Published today in The Guardian and Daily Mail our latest design campaign for Liberty is Valentine themed with a serious message – to raise awareness of the poposed Justice and Security Green Paper which would allow secrets to be hidden from the courts, press and public, fundamentally damaging our right to fair trial.

Check out the For Their Eyes Only campaign on Liberty's website. 
 

Late last year we worked with oral historian Ruth Meyerowitz on a project marking 25 years of Mind in Bexley.

Ruth worked with people who attended Mind’s groups and services, to record their life stories, with a focus on their experiences of mental health and wellbeing.

In November 2011, the work was exhibited at the National Trust’s Hall Place . 

Entitled People in Mind, the exhibition attracted almost 150 visitors in two weeks. Extracts from the life story interviews were grouped around the themes that had emerged during the project. These were exhibited with the portrait photographs of participants, taken by photographer and filmmaker Daniel Quinones.

Calverts worked on layout, production and display of the exhibition. 

Read more about the project and hear extracts from the interviews on MIND’s blog.

Authors and publishers Marina Chang and Lukas Meusburger have reserved a small number of copies of The Food Junctions Cookbook to distribute at the discounted price of £9.50 / US$ 15.00 per copy (Amazon price £16.00) + £3.50 / US$ 9.00 post and packing. Please email us with your name, address and phone number to order one or more copies. Payment is by credit card over the phone.

Supported by University College London, The Food Junctions Cookbook project explores the complex relationships between food, human society and nature. Some 70 contributors share their ‘living recipes’ for things to cook, things to think about and above all things to do. It mixes practice, politics and pleasure and ties people together through a common interest in food.

The book takes the word recipe both literally and metaphorically, combining insights and inspirational stories from all round the world; how to taste wine, open up a catering co-op, deal with food waste, prevent childhood obesity, make delicious dishes from wild plants and grow food in the city.

The book was produced on our Heidelberg 5-colour B2 litho press using 120gsm Cocoon Offset for the inner pages, and 280gsm Revive 100 Uncoated for the cover (both premium 100% recycled white uncoated, FSC certified) with Bio vegetable oil based inks, under Calverts ISO14001 Environmental Management System.

Soft cover, 240mm x 170mm 200pp

ISBN 978-0-9570354-0-9

Clothes are an important part of our daily life. We have the opportunity to affect millions of people’s lives and to protect our environment by how we shop and what we wear.
 

If you’d like to create your own sustainable wardrobe, but don’t know where to start, then a new guide by Amisha Ghadiali and Joana Casaca Lemos might help. The 12 Rules To Dress By project is about raising awareness of the ethical issues in the fashion industry. It highlights the part that individuals can make to bring about change. The 12 simple steps laid out in the poster below create an easy way to a ethical fashion future.
 

To read more about the project, and download the full guide visit the Rules To Dress By web page. And if you decide to sign up to the challenge tweet your commitment by using the hashtag #12rulestodressby

We designed these Make-Your-Own postcards books, work books and jotters for an arts event.

Their production was partly an experiment to see how digital colour inks print on coloured paper stock.
By composing a single colour digital ink and printing onto various coloured paper stock we achieved some interesting colourways as the semi-transparency of the ink allowed the paper to show through.

With a few gift and craft shops in and around London stocking them the Make postcard books in particular are great fun for kids of all ages. Take one with you, affix some mementoes of a journey, add some doodles plus a stamp and hey presto – an original mixed media artwork is in the post.

If you would like one, or a set, let us know. They're reasonably priced if you can collect. Maybe we can barter. What have you got?

For her final research project designer Sarah Schrauwen has produced a useful guide exploring issues of sustainability in graphic design.

In the report she asks: How can we design and produce more sustainable products? How can we create a green working environment? How can we change the community, so that the next generation of designers will follow in our footsteps?

Sarah also offers solutions including 5 Tips for More Sustainable Design Work, and 10 Tips for a More Sustainable Studio.
 

