I’m Bodil, a book and identity designer from Trondheim, Norway, holding a PhD in Typography & Graphic Communication from the University of Reading. My research interest concentrates on the verbal and visual presentation of health messages on food labels dating from 1850 to 1970. Please read my blog and have a look at my work. Feel free to get in touch if you think there is something I can do for you.
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INSPIRATION | Visiting Berlin and the International Design Festival was a great inspiration. I like to be inspired by many things; product design, typography in public spaces, colors, patterns, posters and cafes.
Berlin has everything.
With 5 pages in Adresseavisen, Veronika Sørum has written a great story about how I live and work in my lovely apartment at Port Arthur. Great pictures taken by the photographer Lena Knutli shows my sofas in the kitchen, my furnitures I inherited from my mother and my grandmother and the view towards the Dome and the area Bakklandet.
There is no doubt, I love the place I live and work.
PERSONAL PROJECT, WORK | The starting point for my trip to Japan related to the support from The Scandinavia – Japan Sasakawa Foundation, was to gain an insight into Japanese visual communication.
I visited both Tokyo and Kyoto and documented in the first place the Japanese visual language using the camera. I started wide with many different directions; architecture, pattern, manhole covers, signs, clothing, food, stores, packaging design and posters. The result has been nearly 1000 images. In addition, I visited various galleries, and had specifically benefit from an exhibition at the Ginza Graphic Gallery, where the award-winning graphic designer Rikako Nagashima showed various works. In addition, I worked on making contacts. I had a meeting with the Art Director Kaoru Matsuno at Hara Design Institute/Nippon Design Center. She works closely with Kenya Hara who is also the Art Director for Muji. In addition, I worked two days with Mr. Yamamzaki Yo, where I was trained in ancient Japanese bookbinding techniques. Mr. Yamazaki Yo is a renowned bookbinder in Tokyo.
Given the goal of the trip, it’s been an interesting journey. With the imagery I now hold, it will be interesting to go more in depth of Japanese design in order to relate it to Western design. The contact with Mr. Yamazaki Yo gave me not only a concrete introduction into Japanese bookbinding techniques, but there was also a fundamental insight into the Japanese way of life, aesthetics and accuracy. Kaoru Matsuno gave an insight into how Hara Design Institute works in various design processes.
The journey and the process has given me inspiration to convey impressions through both lectures and a book. The lectures are intended as a process description based on the experiences I have gained. The idea about the book is to create inspiration for both Japanese and Western designers.
An alternative, or as an addition, it is also possible to think of an exhibition. I have been in contact with Hagiso, a small, newly renovated Japanese house in Yanaka, north of Tokyo, that is a venue for art and other events. They are open to offer an exhibition space for the project. The idea of the exhibition is to introduce Japanese and Western design in a possible artistic context with the book and the bookbinding techniques as a starting point.
TRAVEL | Even though this was a vacation trip, I spent time looking at details, colors, typography, architecture, food, exhibitions, walls, posters, illustrations, decor, cars, furnitures and magazines.
Rome is a lovely city.
INSPIRATION | Good design is a tough job. New lovely book received today, directly from Germany and the publisher Hermann Schmidt Mainz. 40 projects. 40 theses. 1 manifesto by Kirsten Dietz & Jochen Rädeker. People mostly judge design on whether they like it or not. Although that is important, it is but one criterion. This book not only showcases their work, but also sets out in twenty theses the basic principles of what constitutes good design. Theses for an informed discussion, which is necessary if design is to be more than just pretty to look at. When designers understand their career as not just a job, but an attitude. This is what the book is about, what concerns the writers, what they believe in.
INSPIRATION | 365 days Typoinspiration from the Typodarium for the year 2011. 365 different fonts: bread-and-butter types and typographical baubles, character sets and punctuational marks, old masters and wild youths, favourite fonts from all over the world.
I love it!
INSPIRATION | And this book is one of them. Pachanga – magical moth patterns from the cloud forest. BelénmMena’s book is the celebration of a passion, creative trance, perfection and inspiration rolled into one and captured in a stunning publication by the publisher Hermann Schmidt Mainz. The cover design, typography, patterns and the book production is just great.