CCA News
CCA's Michael Vanderbyl Speaks Out on Branding: Design Does Matter
Posted on Monday, August 23, 2010, by Jim Norrena
It's refreshing to know design does matter—and that people still matter—to such design leaders as CCA Graphic Design faculty member and alum Michael Vanderbyl (BFA Graphic Design 1968), who has gained international prominence in the design field as a practitioner, educator, critic, and advocate.
In the book Design Does Matter, recently published as the third in a series of hardbound volumes by Teknion, a leading international designer, manufacturer, and marketer of mid- to high-end office systems and related furniture products, Vanderbyl advocates how design and brand can be used as a tool for positive change.
Design Does Matter, which can be downloaded in its entirety as a PDF, contains 26 thoughtful and provocative entries by prominent designers, architects, business leaders, environmentalists, and others who "embrace design as a force in commerce and culture," and comprises an anthology of unique essays by noted design professionals, scholars, and writers—including Vanderbyl's piece on "Branding by Design":
Peter Lawrence
Roger Martin
Norma Kamall
Art Gensler
Carl Magnusson
Vanderbyl knows design and brand: "One of the most valuable ways that design can distinguish a brand or the enterprise it represents is through a powerful visual identity that captures and projects all of the ideas that make up the message of a brand. A well-conceived and well-executed visual language not only delivers and clarifies a message—it is the message. It answers questions about the brand before they are even thought of, much less asked. But to achieve an elegant and eloquent visual language is a process that takes a great deal of thought."
In fact, since establishing himself in San Francisco in 1973, his firm—Vanderbyl Design, which is credited for designing Design Does Matter, has evolved into a multidisciplinary studio with expertise in graphics, packaging, signage, interiors, showrooms, retail spaces, furniture, textiles, and fashion apparel.
Vanderbyl explains in the book what makes a brand: "As an analogy, my belief is that a brand is not a suit of clothes, but rather a wardrobe. It’s everything in your closet that you have chosen to represent yourself, your values, the way you live, what you stand for. If one chooses intelligently, that brand, like a well-crafted wardrobe, can work very well for quite a long time with a bit of adjustment here and there."
Teknion used the Design Does Matter concept at the NeoCon World's Trade Fair in June 2010 for its panel discussion featuring industry thought leaders from the United States and Canada to help address tough questions facing designers today. The campaign is currently being further promoted by SideMark, Teknion's largest dealer in North America and who also offers Teknion's award-winning and sustainable furniture solutions to their clients. (On a related note, SideMark's San Francisco office was founded by CCA alumna Margi Sullivan (Interiors 1973).)
According to Teknion: "This new edition presents some of today’s most observant and intelligent design thinking and celebrates its extraordinary diversity by drawing essays from design writers, thinkers and luminaries working across the spectrum of architecture, urban and landscape design to product, graphic and interactive design to emerging disciplines like bio-mimicry. We also expand the dialogue geographically, including voices that speak from cultures around the world. The essays explore the subject with an emphasis on the diversity of design practice and the issue of sustainability."
For Vanderbyl it all comes down to authenticity. "No one has ever built a lasting brand by imitating a logo or a clever ad or by trying to persuade people that a brand is something it simply is not."
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