The editor of Top Estate magazine from the Ukraine is Lubov Franchuk., a sharp and professional editor of one of the leading life style magazine in the region. He just sent us a copy of the latest edition which features a wide selection of highly creative architecture and design from far flung places. The Miriello Grafico office is in between a spread on the Bordello Bar from London and Al Rostamani’s latest real estate mega development in Dubai.  Rich visuals throughout, and absolutely no idea what the stories might be about.

Share in the confusion at Top Estate’s website : http://www.top-estate.com.ua

Here’s what the AIGA website says about the 2008 365 Show which includes the Miriello Grafico new identity system (proudly):

“After careful and considered review of more than 4,700 entries, the jury of “365: AIGA Annual Design Competitions 29” selected a group of 255 examples of outstanding design produced in 2007.

The jury’s selections will be mounted as a public exhibition scheduled to open at the AIGA National Design Center in New York on December 10. The exhibit will travel across the country to AIGA chapters and student groups during 2009. In addition, selections become part of the AIGA Design Archives, a searchable visual database of exemplary design, are documented in 365: AIGA Year In Design 29, an annual print publication and the physical artifacts join the AIGA Design Archives at the Denver Art Museum.”

Take a look at the AIGA site at: http://aiga.org/

Whenever I start to think corporate branding is complex it helps me to spend time with my friends at Nissan Design America. Think of what it’s like trying to design what the world will want to drive three years from now while simultaneously navigating though a juggernaut of financial constraints, global approvals, huge lead times, world wide supply chains and fickle buyers. Corporate branding just got easier.

We spent the morning with Doug Wilson, Moria Hill and Brenda Parkin, members of the design and interiors team at Nissan. For several years now we’ve made it a point to get the hell out of our own minds and little design worlds and cross-pollinate together. This meeting was here at Miriello Grafico, set-up to give Brenda some initial reaction to preliminary car interiors packages - finishes, materials and forms. It’s really about branding in many ways- what’s the story behind the car and what are the design cues that bring the story to life. The difference for Nissan Design America though is that they’re designing from a design brief the size of an encyclopedia. It’s impressive to watch the reverse engineering of an automotive brand experience - using both a crystal ball and sketch pad.

The question was how to create a cool chronicle of Miriello Grafico creative design that was simple, dramatic and easy to update. The Miriello Grafico entry lounge needed a treatment and got one lately with a system made from throw-away key rings and cutout circles of images we’ve either created or collected over time. Press sheets, posters, collected Hatch Show prints, CROP magazine images, packaging proofs, pictures of Johnny Depp, Josh Higgins Casbah posters, photos proof sheets, Dennis Garcia AIGA posters, they all got carved up and took on a new life as a circle graphic in the MG Lounge.

Jumpstart Your Brand: Three guiding principles you can put to use now.

By Ron Miriello

Like the birth of new child, creating or refreshing a brand comes about only a few times in an organization’s lifetime. Conducting this initiative is usually done with high energy, self examination, excitement and a sense of a new or renewed company focus. But all too often, the brand can fall victim to high expectation with little or no ongoing care and support.

As shepherds of a company’s public presentation, marketers are usually responsible to guarantee that the brand’s upfront investment converts into improved business results. Branding often brings some weighty expectations and promises of everything from increased notoriety and improved customer retention to cost savings. Not at all uncommon, marketing budgets don’t include the care and feeding activities necessary to keep an organization’s public identity relevant and producing. Regardless of the resources available, here are three simple and cost-effective guiding principles that will help ensure a brand stays alive throughout the year. Read the full story at: http://www.bizsandiego.com/bizbuz-details-548.shtml

I like using the example of Sam Lucente, brand VP at HP, to help engineers and non-designer to understand more clearly how branding can work to provide direction and focus for a company. The consolidation of the plethora of button dashboards into one HP button configuration is all about brand recognition, customer familiarity and cost savings. Similar in many ways to other brand monikers such as the grill shape of BMW, the familiar pistol grip of a Nikon or the unique shape of a Weber grill. This graphic below, from Sam’s presentation, is a tight little tresses that requires no works to understand and appreciate.

Here’s an except from Fast Company magazine issue 119 in October 2007: The ponytailed Sam Lucente, who’d become HP’s first-ever vice president of design two years earlier, was in the hot seat. He flashed a slide that showed dozens of HP logos, each created by a different team within the company. The next slide was of a single logo, crafted by his corporate design crew, that could be used everywhere. Lucente predicted that when 500 million of the new “jewel” logos were shipped, the company would have saved roughly $50 million in development and manufacturing costs.

“Now,” replied the boss, “you’ve got my attention.”

Lucente argued that design could achieve equally impressive results with HP’s software, product controls, packaging, enterprise systems, even parts of its supply chain. He promised senior management what he now describes as “tens of millions” in additional savings. Hurd gave his backing to Lucente’s plan to ramp up the company wide design practice.

Read more about Sam Lucente and other brand related stories on this site: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/119/streamlining-hp.html

As we brainstormed the layout of our new office building, The Logan, our architect, Jonathan Segal said to me, “I’ll create the building as a blank canvas, you guys paint the canvas and make it your own.” Over a years time, we collected discarded channel-letters from sign makers throughout So. California. A piece of Jack-In-The-Box and Nextel signs from LA, old 40’s dry cleaners script and some Hooter’s letters from a sign maker in the desert near Indio, CA. Each letter was locked together into a new form and new purpose to create a kind of kid’s toy box of old letters. It has became our new office entry icon. Curiously, when we finished placing the last letter-form, there wasn’t one letter left unused.