Winnipeg, Canada

A handsome presentation box from Nova Scotia Crystal has arrived at the office… containing the sand-blasted crystal trophy for the Icograda President’s Award presented to Robert L. Peters on 26 October 2009 at the opening ceremonies of the Xin: Icograda World Design Congress 2009 in Beijing. The 35-cm-high piece is now on display in Circle’s forum area—due to logistics complexities (involving the “import of creative works” to China) Peters had been presented only the framed diploma portion of the award at the ceremony in Beijing.

Winnipeg, Canada

Digging through some old files in the office recently, we came across this 17-year-old clipping from the Winnipeg Free Press, which ran just before we moved from our original studio on Albert Street to the space we’ve occupied here at the corner of Princess Street and McDermot Avenue since 1993. Our saying “No” to a cattle-call RFP by a prospective client caught the attention of journalist Martin Cash, who penned a mostly complimentary story about our design practice and ethos (read the whole piece in a 252 KB PDF here, if you like)…

Mr. Cash described Circle as “having become known for a certain thoroughness and a high level of quality”—traits we would like to think have remained with us to this day.

Winnipeg, Canada

We wish you and yours the very best!

Taipei, Taiwan

Circle’s founder, Robert L. Peters, is in Taiwan for a week as part of the three-city 2009 Conference of International Design Competitions lecture tour; Taipei, Taiching, and Tainan. The two other international presenters are Nakanishi Motoo (one of the great corporate identity masters, responsible for creating and/or managing the image of over one hundred top-500 companies worldwide, among them Bridgestone, Kenwood, Mazda, Asics, Kirin beer, etc., etc.), and Hiroshi Tsunoda, a talented young Tokyo-born product designer with a burgeoning practice in Barcelona, Spain. Peters reports that audience response in the packed-out venues has been enthusiastic and warm (and Taiwan temperatures in the high 20s have been a full 50 degrees warmer than back in the ‘Peg).

Images above: Taipei 101 (the world’s tallest skyscraper when it was completed five years ago); delegates with Rodin’s Thinker at Asia University in Taiching; Peters in Tainan.

Winnipeg, Canada

Amdocs Inc. provides primary physician services in remote and Northern Canadian communities. Its community-based approach fulfills the vision of Dr. Anthon Meyer to develop mutually rewarding relationships with First Nations communities by delivering high quality family physician services, chronic disease management, practice consultant support for nurse clinician services, and related continuous medical education services in full compliance with both College of Physicians and Surgeons and Governmental standards.

Over the past month we’ve been delighted to work with Dr. Anthon Meyer and his team at Amdocs (now located in Gibraltar House alongside long-time client The North West Company) on the design of a corporate identity, recruitment ads, print materials, and a website. Learn more about Amdocs and the good work the organization is doing here.

São Paulo, Brazil

Our talented colleagues at Oz Design (one of our co-design worldwide partners) were featured this week in the leading Brazilian weekly magazine Veja by means of a 10-page article introducing them as the graphic design professionals who “Give the city a face.” A piece of well-deserved recognition, we think, regarding the efforts that Oz has invested over the past 30 years to promote the value of design in Brazil. If you understand Portuguese, read more here.

Keep up the good work!

Beijing, China

Circle’s founder, Robert L. Peters, was honoured today to receive the Icograda President’s Award from outgoing Icograda President Don Ryun Chang of Korea. The presentation took place at the National Centre for the Performing Arts (the ultra-modern opera house also known as “The Egg”) in Beijing, with an audience of several thousand present for the opening day of the Xin: Icograda World Design Congress 2009.

Beginning in 1970, the Icograda President’s Award has been presented on a biennial basis by the Icograda President. The award honors an outstanding contribution to the work of Icograda. A listing of previous recipients is available here.

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The presentation transcript follows:

“Before we start the Adobe Design Achievement Awards, I have the pleasure of announcing the second 2009 Icograda President’s Award and it gives me great pleasure to introduce Rob Peters and to recognize his many contributions—from his distinguished stewardship of our council during his term as President and board member, to his numerous published articles featured in important design publications, but today especially his significant role in nurturing and promoting design in China and Asia.

