CORPORATE DESIGN

Akademie für gesprochenes Wort (Academy for spoken word, Stuttgart, Germany)

Task

Development of new visual Language for the „Akademie für gesprochenes Wort“ (academy for spoken word in Stuttgart), an institution founded to support the beauty of language in the manner of analysing, researching and teaching about it. How can society be made more sensible for the importance of spoken words? How can the outer perception be more uniform, but not too rigid?

IDEA

The central element of identification comes from the world of literature. The comma structures a sentence and makes it speakable. Proportionally increased it also looks similar with a speech bubble and presents the core competency of the Akademie für gesprochenes Wort.

BASIC THOUGHT

The whole line bases in a colour world of BW to mirror the world of literature and to keep printing costs low. Only for events for children (series with animals doing fantastic things, e.g. the Elephant) colour takes over. The format of the Standard Postcard returns in almost every media of the communication material, serving the need for an effective use of itself and as a collectable item as well. The contact card is also in this format and is offered to take away and present to others, too. So the Akademie für gesprochenes Wort stays the talk of the recipients.

SOLUTION

The comma as the Logo shows a clear, recognisable structure. Additional the Brand core „create a world through speaking“ can be implemented through a „Doodle-world“ around the comma, because you can create the biggest world in the tiniest room through speaking/talking. The Illustration works here as a visualisation of this dimension of phantasy and can make the comma become a speaking field itself.
Development of the identification element. Starting with the comma as a symbol out of the world of literature and sign to hold a moment while reading or speaking.
Chosing the form of the comma from all kinds of types to be the sign for a modern approach of the academy.
Finalising the Draft of the Logo with the full written name - as the client wished for.
Logo idea placed at the new letterform - the comma always "touches" the border of the paper and proportional expanded it also reminds of a speech bubble sign and shows that this letter is a "speech" from the academy.
View of the letterform in the new Corporate Design.
The Slogan of the academy is "create a world through speaking". So the Logo can be implemented into a"doodle-world" and emphasize this leading thought.
Contact Cards are in the main format of a standard postcard. On the front they show the Comma as a speech bubble formed out of different kinds of doodles, filled with famous literate quotes.
So the Contact Cards become collectibles, as there are different quotes with different doodles.
Close-Up of one card saying "Don´t read the next sentence", and smaller below "I like you, you little rebel". The quotes should make the receiver smile and remember about a famous book, author or just to read more.
Another Close-Up, saying "On `human' there's no other word rhyming in the German language". These cards can also, besides displaying quotes, show facts that make the reader think.
On the back the reader finds the contact details of the Academy and leave space for the Sender (from the academy or from the person, who sends this card further to somone interested) to leave a private message.
Cover view of the image brochure.
Example design for a double page at the image brochure. Repeating the Designs from the Contact Cards.
Another example of the image brochure.
This example page gives an insight on the academy's efforts for childrens education in speaking and learning about literature. For them there is a special Postcard Set customized to their eyes. Everytime there´s content for children the doodle-world is replaced by an animal doing fun things. See next.
For events, that are made especially for children like reading childrens authors etc. the invitation cards show a different layout. Every children event series has an animal as hero and shows it in an unusual, surreal or funny situation. Here it´s an elephant as example.
The Elephant is not only drawn with simple lines, but also coloured - only colour-use for the academy and only occasion to break with the Corporate Colours Black and white.
Three examples of invitation/Flyer Cards of one event series.
On the back you have - similar to the Contact Cards - Details of the event. Form and prepared adress field makes them sendable to interested parents.
For all other events like literature readings the bespoken authors will be illustrated in black fine lines in the similar way as the doodles. To make it more interesting the authors will not only be portraied, but always show a bit of their character or have a distinctive detail of their work implemented.
Example of Event poster, postcard (Event invitation) and event sheet for an event about Jean-Paul Sartre. Because of his unique view on women he is illustrated as a Dandy with big hair and his pipe with a James-Dean-holding gesture.
Detail of the Event Poster. The main information is always shown in a black box to see them in one view - similar to the guideline of the Postcards.
Closer view on the event Poster which also has space for a short introduction to the evening with an exerpt from the authors work.
The main event of the year are the "Stimmtage". Once a year the academy invites artists, scientists, poets and teachers from all over europe to a three-day-symposium.
The programme can be fold together into postcard-size and is easy to send out as an invitation.
Folded out the programme divides its content into a postcard-sized grid.
The main challenge was to divide and also combine the artistic programme and the scientific symposium.
Fully folded out it can also be a poster.
Both sides show either one of the programme.
Fold-in the programme is fixed with a comma-shaped sticker.
For the website a similar grid with content and black-boxes for the details is chosen.
The possibilities of the web-view are for example used with an implemented movie to welcome the viewer. An excerpt from a training lesson of the academy ensemble gives the viewer a first impression what the academy is all about.