Deeper Into Dream: Ben Lee

Artwork Photography: Lizzy Waronker
Design, Layout: Rory Wilson

My thoughts on Ben Lee are pretty well documented on this blog, and this was a particularly awful release music wise, even by his recent standards. That said, I’ve got to admit he does commission some pretty cool covers for his albums, this being no exception. Maybe he should consider a change of career?

Singularity: Sounds of Sirus

Artwork: Glenn Thomas

Quite a beautiful, sedate cover for a band with such a guitar heavy sound, you can’t always tell an album by it’s cover.

Night Owls: Ryan Meeking And The Few

Design & Artwork: Motherbird

A beautiful illustration on an album cover is always going to catch my eye, but those birds aren’t really owls are they?

RRakala: Gurrumul

Artwork: Carlo Santone

Musically, just a beautiful album. Visually, it avoids all the usual clichés to produce a sublime and effortless cover image perfectly matched to the music.

The Cat: Ben Salter

I know it’s just an illustration of a cat, and maybe not a very good one, but it somehow seems to work in the context of this release.

Carried In Mind: Jeff Lang

Cover Illustration: Amanda Upton
Album Design: Myf Walker

This album cover really jumped out at me visually when I first happened upon it at the local JB hi-fi. Beautifully and playfully illustrated with sympathetic hand drawn type, this is a winner all around. Why can’t more album covers be this much fun?

The Great Impression: Sparkadia

Artwork: Kareena Zerefos

The cover feels like I’ve walked into some kind of art installation and does an amazing job of bring both imagery and typography to the forefront rather than leaving either as an after thought.

Matchsticks: City Riots

Loving the half-tone dots, colour and glam of this release from Adelaide’s City Riots, would love to know who did the artwork.

Odds Or Evens: The Bowers

Design: Mick Stylianou
Photography: Steve Harris
Hand Lettering: Rhys Lee

While I’m not particularly blown away by the photography on the cover, I’m a sucker for big chunky hand painted type and it works effectively with the image on this bright red cover. I imagine this looks amazing on the extra size afforded on their vinyl 12″ release, loving that Coke Bottle Green Transparent Vinyl for the disk as well. Thanks to Phil Gionfriddo from The Bowers for updating me on who produced the artwork, I’m assuming the hand-lettering was produced by the Rhys Lee who is a quite well known visual artist in his own right, impressive!

Zonoscope: Cut Copy

Design & Artwork: Alter

Winner of this years Aria Award for best album cover artwork, the tasteful yet powerful imagery of this release propels the album art into the realms of ‘iconic’. Well played Alter.

Great Barrier Grief: Oh Mercy

Artwork: Ken Done

If there is one thing you can be certain of from the band Oh Mercy, it’s that they have never met a pun they didn’t like, as album title ‘Great Barrier Grief’ attests to. It’s still quite a coup to get renowned Australian artist Ken Done to paint their cover image though, striking and colourful, it goes some way to forgive all those koala and Sydney Harbour Bridge tea towels he did during the 80s. Effective as the cover is, it’s a pity they were so timid with the type, maybe they should have left it off altogether.

Dunks: Ghoul

Design & Artwork: Mitchell Cumming

There’s something intrinsically beautiful about the mixture of pattern and texture on this cover, like a loud whisper it beautifully compliments this dark and alluring album.

Routine and War: Singing Skies

Design: Mark Gowing

It wouldn’t be one of my end of year best album covers lists without featuring a design by Mark Gowing and The Preservation label. Everything they released this year had a fantastic cover of course, this being a particular standout.

Making Mirrors: Gotye

Artwork: Frank De Becker

Design: Wally De Becker

Gotye certainly stepped up his game this year with the release of ‘Making Mirrors’, and while his album covers have always been good, he took it to another level with this fantastic piece of artwork taken from a painting by his father. Even better was the artwork used for the single ‘Somebody That I Used To Know’.

Hurtsville: Jack Ladder & The Dreamlanders

Tip of the hat to fellow designer Heath Killen for suggesting this one, there’s something about the bw photo with the unusual combination of mint green type that really works for this.

In The Company Of Wolves: The Ivys

A striking cover image can sometimes say it all for an album without the need of type to accompany it.

Six Petits Hilboux: Inuette

Design & Artwork by Spencer Harrison

Beautifully imagined and photographed album cover by ex-Adelaidian Spencer Harrison, one of the best cover designs of the year in my humble opinion. I can’t say I have heard the music, but if the cover is any indication it must be fantastic.

Only Sparrows: Josh Pyke

Illustration: James Gulliver Hancock

Design: Ben Shackleton

The beautiful illustrative stylings of James Gulliver Hancock once again grace a Josh Pyke album cover, how can you go wrong?

