Luckily, the astute folks at the New York Times are highly organised, and thus they have produced for our enjoyment, a grid-based, icon-fueled look at the last ten years in news, business, culture, and other categories of time–space. Love it.
Think for a second that this was done mainly with icons. One tiny image can encapsulate [...]

// a tale of China, New York, brands & branding, cinema, computers & gadgets, design, design: history, fashion, music, national identities, politics, the internet
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Rio’s 2016 bid logo, official until further notice
So yea, I’m a little behind in covering the massive story about the Olympics of 2016, which are officially headed to Rio. The Olympics are a recurring theme on this blog, as I have taken particular interest in the London 2012 logo, and the mascots of Beijing, and [...]

// a tale of China, brands & branding, design, national identities
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I don’t think I’m the only one looking forward to 2009. So just this last time, let’s take a look back at what was, for me, the highlights (and lowlights) for the previous 12 months.
Design Highlight of the Year: The Beijing Olympics Aside from being the largest spectacle in the whole of human existence, the [...]

// a tale of Britain, China, New York, WTF, brands & branding, design: packaging, politics, the industry, the internet, this website
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In the same perverse vein as advertising on taxis, escalator handrails, and pizza boxes, comes the latest in blatant and gratuitous advertising on everyday objects. My seemingly ordinary Chinese food boxes are now 3-dimensional ads for … Spanish-language news on a local cable channel?
Chinese food box plastered on every surface with ads for Noticias on [...]

// a tale of China, New York, WTF, advertising: print, design: packaging
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It wouldn’t be my blog if I didn’t talk about the branding of nations.
This year’s Olympics were touted as China’s “coming out party.” Here they are, showing the world what they can do — showing the scale, precision, technology, tradition, coordination, planning, and slick execution of a massive event that took about 8 years, and [...]

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Having been writing about the Beijing branding for well over a year, I almost feel like I have nothing left to say. I mean, you all saw it, right.
When I was watching the games I was obviously watching the sports, but I had a keen eye on the background graphics, the signage, the uniforms, [...]

// a tale of China, advertising: outdoor, brands & branding, design, design: print, fashion, national identities, politics, typography
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Now that the dust has settled at the Bird’s Nest Stadium and the Olympics flame has been extinguished, I can finally collect my thoughts and comment on the global circus that was the media coverage. This year’s coverage was bigger, more intense, more global, more comprehensive, more technologically-advanced, more highly-defined, and more quickly deployed than [...]

// a tale of China, advertising: tv/radio, brands & branding, computers & gadgets, national identities, the internet, web technology
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