It was January. 1984. And I heard these three songs. Feels like Heaven by Fiction Factory, What Difference Does It Make by The Smiths and The Killing Moon by Echo and the Bunnymen.

It’s the year that I discovered music. Music. MUSIC!!! A journey that would take me along many twists and turns over the next couple of decades. But that’s another blog on another day.

This was a year that featured great music by The Smiths, Echo & The Bunnymen, David Sylvian, U2, Howard Jones and others. A year that started with Relax and ended with Band Aid at number 1.

What other year can boast greats such as Holiday by Madonna, 99 Red Balloons by Nena, I feel for you by Chaka Khan, New Song by Howard Jones, Together in Electric Dreams by Giorgio Moroder with Philip Oakey, or When doves Cry by Prince? The list goes on… Wouldn’t it be good by Nik Kershaw. Nelson Mandela by the Special AKA. Wood Beez by Scritti Politti. The Reflex by Duran Duran. Master & Servant by Depeche Mode. Madam Butterfly by Malcolm Mclaren.

And that’s just the throwaway singles. What about the albums?

Sparkle in the rain, Simple Minds
The Smiths, The Smiths
The Works, Queen
It’s my life, Talk Talk
Human’s Lib, Howard Jones
Cafe Blue , the Style Council
Junk Culture, OMD
Ocean Rain, Echo & The Bunnymen
Born in the USA, Bruce Springsteen
Purple Rain, Prince
Briliant Trees, David Sylvian
Some Great Reward, Depeche Mode
Rattlesnakes, Lloyd Cole & The Commotions
Alf, Alison Moyet
Treasure, The Cocteau Twins

What a year. It was also the year that Torvill & Dean won gold at the Winter Olympics, Liverpool won the League Championship (hurray!), Michael Jackson burned his hair filming a Pepsi ad, the Soviet Union boycotted the Olympics, the top grossing movie was Ghostbusters, and it was the year of the Miners’ strikes.

Don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of other great years in music. 1967, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. 1987, The Joshua Tree. 1997, OK Computer. 1965, Otis Blue. Too many to mention. But 1984 is the year that does it for me.

And you know what? I’m actually being serious. Next time you see me walking around town with my headphones in, you know what I’ll be listening to!

Growing up in North Wales in the ’70′s and 80′s, in the pre-internet, pre-satellite TV days, my exposure to iconic design was limited to say the least. Since an early age I was obsessed with drawing & design, and I have to say my youth was mis-spent only on the endless hours I spent honing my sketching skills (whilst listening to indie music and The Beatles in equal measures)…

Designers or artists who inspired me, for different reasons, were Terence Conran, Andy Warhol, David Hockney, David Byrne of the Talking Heads, some of Corbijn’s early images and videos for U2 and Depeche Mode, and I loved the graphic simplicity of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum and its visuals.

Why Terence Conran? Mainly because of the early Habitat furniture designs, the simplicity, and the early Habitat ethos of design for the masses.

Andy Warhol because of the graphic simplicity of his art from the ’60′s – the iconic imagery he used – an early observation of the brand-driven society that the world would become? And offering 15 minutes of fame to a boy from North Wales? Wow.

David Hockney, an artist with a graphic, almost impressionist, style of painting. And a creator of a set of works which was a great inspiration – the photocollages. He was also an early advocate of using the computer to draw with… Some kind of 80′s paintbox if I remember. Something he still does now in fact, utilising the iPhone and iPad.

All of these people inspired me  – could I become a car designer, a computer games designer, a commercial artist? A painter? A set designer? A graphic designer?

Frequent visits to the Oriel Galley in Llandudno, The Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool, school trips to London and visits to the National Gallery were also a great source of inspiration and ideas.

So, there you go. No Nevile Brody. No David Carson. No obvious ‘graphic design’ choices in there.

I always tried to look beyond the ‘obvious’…

And I’m the same now. I get my inspiration these days from people like Chase Jervis, Anton Corbijn, Living Etc, Elle Decoration, Grand Designs, architects like Norman Foster. But that’s all for a different conversation. And a future blog…

© Copyright belongs to the image creator, Andy Warhol

If you were commissioning a solicitor to do the conveyancing on your house move, would you ask them to do half a day’s free work to see if they were right for you?

Would you ask a builder to build part of the extension so you can check out their work before you commit? Would you do the same with your dentist?

We certainly don’t take goods from a shop and as we’re leaving shout ‘I’ll pay you later if I like this item’!

Any kind of consultancy work which a business commissions or purchases has to be relevant to that business. It has to be tailored to its individual requirements. In my opinion it’s not possible to have an hour’s meeting with a potential client and come back a few days later with speculative concepts. They wouldn’t mean a thing.

Any designer can come up with a few ‘pretty’ logos. But that’s not what branding is about.

Every brand identity, or logo, or corporate identity, whatever you want to call it, should be tailored to meet the requirements of the company or organisation which it represents. It should reflect the Mission Statement, the Values. It should engage with customers, potential customers, with employees. It should stand out. Be different. It should be legible. Memorable.

It should also add value to a business.

Which in turn means that the work has value.

A business or organisation which develops their branding or graphic design in the correct way will ensure that they get the best results first time – and like anything in life, that usually means that you pay the going rate! If you don’t get it right first time, you’ll need to start again. Which costs time, which costs money.

That’s why at Carl Jones Design we don’t do ‘speculative’ design work – instead we offer a free initial meeting where we’re happy to discuss your requirements, with no time limit.

So we don’t agree with free pitching. So please don’t ask. Then we can’t offend you by saying no!

I was a Design Director at a London brand consultancy, we were commissioned to develop a name, brand identity and campaign concept for an internal communication programme, aimed at implementing a culture change within the organisation.

So, we set about our research. We got to know the company, we got to know the team involved (including the above mentioned Director – and that involved a few lunches!), we got to know their market, their competitors, we interviewed many members of staff. This enabled us to write our brief.

Armed with all of this information, myself and the design team set about developing concepts and themes for the project. As usual, no stone was left unturned, all areas and concepts considered… We developed a range of 4 concepts, each with a strategic message at the core…

Concepts were tweaked, finalised and prepared for presentation, mounted onto presentation boards (yes, this was 12 years ago) and we were ready.

Come the big day, we turn up to present to the marketing director and his team. Lots of discussion, run through the concepts several times.

A decision is made (by the Marketing director, he said he liked to be decisive)… The concept chosen used two of the company’s brand colors, blue and black, with a new colour – pink. Brave choice. But that was one of the reasons he chose that particular concept. Or so he said. Anyway…

We went away, refined the concepts, met again a week later to get final sign-off.

‘I’ve got a problem’ said Mr Marketing & Communications Director… ‘I really like what we’ve chosen but I’ve shown the concept to my wife… and… err… she doesn’t like pink… Can we go for the second choice concept please..?’

My message? – be decisive, be bold and believe in your design team’s judgement and work – that’s what you pay them for.

Happy 5th Birthday to Arts Award! To mark their celebrations in style we have created invitations, banners and brochures using the striking Arts Award colour theme.

Back in July we showed you a new logo for this wonderful Company and mentioned a website; well now you can take a look at the stylish design and all that Synergy & Strategy have to offer… www.synergyandstrategy.co.uk

We were asked to design a postcard to advertise the exciting new Archery facility at Eaton Manor…

We recently created a new brand image for Synergy and Strategy; stationery has just been produced and a new website is in the pipeline!

We recently completed the rebrand of the Wenlock Spring plastic bottles, to go alongside our award winning designs for the glass bottles…