We recently created a new brand for the Camps Foundation; the charity arm of one of our clients, Camps International. The Foundation had evolved organically as the company had grown and it had never been formally branded as it’s own separate entity. So when we got a phone-call from Holly in the Camps office asking if we could mock up some designs for a charity fundraising wristband, we realised it needed to be clearly defined as different from the main Camps International brand. It was time to give the Foundation a facelift.

The branding process was really interesting as we worked through the different options and ended up going in a complete circle in terms of style. Initially we explored lots of ‘icons’ to illustrate the charity’s amazing work – including trees, shovels, wildlife paw-prints, water drops, hand-prints to name but a few.

But it became quickly apparent that the huge breadth of the Camps Foundation’s work just couldn’t be communicated fully via simple icons. It was far too busy visually – hey, it’s a small charity, not Unilever! So instead we started exploring a more typographic route. After all, the charity’s work speaks for itself – the brand will ultimately serve as a framework for all the amazing facts, stories, photographs and videos of their achievements in action.

We were beginning to really feel this and knew we were going down the right track. Sometimes you just get that gut feeling that this is the way to go and everybody starts getting excited about something.

In the end we developed a simple handwritten script alongside a big bold “Giving 100%” statement that nobody can miss. It might look simple but we had to go on a design journey to get there!

Ultimately, this was probably the most complicated response to the question “Can you knock up a charity wristband design?” that we could have come up with. But it resulted in a finished brand that everybody is really proud of and will work across a huge range of platforms and products. Watch this space as we start to roll out the brand online and in print over the next few weeks…

Needless to say, it was pretty awesome seeing the new Camps Foundation charity wristbands come back from the manufacturers – and seeing dozens of people immediately liking them on Facebook and asking where they can buy makes it all worth it!

It’s easy when you work in the design industry to focus on design itself and not actually consider who you work for, or what they do.

The competition to be at the cutting edge of the web, or to produce something that is brilliantly designed seems to have replaced the need to consider why we are doing it? Are we all just chasing the kudos of our peers?

Are your clients your achievement? Do you wear them like badges of honour? Lots of companies seem to.

Does this make a difference? Why do we design? To communicate a message clearly, visually? There are a lot of amazing designers out there that produce their own work, which communicates messages that mean something.

But what about when designers work for other businesses or organisations? You’re then communicating their message. Is it time to have a think about who they are as clients?

If you are their mouth piece are you happy with what they do?

Do they give something back?

The words of Neville Brody are perhaps more eloquent than mine:

Radical Culture and the idea that the work you do as a designer could actually be of benefit to society is no longer evident. When did you last hear the word ‘progress’ ? Progress is essential to society; the idea that what you’re doing now should make a better society for tomorrow. [Good Design] is not about doing something that’s going to bring in money, it’s about doing something that’s going to re-engage people, re-engage culture and society and re-engage possibility.

- Neville Brody

“It’s a bike race, it’s in the bush near wildlife areas, it’s wacky, kids are involved, it’s hot, very local and fun, the mountain has a very distinct shape, man-eating lions of Tsavo, warthogs…”

I replied “so a warthog riding a bicycle?” (meant as a joke) but it turned out that was exactly what he was after. So I drew one:

The temptation to add some spectacles was almost too much to bear.

UPDATE!

The race took place last week and was a huge success! Here are some photos from the day…

You can view the entire Flickr set here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/campsinternationalafrica/sets/72157628294673719/ (Thanks, Dipesh!)

First up was Bob and Roberta Smith selling their weird and wonderful signs, under the guise of “The Bob Shop”:

Who is Bob Smith? D&AD 2010. from Immprint ltd on Vimeo

There were a lot of the sort of things that you might expect from a “fair” (perhaps not a carboot), including a raffle:

…not quite falling into the “expected” category was Gavin Turk signing eggs:

…his head looks a bit like an egg. Just saying.

