Portfolio review with Airside!

As I mentioned before, I'm going to be exhibiting at D&AD New Blood next week. That in itself is pretty damn exciting, but my tutor also told me that they'd be booking me in for a portfolio review with an art director/someone in the industry/person. I got an email today saying that my Review will be with Chris Rain, who is one of the Senior Designers at Airside. So exciting... I did a little girly squeal when I read it actually, I love Airside's work and they've cropped up in sketchbooks of mine here and there. I can't wait! :D

One of my favourite projects they've done is the Identity for Airplot, a Greenpeace initiative where they've bought a piece of land right where the proposed 3rd runway for Heathrow is going to go. Which means they can't build it, if Greenpeace have got anything to do with it. It's a great cause and I love the identity for it:
Taken from their blog post: "In 2008 Greenpeace secretly bought a plot of land within Heathrow’s proposed expansion zone and asked Airside to develop an identity that would be able to weather the storms of what could be a very long, unpredictable and difficult protest. With the need for clear communication amongst fast changing circumstances, Airside’s goal was to create an identity that would stretch much further than a single logo. Greenpeace’s latest campaign would have to communicate many different things to many different people and considering Airplot’s abstract form of protest, Airside made a conscious decision to make what needs to be communicated central to the identity. A volatile campaign such as this needed a language."

What I also love is this post here, which explains the process behind creating the logotype, sketches that sort of thing.


Cardboard stamps, printed then scanned in. Sooo simple but looks great. I love this kind of thing - reminds me that I need to experiment with printing so much more.

They've also done...

Title sequences for The No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency, on BBC

TV adverts for Virgin Trains (with the hoppy frogs and 'big train' music.... we all know this one)

A series of short films to demonstrate Fiat's new eco:Drive technology

and... (weirdly/coincidentally) the Identity and interior for Wolverhampton Art Gallery's new Pop Art gallery. I didn't actually know that. This was a big deal when it opened for the city, I remember being bombarded with those pop stickers in 1st year. It's actually had some pretty amazing stuff in there so far, I'm not a huuuge fan of Pop Art (take it or leave it, me) but for lil' ol' Wolvo, it's quite spesh.

All of these images are from Airside's website and so copyright is theirs, obviously.

So yeah, pretty excited/scared/humbled to be having a Portfolio Review with someone who is part of a design studio I admire so much. Better make sure my portfolio is as good as it can be, now. Which reminds me I need to go and pick it up from Uni tomorrow so I can work on it a bit. So much to do....

I'm also going to be attending 8x8 on 1st July as I'll already be in London for D&AD so making the most of it! One of the members of Airside will be giving a talk there too, as will 7 other design-type-people, like Matt Dent (who designed the new coins, surely you know that), Alex Bec & Will Hudson from HudsonBec, and each will be speaking for 8 minutes. Hence 8x8 :) I'm looking forward to that too, should be fast, intense and inspiring! Like it.

I sense a lot of blog posts next week.