eames wire chair

Really love the lines created in this image from just a few eames chairs. Also the bird is a nice touch.

JOHANNES ANDERSEN TABLE (1958 CF CHRISTENSEN SILKEBORG)

Could not find much on this table other than the designer and date of design. 

Playboy 1961 - Tops still on

I came across this image a while back and just had to post it the who's who of modernist design. From left to right George Nelson, Edward Wormley, Eero Saarinen, Harry Bertoia, Charles Eames and Jens Risom. The photo was taken in 1961 for Playboy magazine for an article entitled "Designs for living".

Dieter and Sam

Another example of styling similarities this time between Dieter Rams RT 20 tischsuper radio design in 1961 once again for Braun on the left and on the right Sam Hecht's second phone for MUJI from 2004.

Utilitarian design from Braun to MUJI

Following on from my Dieter Rams article I have chosen the above image to start the comparison between the work of Dieter and Naoto. In this image the left hand image is TP 1 radio/phono combination 1959 by Dieter Rams for Braun. The right hand image is of the Wall mounted CD player by Naoto Fukasawa for MUJI designed in 2000.

How to make an iPhone

IPhone development initial video to explain concept:



The final game produced:



"It starts with a wiki; the company keeps a collaborative site of all the ideas they have for upcoming games, and if the decision is made to go ahead with an idea, that wiki page branches out into the planning documents behind the eventual app. Concepts are drafted in sketches, conversations, and outlines, and eventually they feel like they have the idea "fully developed," at which point the game goes into a proposal pool, and then is eventually picked for production."

For further information check out Mike Schramm article here

Another list from Creative Review ages ago.

the last three are:

8. Keep it simple

9. Be Calm

10. Smile

Creative Review, originally uploaded by julian marshall sykes findings.

MUJI and BRAUN still making a splash

I came across this interview with Dieter Rams on the V&A collections website the other day and I have been meaning to post it for ages. Having recently been looking into MUJI and it's styling and history for a project I am currently working on, it is striking how similar the work of Dieter for Braun in the 50's and 60's is to Sam Hecht and Naoto Fukasawa's design has been for MUJI in recent times. Obviously they are based on very similar brand languages indeed I found Dieter's 10 commandments on the vitsoe website. For those who cant be bothered going on the site I wrote them here:

1. Good design is innovative

2. Good design makes a product useful

3. Good design is aesthetic

4. Good design helps a product to be understood

5. Good design is unobtrusive

6. Good design is honest

7. Good design is durable

8. Good design is through to the last detail

9. Good design is concerned with the environment

10. Good design is as little design as possible

I am going to post some images in the next few days to hopefully show the similarity in the next few days.

News and how we become the broadcaster.

Michael Surtees, the man behind DesignNotes, recently posted an interesting piece on new media’s role in delivering breaking news.

"Thinking about it now, the speed of events was pretty crazy. Within an hour and half I had learned that a plane had landed in the Hudson River, saw images within minutes of it happening, watched the rescue live, hearing survivors being interviewed soon after, and by the time it was over knowing that everyone was going to live – I was listening to music from A Flock Of Seagulls. All the tools that I used to get more info was available to anyone out there which was kind of cool in itself."

It is quite interesting to me as it is very similar to thoughts I had previously about people now being journalists and being johnny on the spot if you like. It follows on from an blog I wrote about fifth element a good few months ago. In the film there is a guy who is a famous journalist who is almost always live broadcasting what is happening to him and who he is meeting. Following on from that with the advent of camera phones and the like people are now becoming the journalist of our generation.

Another example of this would be the Oscar nominated documentary trouble the water about how a group of people stayed behind to film the storm that ripped through New Orleans a few years ago.

Barbers - Christmas day - Goa

Lovely ELY

Rich simpson - Strong is not the word

Lamborghini shoes

Following on from some of Carwyn's recent blogs I thought these were great fun. I came across them on Dinosaurs and Robots blog. I don't believe they are really but a nice bit of fun either way.

Pop up shops required

Saw this piece in Design Week recently. Ethical shoe retailer Terra Plana is seeking designers to help create a series of pop-up shops. Starting this year, Terra Plana hopes to open pop-up shops across the world, beginning in London.

The company says it is seeking ‘creative ideas and approaches, centred around sustainable, mobile, short-term shop design’, according to a statement.

It adds that it is seeking designers who ‘are able to produce imaginative retail solutions to a limited budget’.
Terra Plana opened its latest permanent store at Westfield last autumn, co-designed by furniture and product design group Hotcakes and Terra Plana’s head shoe designer Asher Clark.

It reminds me of the Japanese stores that spring up every now and again in Tokyo.

Twitter joins top 100 - trebling it's traffic in one month

Robin Goad from Hitwise reports Twitter last month dropped into the top 100 visited websites "Last week Twitter became one of the 100 most visited websites in the UK for the first time. It ranked 91st, placing above online heavyweights such as Expedia UK (96), Gumtree (100), easyJet (101), Digital Spy (103) and Money Supermarket (105)."

Canadian Drink Driving TV advert

WARNING GRAPHIC CONTENT!!

Amnesty International Advertising Campaign

A great piece from Saatchi & Saatchi Highlighting Human rights in Belarus.

Subway swing

Fun idea see more details here

blue is the colour

Blue is the colour for creativity according to a recent study by a Canadian team. Red has a different no less interesting effect. Making people concentrate. The scientists from the university of British Colombia's findings have been published in Journal Science.

durex toys

Free coffee for all

For full story click here

Rocklands South Africa - Oral Office

I really like movement and composition of this piece of climbing footage. Music is pretty good as well.

Love this.

Pizza anybody

A great piece of advertising by the Economist see full story at the cool hunting website

Composite Karabiner

A lightweight composite carabiner for rock climbing - will it work? from Virgil Scott on Vimeo.

New Website

Well it has taken us some time but we have finally got our new website up and running. We have tried to make it much more informative this time around. See what you think at www.hoffi.com 

The site is very much in line with our current thinking of concentrating on our core products of branding, brand communications and digital. We hope you all enjoy the new site and find something of interest. We will be uploading new projects on the website very soon.

India - Mumbai rush hour