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Ben
London
I am Group Design Director at the Co-operative Group. I am also Governor of University of the Arts London, an advisor to the London Design Festival and an angel investor in Bowndling and Cavendish Keble. I founded and recently sold Newspaper Club. I have won numerous awards including the Design Museum's Design of the Year and a D&AD Black Pencil.
Interests: design
Recent Activity
Might blog every day in August
That's a silly idea isn't it? In the old days we used to shut for August. Once upon a time we had guest bloggers in August. Anyway. Continue reading
Posted yesterday at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Underground overground Tom wouldn't have been free
I made a special trip to see the Camberwell submarine the other day. It's not a submarine nor is it an air vent for a Tube line. It's actually ventilation shafts for boilers that heat two council estates nearby. I... Continue reading
Posted 2 days ago at Noisy Decent Graphics
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George Michael AirPods
I love a bit of personalisation. I was 16 when this came out, listened to it on repeat. Still do. Thank you George. Continue reading
Posted 5 days ago at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Morning Cedric
In response to My Captain. I was in a cafe, early, the other morning. Overlooking the sea. A man walked in and the owner said, "Morning Cedric, welcome to paradise". Continue reading
Posted 6 days ago at Noisy Decent Graphics
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More typography - some nice 3D signage
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Posted Mar 31, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Postcards by David Gentleman RDI
Bought this wonderful box of postcards by the brilliant David Gentleman. All scenes from central London. This is Russell Square, I thought I was stood in the right place but actually I needed to step back about 10 meters and... Continue reading
Posted Mar 30, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Lovely old signage revealed
About time we had a bit of typography on this blog. Might do some more. I'm a particular fan of those 3D painted letters. Continue reading
Posted Mar 28, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Top shop to let
I knew Top Shop had gone bust but I hadn't been past the shop on Oxford Street until last week. Odd to see the huge retail presence in the centre of Oxford Circus with a 'to let' sign. Even weirder... Continue reading
Posted Mar 28, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Complicated opening times
There's got to be a better way of doing this. Continue reading
Posted Mar 28, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Digital services so good people prefer to use them
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In the very early days of GDS we used to do lots of presentations to explain the benefits of digital for government. Government is very big (c400,000 people) and there's no easy way to reach them all so we traipsed... Continue reading
Posted Mar 14, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Pandemic Graphics Archive
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Remember back in August when I mused that in the old days there would have been loads of blogging about the covid graphics. Thought not. Anyway someone's gone and done exactly that. Pandemic Graphics Archive. Continue reading
Posted Feb 4, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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35 blog posts last year
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Posted Feb 2, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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20th anniversary of Break Down
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20 years ago this month Michael Landy did an Art called Break Down. He took all of his possessions, all 7,227 of them, and destroyed them, broke them down. Lisa and I went to the show which was in the... Continue reading
Posted Jan 31, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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A nice simple logo, for a change
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Shall we do a post about logos for old times sake? Here is the first logo I've seen in years that made me stop. The first one I've thought it's actually worth commenting on. It's for a company called Nix... Continue reading
Posted Jan 12, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Essential language
Remember in 1999 when everything got renamed to millennium something, Millennium Food & Wine, Millennium Pizza, Millennium Barbers and so on. I swear this shop was just called General Store a few weeks ago. I wonder if this is because... Continue reading
Posted Jan 10, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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The big boss shows us how it's done
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Long time listeners will know that I've been doing a sketch every day 3 or 4 days for a while now. During remote working finding interesting subject matter is hard. I like drawing buildings and people sat in meetings and... Continue reading
Posted Jan 7, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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RE: Stay at home, come on air
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In reference to Russell's excellent post 'Stay at home, come on air' over on the Typepad platform. Yes, I completely agree and I would like to add that it has the additional benefit of seeing people in their homes, offices... Continue reading
Posted Jan 5, 2021 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Recent Royal Designer talks and interviews
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Video Here's a video of a talk I did with Michael Marriott a few weeks back. You may not think our work is similar but we talked about the "boring magic" in designing every day things. I enjoyed it a... Continue reading
Posted Dec 13, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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4 mins of Tony Hart brilliance
Two of my favourite things. Art and the subject of this picture. All in 4 minutes! Enjoy a few relaxing minutes of the great Tony Hart drawing with pastels, on Hartbeat #onthisday in 1987. pic.twitter.com/LrZRYrBqrC — BBC Archive (@BBCArchive) December... Continue reading
Posted Dec 5, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Drawing of a tree, next to a tree.
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Posted Nov 8, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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RDI Insights talk Tuesday night
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I'm doing a talk with fellow RDI Michael Marriott on Tuesday night. It's free and virtual and you can sign up here. The evening is called Boring Magic and I think there is something of that in both our work.... Continue reading
Posted Nov 6, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Nice design for a pharmacist sign
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Posted Oct 29, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Work news
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In case you don't read Twitter or LinkedIn. Hi Phil. Public Digital has joined the kyu Collective. Continue reading
Posted Oct 13, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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Warhol at Tate Modern
Russell, don't bother. You neither Phil. Went to see Warhol at Tate Modern on Saturday, err, night. It was ok. Not enough famous stuff for me, but maybe I'm too mainstream. Anyway 15yo liked it very much which was a... Continue reading
Posted Oct 13, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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D&AD Presidency - why I'm making space for others
I love D&AD and I've always been a passionate supporter. I wanted to win the coveted Black Pencil from when I was young and I've wanted to be D&AD President for as long as I can remember. Today I should... Continue reading
Posted Oct 9, 2020 at Noisy Decent Graphics
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