Raised and schooled in Europe, Robert was educated in Switzerland, Germany, and England. He is a graphic designer, communications strategist, and principal of CIRCLE, an award-winning design consultancy he co-founded in 1976. Robert is active internationally as a design practitioner, advisor, juror and lecturer.

Following the 1991 Icograda World Design Congress in Montreal, Rob was designated as the GDC’s official delegate and liaison, representing Canada to Icograda General Assemblies in Glasgow in 1993, Porto (Portugal) in 1995, Punta del Este (Uruguay) in 1997 (where I first met him), and Sydney in 1999 where he was elected to the Icograda board for a six-year term from 1999 to 2005, serving as President from 2001 to 2003. Significant achievements during Peters’ six years on the Icograda board include: development of our first content-rich portal, rejuvenation of the network ‘Friends of Icograda,’ launch of both the Icograda Design Education Network and the Icograda Design Media Network, co-organization of Icograda congresses in Seoul (‘Oullim’ 2000), Johannesburg, South Africa (‘Continental Shift’ 2001), and as President of our Council in Nagoya, Japan (‘VISUALOGUE’ 2003—with some 3700 delegates from 49 countries in attendance, the world’s largest ever congress of graphic designers). Rob also served as official liaison between Icograda and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) as well as the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) from 2001 to 2005.

Peters joined the board of the international humanitarian organization Design for the World (DW) in 2000 and was appointed as a Vice President in 2002; in 2004 he was named an Honorary Member of the Brno Biennale Association; he was also a member of the founding executive of the International Design Alliance (IDA) from 2003 to 2005.

For nearly 30 years, Robert has lived in a low-energy, passive-solar house he designed and built in the woods east of Winnipeg, Manitoba. He is an avid climber (rocks, ice, mountains) and he enjoys nature and human-powered outdoor pursuits. His interests include art, architecture, photography, visual language, and travel, and he has written many important articles for prominent design publications such as Communication Arts (like the memorable article that introduced Chinese design to many readers all over the world).

Rob has been a great role model, a friend to me over the years, and he has given me great advice—it is a special honor for me to recognize his achievements here in China today.

It gives me sincere pleasure to present the 2009 Icograda President’s Award to Robert L. Peters.”

Winnipeg, Canada

We’re excited about a significant product launch happening next week here in Winnipeg. For nearly two years we’ve been working intensely with a visionary client team from Conquest Manufacturing Ltd. and a number of leading architects on the conceptual development, ideation, planning, and design of an exciting new product offer—eco-smart, sensibly-sized, precision-built homes reflecting best practices in sustainable design and offering future-proof comfort and convenience.

We’re currently launching the brand (an initial website went live this week here) and the new line of Challenger homes will kick off in dramatic fashion next Friday at the Autumn Home Show in Winnipeg. The Cube, an innovative, modern, two-story home designed by architect Ed Calnitsky, is being assembled right on the Convention Centre floor (from four precision-built modules delivered to the venue). This leading-edge demo home will act as the event’s feature attraction, and will show off innovative products from many of the show’s other exhibitors.

Find details about show hours, etc. here. If you’re in or near Manitoba, we’d encourage you to drop by Booth #217 (right across from The Cube) and see what the future of smart living will be like.

For more information about this launch, contact Robert L. Peters, FGDC
(Tel. +1 204 943 3693).

Morden, Manitoba

Over the past few months, a new small-space ad for Boundary Trails Dental Centre (a Circle client for over two decades—see a previous campaign here) has appeared each week in the local paper, the Morden Times. Designed as a low-cost, 13-week, awareness-building campaign, the small ads (which have a common look and appear in the same position each week), offer tidbits of engaging information, interesting statistics, factoids about teeth, etc.—all the while lending increased visibility and conveying the specialized services and expertise offered by the area’s leading dental practice.

Feedback has been favourable, and response to the ads’ subtle yet persistent “New patients always welcome” call to action have been impressive—some days have seen as many as 15 new patients!

Toronto, Canada

The latest issue of Applied Arts, Canada’s Visual Communication Magazine (Vol. 24, No. 4, August 2009) has just arrived—in it an in-depth article by Pamela Young on “Green Design” that includes excerpts of an interview with Robert L. Peters. The article by Young acts as “a guide to some of the fundamental issues and options you need to get a handle on or to go green” and lists a variety of accreditation bodies and professional resources to help designers become more savvy.

