22 Mar Going OffMac….

Going OffMac for a while…

Recently four of us decided to leave the cool, reassuring glow of our friendly imacs to emerge blinking into the daylight on our way to a fascinating talk given by two leading designers: Malcolm Garrett and Martin Lambie Nairn. Arranged by Digital Scarborough at Westwood Theatre it was good to see a full audience waiting to welcome the two speakers. Sadly, I’m old enough to recall a time when you could count the graphic designers in Scarborough on the fingers of one hand – and still have enough left over to show a politician what you thought of them.

The modest Malcolm Garrett was on first with a whistlestop tour through his impressive portfolio. Malcolm started out at Manchester Poly designing posters and record sleeves for the Buzzcocks, his ground-breaking graphics established him within the music industry where he produced many album covers, and used the emerging design technology to create innovative CD graphics and on-stage video backdrops for bands including Duran Duran, Spice Girls and Heaven 17. Malcolm also presented some of his ‘proper’ design work which included a massive project to create user-friendly bus route mapping for the city of Dublin which previously had none, and the successful re-branding of the UK Border control at Stansted Airport.

Next up was Martin Lambie Nairn, probably most widely known for his Spitting Images concept, who started out producing TV graphics using cardboard and Letraset and ultimately undertook the mammoth task of re-branding the BBC for the modern digital age. He presented several other interesting examples of TV branding and advertising, and finished with the remarkable story of how his company’s re-branding of O2 transformed a collection of smaller mobile phone company virtually no-one had heard of, and with a £2bn debt, into a successful brand that soon gained a 70% public awareness in polls and which, when subsequently sold, had the O2 brand alone valued at £9bn. Martin asserted that creativity wasn’t all about technology, it was about relationship – about working with people. Effective design is about daring to be different – it’s a risk but the payoff can be well worth it. He stated that their are always 4 key considerations for any design project: start by understanding; keep it simple; do it differently and manage consistency.

It was an inspirational afternoon – good design is co-created with our clients so the relationship is very important to us. As well as our creativity we also bring fresh pair of eyes, which helps us see a client’s business from a customer perspective, which can help us create ways to communicate more effectively. It was good to hear the positive effect creative design can have on the public’s awareness and emotive response to an organisation. How many times have I had client’s show me a competitor’s literature and ask for ‘something along these lines’. It’s only human play safe but sometimes the greatest rewards come from taking a risk and doing things differently. As designers it’s important that we stay open to new ideas and ways of looking at things, and that we win the trust of our clients in order to deliver the best creative solutions for their business.