongst so many other like-minded partners is inspiring.”
Update: The new partners—including Luke Hayman— are featured in Form.
After the jump, some work from the new partners.
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