Fictive party icons

Most parties in Sweden use flowers as an icon. How the established Swedish parties icons looks like are well know in Sweden.

The creative company Fabel Kommunikation, has created a game for The Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SALAR). It is a role-play game. The participants play representatives from different political parties and their task is to govern a fictive municipalities.


Unna design has co-operated with Fabel Kommunikation in several projects and we were assigned to do the graphic design. Here are a few examples of characters cards. Different colours and different fictive icons (flowers) make up the cover for each in the game. On the back the graphic design associate to the Swedish ballot paper being used in Swedish elections even though we used another font (A font from SALAR' s graphic manual).

Burned out car

Ice cream vendor in Copenhagen

Vespa

From the start it was a quite dull photo of a house façade and the shadow of a vespa. Then it became something else, it has a nice comic feel.

I love vector graphics

On the Internet I have found many cool free fonts. I used some of them in my design. A colleague told me about http://www.iheartvector.com/ and there was plenty of cool stuff and some for free. I got so inspired and during my Eastern Holiday I took photos in a forest. This is my first attempt trying to make cool vector graphics. The image is still in progress, there are some minor adjustments to do, and the final result will show up in a few days.

Tuc-Tuc

Forget seatbelts. Forget airbags and a comfortable ride.
Tell your three year old and four year old to hold on to daddy or mammy.
"Please don't lean out of the windows."
"There are no windows daddy".
"I wish there was, so please, SIT DOWN!!!"

We experienced no incidents with tuc-tucs. We enjoyed each of the many rides. Also we saw many cool tuc-tucs. I'm not sure but I think the photo was taken in Trang (Thailand).

A downtrodden place (Hornstull, Stockholm)

This photo was taking at Hornstull (Stockholm) near our office at Unna design. It was one of several first sketches for the artwork for the Susa Duo CD debut. I don’t know if the still play but the duo was made up by Linda Edsjö (vibraphone and Marimba) and Christina Larsson (vocals). There are many great melodies and harmonies on the CD. The music tends sometimes to Swedish folk music, sometimes jazz and other times to art music. Some of the song are really heart racking and it’s almost impossible note to associate the music to beautiful natures and fairy tail worlds. But I didn’t want to follow clichés. Instead I wanted the cover and booklet to be in an urban context. One reason for that was that both the musicians by that time lived in Copenhagen. So I looked for downtrodden places where I later could take photos of Linda and Christina. This was one of the places I found. Then I made the collage, letting the nature in form of tree make a shadow on the walls.
None of my first sketches did show up in the end. Instead the talented photographer Adam Haglund was involved and took many great photos.

You can se some of the final result at www.unna.se/Sidor/cd.htm

Noodles

I’m often restless.
A few egg noodles were left after a dinner and there were also a clean plate at the table. I often tell my children not to play with food while eating. But this Japanese inspired nonsense text was made after dinner so I guess it’s was OK.

Museo my new friend

My colleague disapproved my first choices of fonts for the graphic design for the exhibition “Smal” (“Thin”, read more at www.arbetetsmuseum.se).
I realized that we needn’t a font which could be associated with fashion and youth, but also a font that wasn’t too strict. I spend time searching the Internet and reading MyFonts newsletter. And then suddenly I saw the font I was looking for, Museo. I fell in love at first sight. It was truly inspiring to use the font.

Jos Buivenga designed Museo. Thanks for a beautiful font!

Travel abroad VII (Indian Ocean)

Imagine that you only could travel abroad once in your lifetime?
Where would you go? Sail in the Indian Ocean?

Travel abroad VI (Andalusia, Spain)

Imagine that you only could travel abroad once in your lifetime?
Where would you go? Andalusia?

Travel abroad V (Thailand)

Imagine that you only could travel abroad once in your lifetime?
Where would you go? Go for a bus trip in Thailand?

Pushing the limits | Museum of World Culture

Today I visited Museum of World Culture in Gothenburg in order to take a look at the exhibition Pushing the Limits that Unna design created. The exhibition opened in September 2007 but I was unable to participate. So today, two days before the closing I finally saw what my colleague Anna Edsjö and I created. I was thrilled and proud

In the exhibition Pushing the limits young activists in conflict areas talk about the conditions for young women and how the like to change the society. Pushing the limits is aimed at anyone who is interested in issues surrounding activism and feminism.

Pushing the limits is a travelling exhibition and next place will be Umeå (Sweden).
Hopefully many more museums want to show this important and exiting exhibition. Our client was The Kvinna till Kvinna Foundation which supports women's organising in conflict regions.

Travel abroad IV (London)

Imagine that you only could travel abroad once in your lifetime?
Where would you go? London?

Travel abroad III (Unguja, Zanzibar)

Or is the Island Unguja your choice?

Travel abroad II (Fårö)

If you're not from Sweden than maybe Fårö, a small island near the big island Gotland, could be the once-in-a-lifetime-place to visit.

Travel abroad I (Rome)

Imagine that you only could travel abroad once in your lifetime?
Where would you go?

Logotype

Logotype for the exhibition Smal opening in March 2009 at Arbetets museum in Norrköping, Sweden.
Unna design is currently working with an exciting exhibition project about the ideals of beauty and how it affects young people. The content, research and ideas for the exhibitions come from young people from four different cities in Sweden.
Our role has been to help them develop their design ideas, outline the planning for the exhibition and making the graphic design. Smal (thin) is a travelling exhibition.

All those designers dressed in black

“It’s impossible to find black clothes for my child”.
I’m told that a famous Swedish furniture designer once said this. He is of course most often seen in public wearing black clothing, like many other designers and architects in Sweden. In the design world that’s cool and safe. Then it might be a problem if your child likes to dress in a colorful way, not to mention clothes with all kind of childish patterns.

I once asked my son, (at the time six-years old), to wear black trousers with thin grey stripes for a wedding. He protested, saying: “I don’t want to look like an old man”. And he totally refused the black shoes I had bought him, despite my exiting voice saying: “Daddy bought very cool shoes for you!”

“It’s shoes for grown-ups.I will never use those”, he answered. He was really offended. I had to buy him a pair of red shoes, and then he accepted to wear the trousers for the wedding, but never after that. He loves his gold trousers, glitter shirts and his shirt with a big Asian inspired dragon print.

And what about me? Well, I have to be honest. There are some black and grey shirts and trousers in my wardrobe, even though I really like bright colors. Like my son, all my favorite garments are colorful or full of patterns.

Wabash Street, Chicago, Illinois

Ages ago I studied music at Roosevelt University. Wabash Street was one of my favorite spots.

Swedish arms exports

Sweden with a tiny population of about 9 million people is today the world’s eighth largest arms exporter. Four years ago I designed a folder about the Swedish arms export. It been up-dated once and now it is also published in English.

A quote from the folder:
“But maintaining a leading role in the international arms market is not without its share of consequences. To be precise, there are four: Swedish arms help fuel wars and conflicts, contribute to violations of ­human rights, contribute to poverty and strengthen dictatorships.”

Our clients are four Swedish NGO:s: Amnesty Sweden, Diakonia, Swedish Fellowship of Reconciliation, Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society.

Back to work

Back to work after more than two weeks vacation. Most of the day I have been sketching on graphic design for an exhibition. And my wife and colleague has been busy with the planning.