Last week we finally launched the new website for 'Kastanievej Efterskole' - a Copenhagen based independent boarding school for lower secondary students. Its been a long process of defining the new framework for the website, developing the information flow, designing, programming and finally introducing the teachers to the new website where everybody contributes to a dynamic site.
Stagis developed identity design and the schools first website 10 years ago, this is only their second site, which we hope will last for many years - if not 10 - less can make it as well!
Kastanievej is one of our oldest clients, why its been important to create a product that corresponds to their needs as well as challenge how they use their website as a tool for communication. One of the new features on the site, is a 'daily life' news stream where every teacher contributes with notes, pictures, movies and sound from their daily work with the students. The news will be directed to relevant pages on the site and create a vivid website, reflecting the colorful life at the boarding school.
The new website evolve the identity design as well as keeping the old spirit of the chestnut leaf which is the characteristic symbol for Kastanievej!

The last few weeks has been the first, in my new position as both a member of the Stagis team and as a master student in London. I had the privilege to be accepted at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design’s MA in Communication Design. The school is located in Clerkenwell and Holborn in the center of London and is a part of University of the Arts London. The course is focused on developing designers who question and develop the communication design scene, work with concept developments and problem solving instead of focusing on particular practices.

And how does being in London match with me still working as a designer at Stagis? During the week I will be in close contact with the colleagues at the office in Copenhagen, and I try to be present at the office as often as possible, in order to work on projects and stay in touch with clients. In the meantime I work from London, with the kind help from Skype and other technology wonders, which makes it possible for us to maintain our work processes and work as we use to!

Of course being both a student and a professional requires a hole lot of time, and the work load will probably be a bit more that I’m used to, but as this an amazing opportunity for me to develop my practical and theoretical design skills, I’m convinced it's worth the work. Central Saint Martins is considered one of the best design universities, and I already had the pleasure to be enriched by interesting lectures and skilled tutors. 
The shaky image above is from one of the lecture hall’s: To thine own self be true – a Shakespeare quote I used to see every day on the wall at Stagis.

Study focus
My major interest and motivation to do a master, is to study the relation between theory and practice related to identity design. At Stagis we always investigate the indicators of authentic organizational identity before we develop identity design. At Central Saint Martins I will focus my studies towards the way we map or survey the identity, and then how the collected data is transformed to a concrete design proposal. The particular process of mapping and translation is in my opinion a very interesting and important phase of the design process, and I’m aiming towards improving myself as a designer and this area in particular.

We have been working on the book cover for 'The Authentic Company', coming out in 2011 in Danish and in 2012 internationally. Here is a shot from Annes screen I took the other day. The hardcover has a black and white pattern illustrating boxes. At the center of the front page you'll see boxes within boxes - because there are layers underneath the surface of the company that you have to explore in order to find the authenticity of the company. I've just finished chapter 14 which means I'm working on the last four chapters of the manuscript while the editor at Gyldendal is outlining words with red marker in the first 13 chapters...

If you like patterns, check out the Patternity blog "seeing pattern everywhere" on www.patternity.co.uk

Municipality of Copenhagen wants to raise the traffic safety between so-called ”soft” and ”hard” road users to get less injuries in the busy metropolis. And as Stagis has worked a lot with different institutions and organizations in regard to traffic and safety as well as the bus industry of Greater Copenhagen we seemed to be the obvious choice to partner with. This work has led to a collaboration with Department of Traffic within the municipality of Copenhagen. The Department of Traffic wishes to create a better dialogue between the different road users, in order to obtain more safety and less conflicts on the busy streets of Copenhagen. During the summer, the Stagis team has developed, written and designed a new magazine targeted at the ’professional’ road users, namely the busdrivers of the city.

Part of the concept is, that there is a busdriver involved in every story, giving different contemplations about safety. Most of the stories are fairly short and they involve different road users who give their personal view on the issue of safety. The first issue of 'God Tur' (could also be translated to 'Safe Travels') features a story involving a dialogue between a busdriver, a motorist, a cyclist and a pedestrian, advicing each other on safety and pointing out the most dangerous places in the city. The magazine also contains good advice on how to avoid stress during work hours and communicates some of the new initiatives happening in the streets of Copenhagen.

The magazine is handed out in the workplaces of the busdrivers (about 20 places around Copenhagen) these days, reaching about 3,000 people who spend most of their workday in the traffic. In the next couple of months we will work on the next issue which will be out on the streets about November 1st. The content will be created in collaboration with the busdrivers and the other road users in order to speak with their voice and make the magazine easy to identify with.