I particularly loved what these girls were doing (I didn’t get their names, anybody know?) – aside from the adorable letterpress stationery on sale, they were also typing Mills & Boon-inspired mini stories onto little cards, ie. “Naughty Notes”… while you wait! I like to think that they were made up on the spot but I can’t be sure:

Then quite excitingly I got to have a milk-bottle signed by Holly Freeman, who had driven her piece, ‘Afloat‘, all the way from Tooting at 15mph. This was definitely one of my favourite stalls at the sale – funny, tongue-in-cheek, affordable, personal and very friendly!

I got a neon pink milk bottle, which Holly kindly signed for me:

Cassart! and Oliver Gut Watkins were running an Art Improvement Clinic, where students from RCA or St Martins would ‘improve’ your artwork in need of love…

Penguin were running a cute stall where you could buy these amazing deck-chairs (<<< note to anybody who ever wants to buy me an amazing gift) and also some classic novels with blank covers so you could design your own, for just £1! I bought The Great Gatsby and Alice In Wonderland to decorate myself. Penguin have also got some bands to decorate the covers, with varying results…

Oh and then there were these nutters…

This was a group of artists called Bert Industries who were spanking volunteers with some terrifying looking padded arms. Needless to say, I didn’t volunteer (but I did film it for Wired Canvas blog readers’ viewing pleasure):

Spanking at the London Art Car Boot Fair from Wired Canvas on Vimeo

Finally, The Girls (Andrea Blood and Zoe Sinclair) were there with Posted – a temporary exhibition celebrating post and the dying art of letter-writing. This is something that I am personally a total geek over as a serial stationery-nerd, letter-writer and Swap-botter, so I loved this stall:

I bought myself a lovely new commemorative royal Oyster card holder (with The Girls as Bea & Eugenie / Wills & Harry):

…genius! There was loads more going on that I didn’t get round to photographing but at that point the heavens opened so we legged it to the pub. All in all, definitely worth a visit in 2012!

Luke Elwes on Turner’s ‘The Evening Star’ from Luke Elwes on Vimeo.

We built artist Luke Elwes’ website a while back, and just stumbled upon this video of his talk at the National Gallery on Turner’s painting ‘The Evening Star’.

Bow Arts Trust are shortly throwing open their doors to the public for their Open Studios programme, so nosy parkers like us can explore the artists’ studios. We’ll be there Friday night, hopefully see you there.

You can download the PDF brochure HERE!

Firstly, Dorset’s youth contemporary dance company Portrait took over Debenhams for an afternoon, after working with choreographer Carly Reader:

B-Side Encounters have also hit the streets, with some rather subversive and provocative pasted street-art, inspired by the likes of Banksy, created by young people from Littlemoor working with artist Peter Snelling. They have been tackling the subject of economic prospects for young people and plastered the streets of Weymouth with their own unique visions – including a life size human pyramid attempting to reach a ten pound note, and a million pounds being thrown in the air and vanishing into the gutter. My favourite part of this is that they pasted it to the side of a bank… pure genius.

I recently walked past this billboard street art on Cambridge Heath Road near Bethnal Green, East London. Does anybody know who made it? I’m intrigued!

Our good friend, artist Ania Bas, has been commissioned by Open Empty Spaces to create a site-specific work based at Ridley Road Market. She is based there for 26 days of research, creating an A-Z of the market that you can follow online.

Some of our favourites to date (that we hope she will explain to us in more detail) include: “flesh”, “eggs eau do toilette” (I really hope that one is all one phrase), “dandruff”, “celebrities (Alan Sugar)”, “big bargain!!!!”, and “aorta”.

If you want to find out more about Ania and her practice, she is holding an open studio day on Tuesday 19th April between 11am – 3pm at her Market Stall in Ridley Road, Dalston, E8 2NP.

We are in a creative industry after all… So like many new year resolutions we’re trying to alter our diet slightly and make sure we get all the nutrients we need to ensure healthy artistic movements…

This week lunch at View tube near the 2012 Olympic site and a vist to the Nunnery gallery to see the result of the Balfron Project (see previous Balfron blog here)

The person in the right of the (blurry) image in this slideshow is me! I got in the photo…. yes!