I had real fun with this one. A set of x30 vector illustrations and poster designs for the Horniman Museum and Gardens. Find out more here:
https://www.horniman.ac.uk/about-the-horniman/climate-and-ecology/environment-champions-club/
It’s a timely post as there are stag beetles flying around our neighbourhood at the moment. They spend most of their life cycle underground as larvae (around 6 years) so it’s always kind of wondrous to see them take flight.
(post by Tanya)
It’s always great to get a brief from one of our favourite clients, the Horniman Museum. They asked us to update the market identity we created for them a couple of years ago as they were moving it to a Sunday. To expand the suite, we made a walrus on a veg ‘berg and a fruit ‘berg.
We are regulars to the market and particularly recommend Aston’s, the bread stall.
To see the other versions of this design, take a look here:
We’re very happy to see our work underneath this loaf at Horniman Farmers’ Market. It’s best to go early on Saturday or you’ll have to arm wrestle Mike for that last loaf of soda bread.
Read more about this project:
http://chutneychorus.com/#/identity-horniman-farmers-market/
I love winter. Really, I do. But this year I'm impatient for spring and the opening of the World Gallery at the Horniman. Since they closed the Centenary and African Worlds galleries, weekends just haven't been the same. No Dogon masks, no Hopi dolls, no Polish folk horse. Oh dear. However, I have been lucky enough to see an early draft of the plans. The old galleries have been stared at, shaken up and taken to a whole new level. It'll be worth the wait.
As you may know, my graphics cover the World Gallery spaces to prevent peeking while work is going on. I also helped their fundraising campaign by donating this framed print.
They're still raising money, so please donate if you can:
https://horniman.ac.uk/get_involved/help-bring-the-world-to-forest-hill
You might be interested to hear that the museum was named one of the 10 coolest museums in the world by the New York Times. (No need to ask if I agree.)
https://horniman.ac.uk/get_involved/news/horniman-hailed-as-one-of-the-worlds-coolest-museums
For more on my work on the World Gallery graphics:
http://chutneychorus.com/#/large-format-horniman-museum/
(post by Tanya)
With so many wonderful changes underway at the Horniman Museum and Gardens, their marketing team decided to refresh the membership campaign to spread the news. I created the original suite in 2013/2014 so they commissioned me to update the lead image. We explored a few options but this lovely seahorse was the clear winner. As before, I rolled it out in multiple formats for print, web, and probably my favourite, the membership card. I'm happy to say the membership numbers got an instant boost.
On a similar note, they also refreshed their Benefactors' campaign. I created the original blue colourway a few years back and supplied the assets for a yellow version which they banked until now. You can see the blue version via the link below. I'm still undecided whether I prefer the blue or the yellow... decisions, decisions.
http://chutneychorus.com/blog/horniman-museum-and-gardens-benefactors?rq=benefactor
(post by Tanya)
Horniman Museum and Gardens approached me to create this identity for the temporary closure of their galleries while they create the new (and very exciting) World Gallery.
Rather than talk about the design as I usually do, I thought I'd talk shop instead. The 'design' part of my work takes up about 20% of the total time spent on any job. And the rest? It's all technical, technical ... and technical. But what does that mean?
It means thinking about how visitors enter and move around the space: what will they see from where? How legible will the graphics be from a distance?
It means thinking about how a job will be installed: will the vinyl go outside the glass (sticky back) or inside (sticky front)? (The larger part of this job went inside the glass to avoid the cost and inconvenience of scaffolding.)
It means working to accurate dimensions, or 'dims' as we call 'em in the trade. The dims have to be accurate down to the millimetre and include all fixtures and fittings or things can go seriously awry ... imagine trying to cover an A4 book with a standard envelope. (Oh dear.)
