New Originals: introducing the London Rollergirls

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Work / Digital A Pint in London: a new game where the quest is for the perfect tipple

A Pint in London, a game created by London-based writer Ana Kinsella, is a narrative-led, web-based game taking the user on a multiple choice journey through London in search of the perfect pint spot. It’s a game that’s simple in its idea, but finding “your pub” is one of those personal joys of London – a city that to some seems like a stressful metropolis, but to others is a collection of tiny villages to wander through and make your own.

Lucy Bourton — 18 February 2019
Work / Miscellaneous Is robotics set to be the next creative trend for artists and designers?

AATB is the collaborative practice of Andrea Anner and Thibault Brevet. Having studied graphic design at ECAL, the duo, now based in Marseille, focusses their attention on robotics and the fascinating, unexplored territory of how it can be utilised outside of industry for creative (and sometimes counter-productive) means.

Ruby Boddington — 07 February 2019
Work / Miscellaneous Thibault Le Hégarat's collection of eight-bit video game skies is a design gem

Last year Thibault Le Hégarat, a doctor of contemporary history and a teacher, was showing his students some impressionist paintings by the likes of Monet and Boudin. During the class, Thibault asked the class to describe one particular and always consistent element of any landscape painting: the clouds. “It was a good time to reflect together on the ever-changing nature of the sky, and also the fact that each of us can see something different represented,” he says, “even when looking at the same skies.”

Lucy Bourton — 31 January 2019
Work / Miscellaneous Take part in our 2019 audience survey and you could win a £200 gift voucher and more

For the past 11 years It’s Nice That’s mission to champion creativity has remained at the core of what we do. The team here are committed to bringing you the best and most inspiring creative work from across the world, organising events that will entertain you, and producing magazines you will cherish for years to come.

It's Nice That — 21 January 2019
Work / Miscellaneous Here's how It's Nice That cheers ourselves up on Blue Monday

Hello and welcome to what is traditionally regarded as the most depressing day of the year. Isn’t that a simultaneously bleak and comforting prospect? Today might be hell but look, in a few hours it’s all over and the rest of 2019 will be an absolute breeze.

It's Nice That — 21 January 2019
Work / Miscellaneous "Are we any wiser about how ideas work?": How to spark worthwhile creative ideas in 2019

Towards the end of 2018 WeTransfer released its Ideas Report digging into where, why and how creative ideas develop and reach fruition. Below Rob Alderson, VP of content and editor-in-chief at WeTransfer, shares his five key learnings as a guide to developing ideas to inform your creative practice this coming year.

Rob Alderson — 14 January 2019

Work / Publication OK-RM and Daniel Shea collaborate on a new work of fiction exploring natural resources

In a compelling new collaboration, esteemed design studio OK-RM teams up with artist Daniel Shea to create Ex Nihilo; a documentation of material products. Commissioned by fashion brand 1017-Alyx-9SM, Ex Nihilo is a series of printed objects including a book, a set of six posters and a stash of plates, contained within a high-gloss folder and fastened by the simple but trustworthy rubber band.

Jyni Ong — 19 February 2019
Work / Illustration Cépé's illustrations capture the colours of southern France

Inspired by the French and Belgian comics his father collected growing up in Marseille, Cédric Pierre-Bez – known by his artist moniker Cépé – had great admiration for his country’s biggest cartoonists, such as Giraud, Druillet and Loisel. After early childhood fantasies of being a thief, of all things, he realised that he could instead have whatever he wanted by drawing it rather than stealing it: “At that age, I had the impression that by drawing an object, it belonged to me,” he tells It’s Nice That. “But I came to understand that an illustrator is never satisfied, because the object of their drawings never belongs to them – that’s what maintains their desire and creativity.”

Daniel Milroy Maher — 19 February 2019
Features / Found in Adobe Stock Joe Melhuish turns fidget spinners, avocados and anvils into animated outfits for any millennial

For Found in Adobe Stock, It’s Nice That has commissioned creatives to explore the world of Adobe Stock’s 3D collection to make a series of works using their individual discoveries. Starting from the same jumping off point, the project follows the journey each creative took as their paths diverged into the strange and wondrous depths of the huge collection, and how they used what they found to make beautiful and hypnotic final pieces.

It's Nice That — 19 February 2019
Work / Photography Gourau and Phong stretches reality by combing photography with new technologies

“We define ourselves as photographers even when we’re working with 3D materials,” say Paris-based duo Benjamin Roulet and François Bellabas. "Everything comes from photography.”

