Occasionally our favorite design proposals get killed before they can see the light of day. Some of these directions were nixed by clients, and sometimes we reject them ourselves in favor of more appropriate ideas, but we’re fond of them all…
This was an idea we had for Metropolis Magazine’s 2008 Next Generation Design Competition, which was themed “Fix Our Energy Addiction”. It’s an illustration of Renda and everything she had plugged in at the studio. (Yes, exactly 10 light bulbs. We counted.)
In 2008, the Walker Arts Center co-sponsored a competition in which participants submitted designs for political yard signs to coincide with the Republican National Convention. The winning signs would be printed and distributed as actual signs prior to the event. We didn’t realize the call for entries specified non-partisan posters, and submitted this, which was promptly disqualified.
An alternate, rejected cover system for Verso’s Radical Thinkers books. We’re happy it went the other way, but have always had a soft spot in our heart for this treatment.
Gareth Pierce’s Dispatches from the Dark Side. This one was called “On Torture” when we worked on it. We wanted something startling but quiet; in the end it was done by somebody else, who did something based on images in the book.
Georges Perec’s The Art of Asking Your Boss for a Raise. The aesthetic is built from a very funny flowchart accompanying the book. They got somebody else to do something a little more image-oriented. We later did a website promoting it.
Yes! The Verso Book of Dissent is a collection of revolutionary texts. We went through iteration after iteration puzzling over the idea of “dissent” before arriving at the above version, which was eventually killed. Probably with very good cause; the best part of it is the typeface, Fox, which was designed by our friend Chad Kloepfer. Somebody else did the final cover, seen here.
Rejected design (cloth-bound, foil-stamped) for Alain Badiou’s Pocket Pantheon. Shown with spine.
Probably better to consider this “on hold” rather than outright rejected — a logotype for a long-in-the-works website.
Unused concept for a New York Times illustration on warring textbook ideologies. A chalkboard drawing made the cut.
An illustration for a Times piece on the use of informal language and grammar in Bible translations. Nixed in favor of a blackletter type image, which we love.
Another rejected New York Times illo, this one for a Sunday Review piece on Murdoch’s sleazy media empire. We ended up doing something with a finger trap.
Identity sketch for the AIANY’s Design Awards — confetti, made of buildings. Rejected by the client (who we’re very fond of) because, and we’re paraphrasing here, architects don’t like stupid drawings of buildings.
Designed in the USA was a bluntly named exhibition at the Center for Architecture. The concept was reworked, the show was renamed, and this poppy type treatment was no longer needed.
A killed cover for The Religious Test, a non-fiction book published by WW Norton. They went with another designer.