Partner Steff Geissbuhler’s early work in Switzerland for the pharmaceutical firm Geigy is currently featured in both an exhibition and a book. The exhibition, Good Design, Good Business, Schweizer Grafik und Werbung für Geigy 1940-1970 (Swiss Graphic Design and Advertising for Geigy), is currently on view at the Museum of Design in Zurich. The accompanying book, Corporate Diversity – Swiss Graphic Design and Advertising by Geigy, 1940-1970 (Lars Müller Publishers), is on sale now. Fan of Swiss design? See a short film on the exhibit here (caution: narration in Swiss German).
Here are more images from the book, and a few rare scans from Steff’s own archive from the early years:
Partner Steff Geissbuhler is featured in today’s St. Petersburg (Florida) Times, giving his professional opinion about the new visual identity for Recovery.gov. Steff “likes how the colors work together” but is otherwise, well, “outspoken”. Read the full article here.
C&G Partners has created a new brand identity for the Greater Hudson Heritage Network, an organization for heritage professionals. The mark projects both the historical nature of the membership and the future potential of the organization. As requested by our client, the logo also deliberately avoids overused regional imagery and colors: no river, no boats, no waves, and no maps of New York State.
The design team explored a range of icons, insignia and symbols, and came to the conclusion that a wordmark was the most appropriate way of communicating the name. The four words are typeset to be the same length, and arranged to read both as the full name and as the secondary vertical pairings ‘Greater Heritage’ and ‘Hudson Network’.
Just in time for Washington’s Birthday, AKA President’s Day, C&G Partners has designed the guide for a new walking tour entitled “George Washington’s New York.” Created for the National Parks of New York Conservancy with support from The History Channel and the Alliance for Downtown New York, the walking tour guide features numerous rare historical images from the Fraunces Tavern Museum and New-York Historical Society.
The design team was led by partner and George Washington fan Steff Geissbuhler.
C&G Partners has a long tradition of hosting traveling groups from design schools in our office, so that they can see what we do and what it’s like to work here. We get a lot out of it too: the perspective of students from around the country, and around the world, helps to keep us on our toes. Today, partner Steff Geissbuhler spoke to a group from Buckinghamshire New University in England, led by senior lecturer John Hazlewood, about his thoughts on design.
We frequently host student groups; last week we met a group of students from Northampton University, London. We asked our new Buckinghamshire friends today if it was as cold in the UK as it is here at the moment, and the answer was a resounding “no.” Sorry about that!
The Grand Opening at the Darien Public Library continues, with a popular new lecture series and other special events, all featuring the line of printed materials (and brand identity) crafted by C&G Partners. A full set of the materials produced so far arrived in our office this week:
Gone are the laminated library cards of the past: the C&G team, led by partner Steff Geissbuhler, designed a library card for today’s fast-paced lifestyle. Miniaturized to keyring size, it allows patrons to check out their books with a quick swipe (center right in the image above).
C&G Partners has created a logo designed to be in continuous movement. The original logo for Argentinian broadcaster Artear was designed in 1994 by C&G Partners’ Steff Geissbuhler with Henricus Kusbiantoro at Chermayeff & Geismar Inc. Like the flag of Argentina, the original logo was inspired by the Argentinian sun, but made of interlocking elements around an open center. In the ensuing years, Artear grew to operate numerous channels and cable stations, and needed a new brand architecture for all their properties. Time had also come to change the official name of the flagship, Canal 13 (Channel 13), to its nickname, El Trece (The Thirteen).
Artear returned to Steff in 2008 for some new thinking, a refresh of the brand identity and a new brand architecture for their many subsidiaries. Because most people experience the identity during a broadcast, not in static form, the reinvented mark was built to be in continuous, elegant motion. First, a three-dimensional take on the original mark was modeled:
Tonight on PBS: Helvetica, the eye-opening documentary by Gary Hustwit and cinematographer Luke Geissbuhler (son of partner Steff Geissbuhler), about the typeface of the same name. Luke is not only family, he has also been behind the camera for some of our projects. Check your local listings and learn more here.