Prisoner: The Jezabels

Design: Christopher Doyle

Designer Christopher Doyle has realised the identity of the Jezabels across all their visual media with beautifully conceptual photography and a restrained typographic approach, this album cover being no exception.

Single Twin: Marcus Teague

Dancing skeletons make this cool, who doesn’t like dancing skeletons?

Secret Rituals: The Grates

Design & Artwork: The Grates

Lovely illustration done by the band themselves, but it’s a cover that you really need to hold in your hand to appreciate it’s use of paper stock and transparency effect. I like the use of typography in the left hand circle as well.

Tambourine: Teeth & Tongue

If you’re going to stick your portraits on the cover of your album, this is the way to do it. Beautiful and arresting photography and technique with a refined use of typography.

A Trophy: Tobias Cummings

Sometimes the most obvious ideas can work a treat if done properly.

I Want That You Are Always Happy: The Middle East

Artwork: The Middle East

Hands down, my favourite Australian album cover of the year An already exquisite record complimented by this beautifully weird, funny and still somehow haunting cover picture with some nice handwritten type to sweeten it even further. I advise you purchase it in the larger 12″ vinyl format to truly appreciate it!

So there you have it, another year wrapped up – Agree? Disagree? Any glaring omissions? Leave a comment and let me know.

The Design edition of Adelaide Deluxe Magazine is now available free at various cafes, restaurants, bars and design haunts around the city. This issue is co-edited by me and features articles on local graphic design firms Parallax and Voice as well as stories on people doing lots of interesting stuff in other various design fields. Keep a look out for it – it’s sure to become ‘highly collectible

The clever chaps at Voice have updated their website with a new look and lots of new work to gawp at.

Ben Shacklton produces some pretty spectacular design and illustration for the music industry, and seeing as though he has relocated himself to the humble environs of Adelaide, I’m happy to claim him as ‘one of us’. He’s also the Co-Director of record label Rice Is Nice who release some pretty sweet music such as personal favourites Seja and Straight Arrows, and is available for freelance work. Take a gander at his talents on his Studio Little George site.

Stobie Sounds

I’ve been really impressed by the output of local record label Stobie Sounds, they combine three of my favourite things, roots music, Adelaide and importantly (as far as this blog is concerned anyway) some great DIY handmade design. Their website states their mission pretty well:

“Stobie Sounds is a small not-for-profit community record label that was set up to help support the local roots music scene in our fair city of Adelaide, South Australia. The label is run by a committee of three volunteers with the support of artists, musicians, studios and promoters who share a passion for roots music in Adelaide. Our mode of producing albums is built around a simple, small scale DIY philosophy. The typical Stobie Sounds release is 50-100 copies. Album sleeves are made from recycled cardboard and hand-printed using traditional techniques. This system allows us to create small batches of delightfully hand-made albums at low cost. We put a premium on simple design and interesting liner notes. Artists retain control over their artistic vision and retain all ownership of copyright in their recordings and compositions. Stobie Sounds takes some income from sales to cover costs and fund new projects.”

It’s great that someone is trying to do something different and interesting in a very difficult environment for local roots musicians, it seems to be a pretty sustainable plan, already reaping some remarkable results (both musically and aesthetically). I love the little pieces on how they made the artwork  for various releases up on the site, the use of hand-stitching, letterpress and screen print ensures that each piece is a one of a kind, a nice little keepsake is this world of digital download. While I’m knocked out by the artwork, the music is actually pretty good as well if roots music is your thing. You can buy their releases at their online store, being limited to 50-100 copies you need to be quick though as they usually sell out.

I’ve been watching the development of illustrator/designer Joel Van Der Knaap by stalking his website for a little while now. It’s been interesting to watch the development of his style to where he is just really hitting it out of the park, so to speak. I’m loving his pop/1970s style illustration interpreted through a modern day street aesthetic such as the above piece designed for Mondayjazz.com. I’m happy to see that he’s working on a project with Kim Seppelt-Deakin of Sherpa/The Inkroom, another local Adelaide design dynamo, on  a project for for D’Angelo Coffee, the snippet I’ve seen so far looks spectacular, I can’t wait to see the final product. Adelaide is producing some amazing illustration talent at the moment.

Chris Bowden: Can you tell me a bit about how you started out in design?

