Emilio Ambasz



I like Emilio Ambasz’s drawing, “casa de retiro spiritual” (the house of spiritual retreat) in MOMA. The drawing is simple, clean, and neat with very delicate lines and colors. The drawing is not loud, yet stunning with its clean lines. He uses wavy and perfectly straight lines, and both kind of lines come together nicely. This is similar to his concept of the design, which is embodied these heterogeneous environmental surroundings, which is composed of nature and building. Moreover, his drawing was presented in 1979 and his idea was advanced, because the features were close to the environmentally conscious “Green Building.”  The Green Building aims for us to achieve sustainable environment by developing infrastructure, lowering energy consumption, using renewable energy, conserving water and minimizing waste. The actual building was built in Spain.





Field trip

We visited two design studios in Manhattan; one studio named “Common Name and Linked by Air,” and another studio was “Whitney Museum Studio.”

At the Common Name and Linked by Air, they said that they are sharing studio space. They presented their works such as web sites, books etc., which were very clean and neat. One work in particular has a unique concept, which allows a person to read the book two different ways on the same pages. In other words, each story starts from opposite side of the page in a different way. The designer of the book said that there are two different concepts that coexist on each page, but they are still related to each other. The concept was interesting and different, yet the book was still very clean and modern, probably because it only used two colors. I would like to make my works look simple, but I feel it would be hard to achieve.

     As a contrast, they show us a website, which has an intentionally awkward design; the designer uses a busy background that makes the texts hard to read. This is designed by a Yale graduate school student, who has studied the principle of design, so the meaning of the design weighs more than the authenticity of it.

     One of their web site projects was worked on for one year, they really liked it. However, they said that they would be broke if they spent so much time on projects, so they had to compromise the time spend for each project. One of the designers used to work for IDEA, where he learned a great deal about designs. He had a responsibility for a part of the projects in the huge design firm. Now he has started his own design studio, which he can take in charge entirely on the projects. After the studio Common Name and Linked by Air, we traveled to Whitney Museum Studio.

     At the Whitney Museum Studio, they showed us the advertising poster they made for Whitney Biennial. According to the designers, they said that they trust each other, so they just concentrate on each other’s work. I feel that trust is a really important aspect when we work as a team. One of the designers used to work as an intern first, and then decided to work there. She said that she was really comfortable working there. That would be perfect to work in a design studio where we like.

I realized that the projects should be on time in business, however, it would be fine anytime if the projects are for a hobby. The works have to meet the budgets and the due date in order to maintain the business and make a profit.   

Paula Scher

by Pentagram,

The identity is easily rendered in other languages, here in Taiwanese-Chinese.

 The new logotype can also be rendered in one color or in black and white.

The new renu® identity is designed to stand out from its competition.



Paula Scher's poster for the 2nd Chicago International Poster Biennial.

Truvia™ is designed to stand out from the competition.

Paula Scher is my favorite designer. She states in an article, “It’s important to have ideas and think about things because design styles, like technologies, change all the time.” Paula Scher is a Graphic designer at Pentagram, and she created designs for a healthcare brand called Bausch + Lomb by new logotype and packaging. The primary colors of the designs are green and blue. These colors give me a sense of calmness and cleanliness, because of the association of those ideas with these colors. For example, water, the sky, and wind is blue, while trees, glass and ecology is often visualized using green. Furthermore, Scher's poster for the 2nd Chicago International Poster Biennial is  quite simple as well. The only element, number “2”, is constructed with circular lines. The design is not only simple, but also has visually interesting, due to the movement and impact with the huge number “2.”
     In addition to her previous work, Scher also designed the new, natural, no-calorie sweeteners’ packaging design and the brand identity with Daniel Weil. When I went shopping, the box caught my attention, because the box was simple, clean, and cute. The box was also very functional, since it was easy to find out information about the product. It is a natural sweetener that uses a transparent green along with the image of a powdered sweetener on a strawberry.