To be honest I'm not a huge sports person, nevertheless the European Championship in Athletics dragged my attention yesterday. It was the medals round the necks of the champions I found exciting. The medals are in my opinion quite remarkable due to the v-shaped design, and as the medals are hanging from a white ribbon, the medal itself is a perfect reflection of the ribbon.
I'm note sure if the medal lead my thoughts to the sport, but its very simple and beautiful. The designer is the Spanish Martin Ruiz de Azua's who is a man of medals. Among others he designed medals for the 2003 World Swimming Championships, a transparent bubble filled circular design, which indeed leads my thoughts to swimming.

Today we've launched a new video about the process and the results of the new authentic identity of the Corporate Governance Agency of the Danish Cultural Ministry (Kulturministeriets Koncerncenter). The mapping of the authentic organizational identity and the creation of the visual identity was developed during the past year and this spring the new corporate website was implemented. During the process we found that the primary authentic strength that the management wanted to promote was the role of the Agency as 'translator'. Every time the staff of the Corporate Governance Agency meets politicians, government officers or employees from the many Danish cultural institutions, they try to understand the everyday world of the institution and translate that into politics and vice-versa.

You can see the film on our website www.stagis.com where you can also download an article with one of the Agency employees who's bringing her personality into the everyday job as she lives out the role of the 'translator' between the Cultural Ministry and the cultural institutions who are the clients of the Agency.

We wrote a few blog-posts during the process. Back in October I wrote a post on finding and living the authentic identity which involved a two-day staff workshop and in November Anne was posting the authentic strengths and visuals and corporate colours from the new visual identity.

 For the first time the artist is a photographer, and there is to variations. Artist: Søren Solkær Starbird. Copenhagen Jazz Festival
 

During the Fall of 2009 we developed a new identity for the Corporate Governance Agency of the Danish Ministry of Culture. Part of this project was to develop the IA and design a new website. During late 2009 and early 2010 the site has been technically implemented and now it's finally launched. Even though The Corporate Governance agency is still working on some updates you are very welcome to visit the site.



The pervasive idea in the design is to symbolise the Corporate Governance Agency as an ‘interpreter’ between the Ministry and the Institutions (their clients). We wanted to emphasise this throughout the imagery for the identity, by shooting photographs of the employees in the scenery of their clients, where they actually function as interpreters. This is implemented in the website as well, where the part of the logo representing the cultural institutions contains images and the most important information for the institutions.

The design ethos of Dieter Rams. The German industrial designer, closely associated with the consumer electronics manufacturer Braun, where he was lead designer 1955-1995. I recently visited London Designmuseum and the exhibition of Rams' landmark designs for Braun and furniture manufacturer Vitsæ. For over 40 years he influenced the product range of Braun, and when you experience the pieces side by side, its absolutely impressive how he managed to keep a strict design aesthetic, thats clearly linked in the approach and result throughout the many pieces. Beside from a very nice and well integrated exhibition design, I found it quite inspiring to discover his work again. Even though I know the pieces, they are a bit retro, but nice, I'ts rediscovered in a new point of view. I didn't have the energy to through the 'Brit insurance designs of the year 2010' on the floor below the Rams exhibition. It just seemed to busy and colorful for the state of mind you obtain by spending some time with Rams. And I really enjoy how design can bring this feeling forward. And I guess thats why many argue that Jonathan Ive is a lot ispired by Rams.

 
 Here's a few statements from the exhibition that i found interesting and typical for the experience i had.

"Fascinating!" I thought to myself the other day, as I looked at an art installation. Over the past two months, I've been studying BMW in Munich as part of my ongoing work on a book on authentic organizational identity, which I am planning to finish this spring. The time had come to visit one of the greatest brand museums ever. Back in 2004 the BMW Group decided to spend some 80 million Euro on the renovation and expansion of their corporate museum, initially built in the 1970's. Located in front of the tall BMW headquarters and across the street from the architecturally fascinating BMW World, the Museum looks like a giant tea-cup and would serve well as an iconic entrance to a museum of modern art in any metropolis. Here, however, it's not paintings that are on show, but cars and motorcycles. At least, that was my expectation.

Authentic BMW
The architecture of the Museum itself is a piece of art. The building is listed, protected by the German Government. I soon found myself happily surprised at the first installation. What seemed like a thousand silver pearls were floating in the air, changing from arbitrary swarm to orderly sculptures depicting the forms of old and new cars. When the BMW started the revamp of the Museum, they hired Joachim Sauter, a specialist in new and innovative media. "He told us 'Be authentic!'," says Dr. Andreas Braun, who is in charge of the communication of the 5.000 m2 museum and was deeply involved in the development of the museum throughout the 2000s.