Winnipeg, Canada

Our latest Canadian Recording Artists stamps (that launched a week ago) have garnered a fair bit of early attention, and there’s been a steady stream of feedback from both near and far. Locally, Robert L. Peters was interviewed on 3 July by Margaux Watt on the CBC radio afternoon show, and on 4 July the Winnipeg Free Press ran an article about the stamps’ design in the Business section (view a larger JPG of the article here or read the piece online here).

The Globe And Mail ran an in-depth story (online here), CTV gave the issue quite a bit of coverage as did Radio-Canada (highlighting that this is the first time that Canadians who perform in French are being lauded by Canada Post), and the stamps and related stories have appeared on numerous websites and blogs (including Bryan Adams’ website here) and philatelic collectors’ sites such as Stamp News International.

Canada Post (our client) and the featured artists all appear to be pleased. Stompin’ Tom says he’s “delighted, humbled and overwhelmed by the ‘stamp of approval;’” Édith Butler (whose great grandfather was a postmaster and who sent us photos of the stamp launch in Paquetville, NB—where her 92-year-old cousin was the first in line at the post office to buy a souvenir sheet) called the stamps “the greatest thing that ever happened to me;” a chuffed Bryan Adams responded “It is a wonderful honour to be amongst the great men and women who have graced our Canadian stamps… I am humbled by the recognition;” and Robert Charlebois stated: “I wish my parents would be alive to see this, because when I started 40 years ago, I never thought I would land on a stamp… I probably will send all my friends postcards with my own face on it, especially to my friends in Belgium and Switzerland—they’re going to faint, they won’t believe their eyes.”

Paquetville, NB / Timmins, ON

On 2 July 2009 the latest set of commemorative stamps we’ve designed for Canada Post will launch concurrently—in the small Acadian village of Paquetville, New Brunswick, where chanteuse Édith Butler was born and raised—and in Timmins, Ontario, where renowned folklorist Stompin’ Tom (Connors) was first granted a 14-month contract to play at the city’s Maple Leaf Hotel. The set of four stamps also includes international rock superstar Bryan Adams and Robert Charlebois, a pioneer of French-Canadian rock.

Building on the market success of the Canadian Recording Artists series we designed two years ago (featuring Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell, Anne Murray, and Paul Anka) this set of stamps adopts the round CD-shape precedent for booklets (each artist is featured on a separate booklet cover) and the gummed souvenir sheet (popular with collectors and philatelists)—the latter also appears with dual cancellations with date of issue on the Official First Day Cover (OFDC). Booklets of pressure-sensitive stamps include envelope seals and information about the individual artists.

We also designed a set of postcards—each of these includes an additional performance image of the featured artist. We initially decided to create monochrome portraits for the artists (using a vector-conversion process based on sourced photography of dramatically varying quality levels) and then brought them all into the same dynamic visual “performance space,” a spotlit simulation of how they might appear live and on stage. As we did in the 2007 series, we incorporated a distinctive MetalFX® process of under-printed metallic inks into backgrounds and selvedge areas, adding a lustrous sheen that helps convey the feeling of shiny vinyl and “gold album” prestige.

These limited edition stamps will be available through post offices across the country as of 2 July 2009, can be ordered online by following the links at Canada Post’s website www.canadapost.ca, or by calling toll-free: 1-800-565-4362 (Canada and the United States), or 902-863-6550 (from other countries). Read the feature article published in Canada’s Stamp Details (Vol. XVIII No. 3; July to September 2009) here.

For more information about the stamps’ design, please contact Robert L. Peters, FGDC at Circle: +1 204 943 3693.

Images: the round souvenir sheet; the four postcards, each featuring an enlarged stamp/portrait; the OFDC with dual cancellations.

Winnipeg, Canada

The North West Company (NWC) today held its Annual and Special Meeting of Unitholders at the Winnipeg Convention Centre—President & CEO Edward S. Kennedy was happy to announce the Company’s ninth consecutive year of achieving record sales and earnings (no small feat, given the global economic downturn in the past year).