On a related note, the next design documentary by Hustwit, Objectified, also with cameraman Luke Geissbuhler, will be released in Spring 2009. More about Luke’s role on this new film about product design here. The new trailer via YouTube:
The new Darien Library, one of the top 10 small libraries in the nation, opens this Saturday, January 10th, with an all-new identity and signage by C&G Partners. For more information about the opening events, click here.
In 2007, C&G Partners went to the White House for lunch. The sitting First Lady is always designated the chair of the National Design Awards given by the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, and the firm was a finalist that year in the Communication Design category.
Next week, Steff Geissbuhler will speak on the subject of “Making and Leaving a Mark” at the ninth annual DesignThinkers 2008 conference in Toronto.
From designthinkers.com: Steff explores the thinking behind the creation of a logo, trademark or visual vocabulary and the many forms and personalities an identity can take on. Using his work as examples, Steff will discuss the problems of designing for other countries and languages as well as branding, establishing and projecting a personality, appropriateness and mission, international problems, working for government, media, cultural and nonprofit clients.
Billed as an “annual journey into the creative process and a celebration of strategic design thinking,” the DesignThinkers conference is hosted every year by RGD Ontario, the Association of Registered Graphic Designers of Ontario.
C&G is featured in the new book Museum Design 2009, published in the UK by Heritage 365. The volume contains both an article written by partner Jonathan Alger on “museumless” projects, and a portfolio section containing a wide range of firm exhibit design projects. The portfolio features the work of all the partners of the firm.
From AGI Chicago: On September 23-28, 2008, over 1000 of the world’s top designers, students, educators and graphic arts professionals will converge in Chicago for the 2008 AGI Congress and AGI Student Conference. Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI) will bring their annual Congress to America for only the third time in fifty years. Billed as the global design event of 2008, the event will present lectures, exhibitions, and a host of unique interactions with the world’s most notable leaders from the design profession. The student program invites students and design educators from throughout the world to engage in a variety of lectures, special programs, workshops and exhibitions. AGI members will participate in side-by-side activities with the attendees, sharing knowledge, practical insights and hands-on instruction.
More about AGI worldwide here. See you in Chicago.
This week, Rockport Publishers released Masters of Design: Logos and Identity. The book profiles twenty well known designers, including C&G Partners co-founder Steff Geissbuhler. The profiles “are not only inspirational, but they provide real-world advice and support designers can use in their projects.”
The book was (well) put together by Sean Adams and Noreen Morioka of AdamsMorioka.
Next week, Steff Geissbuhler will speak about the firm’s new brand identity for the Greater Hudson Heritage Network at the annual conference of the American Association of State and Local History (AASLH). Steff’s lecture will be on Friday, September 12, 2008 in Rochester, New York.
Steff is delighted to speak at AASLH. The organization gave C&G Partners three separate honors in 2007 for the “John Adams Unbound” exhibit at the Boston Public Library: the Award of Merit, a “WOW” Award from the Leadership in History Awards Committee, and a “We, the People” special designation.
Steff has been invited to become the ADC Design Sphere Jury Chair for ADC‘s 88th Annual Awards Competition.
From ADC: ADC’s longstanding goals are to elevate the best and to encourage and inspire both working creative professionals and those who are entering the field … the ADC Design Sphere is awarded to a body of work produced for a single client by a design firm. Unlike other categories, work entered for
Sphere may have been produced over a period of years; this award will elevate the greatest overall sustained execution. Winning work should not only successfully convey a powerful, consistent and meaningful message to end-users; it should also inspire the next generation of designers.
Congratulations, Steff, and good luck to next year’s Design Sphere entrants.
Steff Geissbuhler was just interviewed in TAXI. In the interview, he shares some of his philosophy about branding, design, mergers and a few other things. Along the way, TAXI kindly calls Steff “one of the industry’s most established veterans on branding” and suggests that he has been “helping to ‘invent the entire category’ of corporate identity.” Read the whole article here.