And most of all, it means a lot of work in Photoshop, Illustrator and Indesign. Here's a quick overview of the digital work that went into the project:
Each of these processes takes time and much like creating anything, you have to take a few runs at each stage before you can clamber over the top. And here we are on the other side of the job. Nice.
http://www.horniman.ac.uk/about/anthropology-redisplay
(post by Tanya)
You may not know this but the wonderful Horniman Museum hold an equally wonderful Farmers' Market every Saturday. To raise its profile, their marketing team asked us to design them a new identity. Mike had the brilliant idea of putting their most popular museum exhibit, the Victorian walrus, on top of a cheese 'berg. His initial sketches were a little too wrinkled and blubbery so our clients asked us to smooth it out, making it look authentically 'over-stuffed'. There are two further 'bergs to be unveiled but we're sitting on those for the time being!
On seeing the flyer, we overheard a 3-year-old boy say "I want to lay on a big piece of cheese" ... best feedback ever.
http://www.horniman.ac.uk/visit/events/horniman-farmers-market
Over the last several months I've been working with Horniman Museum and Gardens to create an identity for the Benefactors' scheme re-launch. The brief was to make the design work in tandem with the Membership identity I created in 2013.
Just like the Membership scheme, I made a complete suite of materials: leaflets, folders, membership card, letterhead, posters, pop-up banners, web and email banners – the photos show a flavour. The technically-minded might like to know that I designed the folder cutter guide back in 2013 and we thought it'd be wise to re-use it for those all-important consistency and budgetary reasons.
As a client, Horniman Museum and Gardens strike that wonderful balance between being very responsive and engaged, showing real willingness to try new things and knowing when to step back and let me do what I do best. Marvellous. The butterfly seemed a good route as it represents both the collections inside the museum (the natural history specimens) and the gardens outside (the live animals).
Like much of our local community, Chutney Chorus are great fans of the Horniman. Where else can you find such a high quality collection of art, craft, musical instruments and natural history, to say nothing of the gardens and live animals ... and all this in a compact site? Makes you proud to live in South London!
If you're interested in joining the scheme go to:
www.horniman.ac.uk/get_involved/become-a-benefactor-today
Read more about the Membership scheme on our blog:
www.chutneychoruscreative.com/blog/horniman-museum-members
(post by Tanya)
This weekend the new family exhibition 'Extremes' at the Horniman Museum was launched. It's about extreme environments and the animals and plants that live in them. I created the exhibition identity and strap-line, translating them into various formats including the bus and train ads shown here. The glow around the snow leopard encapsulates a few ideas: its body heat, the insulation of its fur and the phenomenon of bioluminescence. Coupled with a glowing 'x' and a black background, it forms a bold, eye-catching design which will hopefully pull lots of visitors.
At the press opening on Saturday, we got the chance to explore a dark cave, walk on a hot desert floor, water a thirsty camel, examine animal fur under a microscope, press our noses against an ice wall .... and if that wasn't enough, we were given cupcakes with my design on them. That has got to be a first!
http://www.horniman.ac.uk/visit/exhibitions/extremes
As for the title of this post, I've cheated a little I know, but the poem it comes from has been a favourite of mine since I was a kid. If you've got a minute or two, take a look at the poem in its entirety and a little discussion about William Blake on the British Library website:
http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/onlineex/englit/blake/
(post by Tanya)
Pictured is one of 18 postcards we designed for the Horniman Museum Community Fieldworkers project. The cards were posted to the project participants over a 6-week period and they join together to form a whole. Follow the link to our website where you can see the full set and a little explanation about the project itself. (Artefact photography: courtesy of Horniman Museum and Gardens).
http://www.chutneychoruscreative.com/#/print-horniman-community-fieldworkers/
We've also updated the site with more from Tanya's work on the Imperial War Museum Horrible Histories® Spies exhibition.
http://www.chutneychoruscreative.com/#/exhibition-imperial-war-museum-horrible-histories-spies/
One more thing: we've set up a Pinterest page. We're still finding our feet but it's fun searching for things and building boards. We've created one for Ethelbert White the artist and illustrator. We saw his ballet set designs at the V&A Diaghilev exhibition a few years back but are coming to realise he's a little under-appreciated. We've also created a board for Ikko Tanaka, who we believe is one of the world's greatest graphic designers. In 'Drawing' and 'Ceramics' we've a few examples of Honoré Daumier's work whom we came to love after seeing an exhibition at Zentrum Paul Klee in Bern.