Eddie Opara: I’m from London originally, I was born in South London, Wandsworth. I did my undergrad at The London College of Printing in 1995. That year I was also an intern for Nick Bell, the former Creative Director for Eye Magazine, who also ran his own design firm in London. It was just over the Summer but it was a great experience. Later than summer in ‘95, I got a place At Yale University in the MFA program there. I had never been to the United States before, but I thought it would be really good for me to do that type of move. Once I got there, I was actually really home sick, I didn’t like the food, I didn’t really like much of anything for about a year or so, but eventually I became a little bit more comfortable. I graduated from Yale in 1997 and proceeded not to move to New York. Instead I moved to Cambridge Massachusetts with my friend George Plesko. We started working at a firm called The Art Technology Group, which is now very different from when we were there. It was a startup company from MIT, Media Labs and The Business Group, our bosses were quite amazing innovative personalities and idealists, they made us really comfortable. I had a lot of fun there for about four years until I got bored of the fun and felt as though I needed to be a little more creative visually. Over the four years they had really nurtured me in regards to understanding technology and especially user interaction. I came mostly from the world of print design, so for me to delve into interactivity was quite something. I moved onto Imaginary Forces in their New York office which is still around. A friend of mine, Mikon Van Gastel was the head of that group. The main focus of the year I spent there was a series of electronic screens for a building for Morgan Stanley in Times Square. It never became Morgan Stanley, it became the Lehman Brothers building and now it’s Barclays. It was quite an astonishing feat, a block and a half of 3 electronic screens that wrap around the buildings front facade. There was a lot of very complex work done in the motion and the idea of telling a story, being very strategic and understanding that particular type of hardware. It was successful, but unfortunately, September 11 happened, and Morgan Stanley didn’t end up moving into that building, the work was up for about two and a half months though. From there I went onto 2X4 and stayed there for about three and a half years until I started The Map Office.

CB: How did you decide upon the name The Map Office?

EO: As I was leaving 2X4, my friend George Plesko and I were travelling to another friend’s wedding in Argentina. We were on a bus going to the wedding, we were slightly sick and tired of the work we had been doing and wanted more opportunity. We were both getting older and wanted to get out there a little more, so we decided to just start something. It wasn’t necessarily the thought of starting a company at this point, just the idea of embarking on something new. We decided on The Map Office because George’s thesis at Yale had been on maps, and the whole idea of a map seemed quite interesting to us. You can interpret maps in so many different ways, they don’t always look like the general cartographical charts that you might think of in the first instance. Maps can be anywhere on any surface, they can be interpreted in a myriad of ways. That encapsulates the idea of how I work, trying to interpret things in a different manner, whether it be the story or something such as cognitive navigational structures. Whatever it may be, it is something that draws you in and guides you into many different directions.

CB: New York is something like a hub for great designers and design firms, how do you distinguish yourself amongst such a large talent pool?

EO: To begin with I really just set out to distinguish myself from previous employers 2X4 and the strong language they have in message and method. It was just me that ended up starting The Map Office, George by this point had 2 kids and a wife, so the idea of letting go of a steady job to start up a new business wasn’t really very comfortable for him. I was single at the time. I wanted to create products as well as providing a service as a boutique design firm, what those products would be at this point was something I was mainly just thinking about. I also wanted to have some fun, I wanted to enjoy every phase of the process, not just the finished piece. The idea was to not just focus on a section of culture, architecture, fashion or art for example. I wanted to make it a little more open, to see what I could do, I’m always on the look out for really badly designed work to reconstruct and makeover, let’s face it, there’s a lot of it out there. I think a lot of designers sometimes move away from that, they’re looking for an easier path. I’m not saying That I haven’t done that at times as well, but to me, an easy path for a lot of designers seems to be to concentrate on work connected to the artistic world, or fashion or architecture, things that blend with or relate already to the way we work as designers. I want to do things that are not on the same sort of path as others, that has led us to things like building our own software and building software specifically for a client as they need it. The thing about The Map Office is that 4 of the 5 of us here are developers as well as designers, it’s not too difficult for us to build a piece of software if we want to. We can build an interface for the web, as well as produce a traditional printed book, develop branding, signage or whole environments. If you put it in the context of English/Australian, it’s like being an all-rounder in cricket, you can bat and bowl. That’s the type of designers I’m looking for, people that have vast amounts of energy and range. There are a lot of designers who mostly focus in one area, that’s fine, but I like a designer who is able to stretch. You’ve got to stretch that brain and make it larger because we are dealing with so many different types of people and problems everyday. As designers we need to get our heads around the aspects of say, engineering or architecture or writing or whoever we have to work with or for. It was something that I learnt at 2×4, they are very much into the aspects of writing and planning, I try to take it a little further than the typical design firm might.

 CB: Are there any clients or projects you wouldn’t take on?

EO: If was anything to do with furs or tobacco or child slavery or something, that I wouldn’t take on. Over the course of my career, which is still quite in its early days, I’ve gone from designing enormous screen graphics, to fashion shows, to geological manuals to software content management and visualisation. That’s a large range, something that I think is missing from a lot of designers today. They need to get out there and do something that is just a little bit different from what they are comfortable with.

CB: So the definition of a graphic designer itself needs to be stretched a bit?

EO: Designers always seem to define themselves by very specific titles, I’m a user interface designer or I’m a print designer, all these finite ideas of who you are. You need to stretch it, architects do this all the time. Now is a visual communication designers time to be very robust, to be a renaissance man or woman.