We were once again pleased to design NWC’s annual report (the 16th consecutive year we have done so), and this year we were also involved in producing a Flash version of the report (viewable online here—high speed connection required). The design approach for NWC’s 2008 Summary Annual Report fleshed out the theme of “sustainable growth” and uses the Company’s major retail banners to convey the story: “favourable industry fundamentals; remote market expertise; an enterprising culture; community-centred retailing; and opportunity in new markets.” You can view an online PDF (2.4 MB) of the 2008 Annual Report here.

Images: The front cover and several interior spreads from the report; principal photography by Ian McCausland; additonal photography by Chris Arend (Alaska) and Herman Crisostomo (Guam); editorial/writing services by Blunn & Company Inc.

São Paulo, Brazil

Our co-design worldwide partners at Oz Design are celebrating their 30th Anniversary, replete with a move into new offices… here’s a congratulatory toast to our talented southern friends from the great white north…

Cheers!

Winnipeg, Canada

We’re delighted to have senior designer Susan McWatt FitzGerald, MGDC back at Circle—after a year of maternity leave. Following many months of searching (we concur that access to quality daycare in this country is seriously lacking) Sue’s been able to find convenient in-home care for wee August… three days a week for the time being. Welcome back, Sue!

Winnipeg, Canada

Yes, today marks 33 years since the birth of Circle Design Incorporated (we actually started as Circle Graphics back then, and share our illustrious April Fools’ birthdate back in 1976 with this little company called Apple Computer :-). We also continue with gusto…

1976 was an interesting and memorable year in many ways, locally and around the world—in South Africa, anti-apartheid riots began in Soweto; Israeli commandos pulled off the Entebbe Raid in Uganda; in China the Tangshan earthquake killed 242,769 people; in the UK punk enters the mainstream; in the U.S. Jimmy Carter was elected as president; and out in space, the Viking 1 orbiter lands on Mars. 1976 also saw the introduction of the first laser printer by IBM (the Model 3800); The Band’s farewell concert The Last Waltz; the deaths of blues-singer Howlin’ Wolf, artist Alexander Calder, and revolutionary Chairman Mao; and the births of chanteuse Martha Wainright and Brazilian footballer Ronaldo. Here in Canada, the Eaton’s catalogue and Time magazine’s Canadian edition were discontinued; the Summer Olympics were held in Montreal (highlighted by 14-year old Romanian gymnast Nadia Comăneci’s perfect scores and five gold medals); René Lévesque’s Parti Québécois wins a majority in the Quebec elections; and the CN tower went up in Toronto.

Winnipeg, Manitoba

This past month we’ve had the opportunity to update the Beach Safety Program Signage for Manitoba Conservation. Six years ago (when we initially researched and developed a comprehensive set of Beach Safety icons and signage templates for the province) no international standards for pictograms and signage existed—that changed last year with the publication of ISO 20712-1:2008, which we have now incorporated in the entire program (including a change of all Caution/Hazard signs to a triangular shape, standardization of all Prohibition signs, and addition of a new beach safety [status] flag).

Vancouver, British Columbia

Our good friends (and co-design worldwide partners) at Ion Branding + Design are celebrating their 20th Anniversary today… wish we could be there to raise a glass with you—but we’ll do so from afar… Cheers!

Ion sent out cool ‘20!’ coasters as their party invitations.

Calgary, Alberta

We’ve recently had the pleasure to work with Gregor Brandt and Janice Liwanag again (they’re old climbing friends of Rob’s) on the updating of corporate identification, stationery, and the design of “look and feel” for a new website for The Marionette Group, a consultancy offering software development, project management, and technical documentation services to technology innovators in the science and engineering industry. Visit their new website (coded by Gregor himself) here.

Winnipeg, Canada

We’ve recently completed the design of a new corporate identity for the Concordia Joint Replacement Group (CJRG), a highly specialized “swat team” of orthopaedic specialists preparing to move into new, purpose-built facilities within the Concordia Hip & Knee Institute. The identity fulfills the criteria of being distinctive within its field, projecting excellence, inspiring confidence, and having good compatibility with other Concordia identities (which Circle has designed and created standards for in recent years). The folks at CJRG have been good to work with… and we’ve learned a lot about the world of orthopaedics in the process.