The Designers Republic
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The Designers Republic (TDR or miTDR for short) is a group of graphic designers, founded on July 14 1986 by Ian Anderson, and based in Sheffield, England. It is known for its anti-establishment aesthetics.
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History
Initially, Ian Anderon founded TDR to design Flyers for the band Person to Person, which he managed at the time. His first ideas were inspired by Russian constructivism. From the beginning, the works should be in contrast to the current understanding of design (Quote: TDR is a declaration of independence from what we perceive to be the existing design community).
The Designers Republic were introduced to a larger audience by their record cover for the English electronica label Warp Records. Because of the anti-capitalist tendencies in its work, the company has a majority of its clients in the music and entertainment industries: TDR designed the covers of CDs by Autechre and Aphex Twin, but also for artist like Funkstörung, Supergrass, Pop Will Eat Itself and Towa Tei.
Outside the musical sector, TDR created the packaging and manual for the Playstation game WipEout, and cooperated with the Swatch company in 1996 to design their own watch. They also designed the packaging for Sony's Aibo.
In 2001 the book 3D - 2D The Designers Republic's adventures in and out of Architecture, which presented an overview of the different works of the group, was released. The book was preordered by over 3,000 fans, but could only in part live up to the high expectations, because many of the included designs were considered rather conventional.
Current members are Ian Anderson, Nick Bax, Matt Pyke, David Bailey, Abby Ribbands, Vicki Lewis and Bob Sanderson.
Influence
The work of TDR had great influence on the development of graphic design, especially in the fields of web and cover design in the electronica scene.
Style
The Designer Republic's works are playful and bright, but very minimalistic, mixing images from Japanese anime cartoons and subvertized corporate logos, with a postmodern tendency towards controversial irony, featuring statements like "Work Buy Consume Die" or "Customized Terror".
Works
TDR worked in a diverse range of media, including:
- Covers of CDs, vinyl records and DVDs
- Typography
- Web design
- Music video production
- Apparel design
- Packaging
- Corporate design
- Logo design
External links
- The Designers Republic Dot Com (http://www.thedesignersrepublic.com)
- The Peoples Bureau For Consumer Information - A Public Service Division of TDR (http://www.thepeoplesbureau.com/)de:The_Designers_Republic