CB: If designers don’t step up, then someone else will.

EO: And as usual, they will take control of it, then lo and behold, the designers will be sitting there saying “I just do the coding, or I just try to solve a problem even though I don’t really know what the problem is. We shouldn’t be doing that anymore, we need to take these projects by the balls, there’s nobody stopping us.

CB: Any projects or clients that you would love to work for?

EO: Adidas. When I was an undergrad I did a project on Adidas, researching all the history. I was fascinated with the idea of the three stripes, the functionality, the durability, it’s all there set in stone. In software terms you would refer to it as a ‘major framework’, it’s so flexible, you can do anything with it. It’s very different from, say, a Nike philosophy of whatever comes to mind, we’ll figure it out and make it fun and interesting for people to utilise. Adidas feels so much more structured, yet still enjoyable, you can have and hold onto any apparel or set of shoes they have put out for decades. All my mates, they love Adidas as well. Whatever they would want me to do, if they would get me to do anything, I’ll do it as this stage. Corporate analysis structures, rebranding elements, store fitouts, custom software, whatever, I’d do something different with it. In fact, we’ve been considering developing a piece of software in the studio, a sort of sneaker database. You would go around with a phone camera and take shots of different sneakers on the street, upload the shots and tag them. You could then look them up, see who bought what and where, or maybe check out some vintage pairs. It’s the idea of seeing the shoes in use, in the environment, not photos taken under studio conditions. There would be forums for discussions, “I saw this pair of fluorescent Adidas up on Broadway this afternoon, etc. I think that kind of thing is really great, it’s just something we’ve been throwing around the studio. Finding the time to implement it is another story!

CB: What do you know about Australian graphic design?

EO: Unfortunately, not much. I feel as though I’m in a weird bubble here as far as design overseas. I remember seeing an article in Eye Magazine on Aboriginal art and design.

CB: That’s interesting, you don’t hear much about actual Aboriginal designers back home, though their artwork is certainly co-opted a lot in design to portray ‘Australia’.

EO: It sounds a little bit like when I graduated from school, I was about to get an internship at a firm in Holland and I actually asked them if they had ever met a black designer before. The two heads of the company sort of looked at each other and had to admit that they hadn’t! I was interested in that because I was getting out of school and I really didn’t know of any myself, well, maybe one or two. In Britain at the time, in my class alone, there were at least ten of us, some of them have gone on to do really great things. I haven’t seen the same thing much since I got to the United States though.

CB: Why do you think that is?

EO: I really don’t know. I could speculate, but then speculation could get me into a lot of trouble. I do feel the desire to go into the schools, into the areas where minorities live, especially African Americans, and actually talk to them a little bit about visual communication. I know that they are out there, but they just aren’t prominent enough. It doesn’t matter whether I’m from Britain or wherever, there’s less than 2 million of us back there, yet there were still 10 of us in my class in the UK, so why weren’t there more African Americans in my grad school class in the US? Everybody these day are very visually orientated, it’s disheartening to see it’s not on the main stage for some segments of the community.

A (belated) thanks to Eddie for taking the time to speak to me. You can read more about Eddie and some of the reasons he moved to (and was asked to move to) Pentagram on this article and video at Fast Company’s CoDesign website.

Eddie Opara is a multi-faceted designer whose work encompasses strategy, design and technology. His projects have included the design of brand identity, publications, packaging, environments, exhibitions, interactive installations, websites, user interfaces and software, with many of his projects ranging across multiple media. He is a visiting critic at Yale University and teaches narrative design at the University of the Arts, Philadelphia. He has taught at the Rhode Island School of Design, the Columbia University School of Architecture and the Yale University School of Art. He currently serves on the board of the New York Chapter of AIGA, the professional association for design. www.pentagram.com

Toolbox Graphic Design have been a part of the local design scene since 2006, I’ve been waiting until they had some work up on their site before I featured them though. Started by Adam Carpenter with Nathan Fuller, Toolbox Graphic Design is now a team of six, producing some very nice ‘real world’ design work from their fantastically looking renovated church studios. Adam has a good pedigree, having worked previously at John Nowland’s studio, it looks as though he is continuing to produce the goods as far as excellent design solutions go. The interior of the studio looks great, If I’m not mistaken, I also spy an old 80s style tabletop video game, if it has Galaxian on it I might have to consider sending them my CV.

Ask me to list the ten all time creative individuals I admire the most and Paul Sahre’s name would be pretty high up on that list. Now you can see a heap of his illustration work stretching back to the late 90s on his just launched site illoops (Illustration Office of Paul Sahre). There’s lots to inspire you here, the site itself is pretty straight forward as far as layout, but when the work is this good it speaks for itself. I saw the bare bones of this site when I was in New York earlier this year, glad to see it has come out so brilliantly!