Ruby Boddington — 19 February 2019
Work / Graphic Design Graphic designer Benoît Brun’s comics-inspired typography leaps off the page

For graphic designer Benoît Brun, there is “another dimension” to typography, which goes beyond readability: “[It] can also stimulate, give emotion and excitement," the designer tells It’s Nice That. “Lettering on a poster can give someone walking on the street the opportunity to get an eyeful. I like that we can contemplate a set of letters, give them a certain amount of time and ask ourselves what they mean”, he continues. “In my work, I like to handle drawing, create new formal repertoires and develop my own tools while keeping a strict and rigorous approach,” Benoît says. “That’s why in typography I’m interested in display fonts for their formal and expressive character. Through their abstraction, I see drawings, surface games, full and empty, in the letters.”

Billie Muraben — 19 February 2019
Work / Photography Antonis Theodoridis chases the sunlight of Athens in his series Ways of Escape

Ways of Escape, the latest and ongoing series by Greek photographer Antonis Theodoridis, looks at Athens in a different light to the gloomy one cast on the city by the country’s recent economic crisis – namely, the sunlight that continues to bathe its streets with a dazzling glow.

Daniel Milroy Maher — 19 February 2019

Work / Animation “All I could see was puppets”: Johnny Kelly on his series of sweet shorts for Cheerios

Johnny Kelly has created a series of short films for Cheerios. With the overarching title of Right on Tracks, the films encourage children to be kinder to each other through a silly, funny and touching cast of puppets which play out the stories being told in four original songs. Detailing everything from learning about the different types of family structures that exist to simply sitting with someone new at lunchtime, Jonny’s work is both engaging and informative. We caught up with the Nexus Studios director to find out more about the project, below.

Ruby Boddington — 18 February 2019
Work / Illustration Melek Zertal's illustrations all feature different versions of herself

“I have no idea what I’m doing,” begins illustrator Melek Zertal on the topic of how she discovered her practice. “I like drawing, but when I do it I get bored and wonder if I wouldn’t be better off making clothes or music videos.” The Algerian-born, Parisian-raised artist has a nonchalant attitude towards her practice that belies the work itself, which is at once soft and striking.

Daniel Milroy Maher — 18 February 2019
Work / Graphic Design Wyatt Knowles on his DIY approach to poster design

Three months after starting his BFA in Drawing at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Wyatt Knowles discovered collage and spent most of his time doing that instead. During this time he also started making posters and flyers for the bands he and his friends were in: “I think I enjoyed the freedom and contrast of just making this sort of throw-away thing, in comparison to the big conceptual ideas I had to have for my university work,” he tells It’s Nice That.

Daniel Milroy Maher — 18 February 2019
Work / Illustration Jaemin Lee takes on the influence of 80s pop in his illustrative process and aesthetic

Graphic designer Jaemin Lee’s recent Risograph-printed work shares the graphic sensitivity we’ve come to recognise as the core of his work, in compositions that have an equal focus on visual storytelling and production values.

Billie Muraben — 18 February 2019
Work / Digital A Pint in London: a new game where the quest is for the perfect tipple

A Pint in London, a game created by London-based writer Ana Kinsella, is a narrative-led, web-based game taking the user on a multiple choice journey through London in search of the perfect pint spot. It’s a game that’s simple in its idea, but finding “your pub” is one of those personal joys of London – a city that to some seems like a stressful metropolis, but to others is a collection of tiny villages to wander through and make your own.

Lucy Bourton — 18 February 2019
Work / Graphic Design “There is no value in change for change’s sake”: an exclusive look at Spin's update of Mubi’s visual language

“I’ll tell you something,” says Efe Cakarel, the founder and CEO of Mubi as our conversation around Spin’s new visual language update to his company’s identity begins. “For me, the definition of a client is someone who, every time someone presents a piece of work, they say: ‘great, but can you make it a little worse,’” he continues, between laughing. “I try very hard not the be this person.” This attitude is one that has led Mubi’s subtle, but detailed visual update, unveiled today and designed by Spin.

Lucy Bourton — 18 February 2019

Features / Publication “For the new generasian”: a look back on long lost design treasure, Yolk magazine

In the first half of the 1990s, before the term “cultural appropriation” was a widely understood concept, a group of 20-something Asian Americans were seeking to improve their visibility. Gathering together in Los Angeles’ media capital with two Macintosh LC’s (those old solid beige blocks of computers,) and an edition of QuarkXPress (otherwise known as InDesign’s great-great-grandma), a magazine priding itself on expressing unheard stories from the East and South-East Asian diaspora in the US was formed. That magazine, was Yolk. A one of a kind title in its celebration of Asian and Asian American identity, Yolk ran from 1994 to 2003. Since then, not a single publication has come close to rivalling its mantel for championing people of Asian descent. It was innovative in its art direction, experimental layouts and not to mention its original content. It featured interviews with highly visible film directors such as Ang Lee, to features on lesser-known creatives like Pedro Flores, the inventor of the Yo-yo. Yolk created a platform not only for Asian faces but for wide spanning editorial storytelling and cutting-edge graphic design, highlighting ten years of Asian creativity during a period of very little non-white representation in the mainstream media.