There are interviews with industry experts, including Thomas Matthews, Beam, and Calverts.
 

Two hard copies of the report were printed in-house by Calverts on our KM 8000 digital press using 300gsm (FSC certifed) Loop Antique Vellum Jute for the cover and 90gsm (100% recycled) Cyclus Offset for the text, both papers from Paperback.
 

Envelopes and belly bands were made from the used paper wrappers.
 

Further detail at Sarah's website, where you can drop her an email to request a PDF copy of the report.

A Dictionary for the Future and How to Survive it

David Fleming’s Lean Logic was published in his memory in July 2011.

Printed at Calverts in hardback and finished with a beautiful green book cloth and gold foil blocking on the cover, the book comprises David’s final draft, comprehensive footnotes, bibliography and references and many wonderful wood cuts and illustrations. 

All proceeds from sales of Lean Logic will be used to promote David’s work and passions.

David was also involved in the Transition Network which supports community-led responses to climate change and shrinking supplies of cheap energy. The main site for the movement, especially in the UK, is http://www.transitionnetwork.org

Do please spread the lean logic word and encourage others to visit www.leanlogic.net where copies of the book can be bought.

We have a spare copy which we're happy to loan to any interested readers who can call in to collect. Let us know.

More information can be found about David Fleming at the Lean Economy website.

Hatched in our design studio and hot off our press we have these neat hydroponic plant tags.

As the tags are quite small and the information relatively detailed we included a QR code in the artwork pointing to a unique website address where readers can find out more and enter a competition to win some nice plants.

QR codes aren't the prettiest things but used creatively they can be incredibly useful in expanding the back story of a product, campaign, or organisation. Get in touch to find out more about using QR codes effectively in your marketing.

We designed and built this big can of soup for Liberty. It was filled with letters of protest against Westminster Council's plan to ban soup runs in central London.

In the letters, Liberty's director, Shami Chakrabarti, writes: "We urge you to vote against this proposal which will use the threat of criminal sanction to shut down charitable organisations assisting the most vulnerable in our community."

She adds: "Soup runs perform an important function, providing a safety net of food provision and a means by which to reach the most socially excluded people."

As it says on the can – it's our soup and we'll share it if we want to. Read more on Liberty's website

Client: Supporters Direct
Project: Briefing Papers

Supporters Direct promotes sustainable spectator sports clubs, based on supporters' involvement and community ownership. Its members are, in the main, grass roots supporters' trusts in football and rugby clubs.
 

We've just designed and printed the first two in a series of four heavyweight papers aimed at influencing policy thinkers and government. The first paper was 'Developing Public Policy to Encourage Supporter Community Ownership in Football'. Written by Substance, and with involvement from co-operative law specialists Cobbetts LLP plus research input from three universities, these publications will take SD to a new level of influence and respect as an advocate for co-operative ownership and control of sports clubs.
 

SD Chief Executive Dave Boyle gave us a succinct brief: we needed to create cool but lively, readable pages. Visual style: make it German. As fans of German magazine design ourselves, we thought we knew what he meant. The other requirement was to come up with an unusual format which would be cost effective in production terms.
 

The Calverts design team proposed the classic 'journal' format 240mm x 170mm portrait (sometimes known as B5) and specified an unusual, German-made recycled paper called Redeem, which is exclusive to Fenner Paper in the UK – it's a bulky, unbleached uncoated with a slightly greenish natural shade. Pages were set at an average 300 words, using indented pull quotes in subtle blocks of pastel colour to create visual rhythm.
 

The two reports, at 44pp and 52pp, were designed, laid out, proofed, amended, printed and delivered in record time, hours before a House of Commons launch on May 10th – which went really well, by all accounts. One MP commented to our client on the high production values, saying that to him it looked and felt … quite German.
 

You can download a complete PDF or order a copy of either report from the Supporters Direct website.