Jyni Ong — 18 February 2019
Work / Illustration Minet Kim’s illustrations explore the unconscious through symbols and colour

Minet Kim’s illustrations are not just easy on the eye in their quirky sense of fun. As well as being brightly cheerful with a hint of the surreal, the Seoul-based illustrator’s practice is founded on emotion, as well as conceptual thought. She tells It’s Nice That: “There was nothing to do in my hometown when I was little.” From a small countryside village called Yeosu which is by the sea, Minet spent her childhood drawing, watching a lot of animation, and collecting seashells with her grandfather near his ship.

Jyni Ong — 15 February 2019
Work / Graphic Design Kay Kwon’s graphic design practice arose from his love of rock and hip-hop music

Seoul-based graphic designer Kay Kwon attributes much of his career to his love of rock and hip-hop growing up. “I’ve always been interested in album artwork and covers,” Kay tells It’s Nice That. “Exposed to the Korean indie scene, I felt a big discrepancy between the quality of album artwork and the quality of the music,” explains Kay. “The music would be quite exceptional, but the album artwork wasn’t always the best reflection of it.” Kay speculates this “discrepancy” was down to “a lack of readily available design resources” and as a result, the designer pursued the industry with the hopes of one day, contributing his designs to the music scene.

Jyni Ong — 15 February 2019
Work / Photography Sam Gregg's latest work uses photography to rediscover his hometown of London

Last time we wrote about photographer Sam Gregg’s work, it was his series See Naples and Die which formed the basis of our conversation. At the time, he was living in the city, teaching English over the course of a year. Prior to this, Sam had spent three years in Bangkok, working for an international film company. Upon his return to the UK in early 2018, he realised that his time away, “coupled with the present, constant rhetoric about nationality”, meant he was experiencing a disassociation with being British. With this in mind, he began exploring his hometown of London in an attempt to reconnect to it the only way he knew how, with a camera around his neck.

Ruby Boddington — 15 February 2019
Work / Graphic Design Joel Evey tests the visual boundaries of Gap through his “under-the-radar” work

When asked to recall a brand with a reputation for continually pushing and redefining its aesthetic choices, we have to admit that Gap wasn’t at the top of our list. But, now, thanks to the work of Joel Evey, the clothing retailer’s senior director of the global creative studio, that may be about to change.

Ruby Boddington — 15 February 2019
Work / Art Madelynn Mae Green’s paintings explore themes of memory, family and domesticity

“I love painting because it requires a combination of analytics and intuition,” says artist Madelynn Mae Green. Born in Milwaukee, Madelynn began painting at the age of 14 and continued simply because she “enjoyed it”. Following on from this, in 2017 she moved across to the UK to pursue an MA in Fine Art at Central Saint Martins.

Daniel Milroy Maher — 15 February 2019

Regulars / Nicer Tuesdays Department of New Realities on using VR and AR to give pixels personality

The final speaker at January’s Nicer Tuesdays was the Department of New Realities, a collective based within Wieden+Kennedy’s offices in Amsterdam. Joining us from DPTNR was Anita and Geoffrey, who “come from a crazy suburban hell in America and Australia," they explained to the audience. "Places where we had to create our own worlds and our own cultures.”

It's Nice That — 15 February 2019
Work / Animation Caitlin McCarthy's new film features coldsores, boner humour and a new female hero

“I wanted to make a high school movie that was in line with my own adolescent experience as an internet dweller who nobody wanted to get off with,” says Caitlin McCarthy, a London-based animator who is definitely our creative crush this valentines for her new film Coldsore. Telling the story of the sweetest and shyly smiling teen, Coldsore documents Caitlin’s protagonists quest for a cold sore after the coolest girl waltzes into school sporting some blistering friends surrounding her lips.

Lucy Bourton — 14 February 2019
Work / Photography Lucy Pullicino documents the personal adornments on motorcycle-taxis in Arusha

“I was apprehensive at first about doing a photography project in Tanzania,” explains the photographer Lucy Pullicino. “Coming from a place of white privilege and being an outsider to the community” the photographer consciously questioned her position on the project before embarking on the beautiful series titled The Bikers of Esso Road; documenting motorcycle-taxis in Arusha.

Jyni Ong — 14 February 2019
Sponsored / Digital Dropbox launches new blog vocalising its unique point of view on work culture

As a tool, Dropbox has always encouraged communication and collaboration. It attracts creatives, in particular, to utilise its services to further their work, whether it be sharing ideas through files or providing a platform for conversation via Dropbox Paper. To continue and elevate this work, its new blog, Work in Progress, provides insight into its product updates as well as sharing stories of new creative projects, overall vocalising its unique point of view on work culture.

Sponsored Content — 14 February 2019
Regulars / Nicer Tuesdays Jonny and Will on taking techniques back to basics in directing and puppeteering

Joining us at January’s Nicer Tuesdays was director and puppeteering duo Jonny Sabbagh and Will Harper, otherwise known as Jonny and Will.

It's Nice That — 14 February 2019
Work / Illustration Everpress’ “slimy love slug” inspired Valentine’s campaign is a wide-ranging vision of love ‘n’ lust

This year, to mark the beloved Saint Valentine’s Day, ethical fashion platform Everpress has asked nine of its favourite artists, illustrators, animators and designers to respond to the day in the form of a T-Shirt. Everpress recognises that there’s a range of responses to Valentine’s Day, from unbridled joy to tears or bitter laments – and “it’s come to be defined largely by overpriced menus and empty Hallmark sentiments”. As a result the collection, titled Love is the Message, takes it back-to-basics, “observing the day as it is and was, as a celebration of romance”.

Billie Muraben — 14 February 2019

Work / Graphic Design Heat by David Loy uses coding and thermochromic ink to educate on climate change

“Daily, through our screens, we see accumulations of information overload about climate change,” states graphic designer David Loy. “Our visual landscape is full of climate disasters, political debate and global warming impacts. It gave me the unusual sensation that it had become almost commonplace.” Spurred on by this fact, David created Heat an in-depth project which explores global warming and its long-term effects away from mass media.

Ruby Boddington — 14 February 2019
Work / Publication FatBoy is the new loud and proud zine dedicated to Asian food and culture

Inspired by his relationship with food stemming back to when he was a child, Christopher O’leary, alongside photographer Emily Leonard, has created FatBoy Zine, a new magazine acting as a tribute to the wonderful world of Asian cuisine and culture.

Daniel Milroy Maher — 14 February 2019
Work / Animation Temple Caché’s animation for new Gérald Toto track explores love and loneliness

Temple Caché, an award-winning French video production company has joined up with fellow French musician Gérald Toto to animate a track from his latest album Sway, titled You Got Me.

Daniel Milroy Maher — 13 February 2019
Work / Art Evie O’Connor on her intimate portraits that explore class and politics

Evie O’Connor’s paintings are intimate, elegant and some are even downright funny. On first glance, the pieces that really grab our attentions are the painted ashtrays of Theresa May and Boris Johnson, captioned with “Prime Twat” and “Lying Twat” respectively. She professes how her work can be “crass and political at times” as part of her larger exploration into symbols of privilege and wealth.

Jyni Ong — 13 February 2019
Work / Publication Klasse John Morgan takes Virginia Woolf’s Solid Objects through a variety of translation processes

“Raum 106 is a class, a studio, a library, and a publication,” says John Morgan, of the publication designed and produced by Klasse John Morgan, at the Kunstakademie, Düsseldorf where he’s been professor of Entwurf, Typographie und Buchkunst since 2016. “Typographie und Buchkunst” translates as typography and book art, but there isn’t a direct translation for Entwurf: “today it typically means ‘to sketch, design, draft, plan, outline’”, John tells It’s Nice That. It’s previously been translated as to form a picture, design, out-throw, throw-open and to throw forward: “This etymology is useful for us to underscore the role and practice of an artist as a ‘conceiver-projector’, working across disciplines.”

Billie Muraben — 13 February 2019
Work / Photography Issac Lam and John Yuyi remind locals that Hong Kong is not a “dying” city

For those of us who have never been to Hong Kong before, it sure does look like a cool place to visit. An amalgamation of culture and ideology, the financial hub seems almost unimaginable to those who have never walked its busy streets. The Hong Kong-based photographer Issac Lam, and Taiwanese artist John Yuyi, teamed up to present two varying sides of the city in their latest project. Through a series of photographs, they explore the city as an inhabitant and tourist, colliding their vision of a “really really special and unique style of culture.”

Jyni Ong — 13 February 2019