Bento & Co

Link: Browse website …

The real store of Bento & Co is located in Kyoto with focus on selling bentoboxes and many nice things all around bento. In their online store you can discover a lot of fetching Japanese style design products such as for example a «camera lens mug» as well as precious bamboo bentoboxes or cute food-picks. Click the link above and find our more!

The web design is a very well balanced mix of international and Japanese elements, the functionality offers everything, that a customer likes to have for a funny shopping tour. Currently it’s one of my favorite sites.

Iwasa Matabei - 岩佐 又兵衛

Iwasa Matabei (岩佐 又兵衛, 1578-1650) was a Japanese painter from Edo (now Tokyo)and he was specialized in illustrations of classical Japanese and Chinese literature, in portraits and also in the genre of historical event scenes. Upon the defeat and suicide of his father, a soldier and feudal lord of the Sengoku period, he took refuge in the Hongan Temple in Kyōto. Matabei’s work was noted for its striking figures, with large heads and delicately drawn details. It became the major influence on the ukiyo-e (color-print) school of painting, of which he was a major founder.

Museum Leaflets

Here’s a staple of museum leaflets, with a very Japanese design and many examples of a vertical typography. Visit also the websites:
• The Mizuno Museum of Art
• Miho Museum
• Nezu Museum
• Otsu City Museum of History
• Machida City Museum of Graphic Arts
• Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography
• Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo

Hajime Namiki

Link: Website of Fuji Arts Japanese Prints …

Hajime Namiki is a master of Contemporary Arts, born in Tokyo in 1947. He was fascinated by trees and captured their majesty and beauty in a modern style with traditional methods. Here you see a small collection of his exciting woodblock-prints, which he began to create since 1978. The nature scenes were printed on gold or silver leaf laid over Torinoko paper. You'll find more artwork of Hajime Namiki on the website of Fuji Arts.

Tokyo Subway Route Map

Link at infomapjapan: PDF of Tokyo Subway Route Map

Japanese subway route maps show an interesting detail: each station has its own number. I didn’t see such system on any other subway map in Europe or USA, there are only station-names. I experienced, that numbers are really helpful for visitors, which are not familiar with the many names and maybe also can’t pronounce them well. It’s easier to memorize the number for to get off at the right moment. And with making a countdown (or ~up) from station to station you would quickly recognize, if you ride into the wrong direction. よくできました！

千年の宴 Menu Card

Link: Browse website of Monteroza …

Monte Rosa Inc. is a large chain of restaurants, shops and brands, all over Japan and also overseas in Korea, Shanghai, Hong Kong. I brought this nice menu card from a 千年の宴 restaurant (‘Feast of Thousand Years’) located in 福井市 (Fukui). It shows the typical style of Japanese menu cards with many photos displaying perfectly arranged foods.

Doing business as foreign designer in Japan

Link: Article at PingMag

On the website of PingMag I an interesting interview with Parissa Haghirian from Austria, who is Associate Professor of International Management at Sophia University in Tokyo. She’s writing about business opportunities in Japan, the title of her book is “Markteintritt in Japan” (Market Entry in Japan). PingMag visited her at Sophia Uni for tips about how to bring your product to Japan, how to work there as foreigner and what kind of fundamental differences you might encounter.

Japanese Posters from DNP Archives

DNP (Dai Nippon Printing) is one of the largest and foremost printers in Japan with a rich heritage of graphic art and design. They have put on numerous exhibition in both Japan and abroad.

The outstanding role played by Japan’s culture of aesthetics in the birth of modern European art has continued through to this day in the unique development of Japanese graphic design - and in particular, through the genre of posters with their unmistakable aesthetic singularity, extraordinarily sophisticated printing techniques and immense power of expression.

Ikko Tanaka | 2

I had already posted some examples of Ikko Tanaka’s art work. Here’s a 2nd series of his unique design style.

Ikko Tanaka has been honored by many awards: JAAC Special Selection, Mainichi Industrial Design Award, Japan’s Ministry of Education, Tokyo ADC Members’ Grand Prize, Purple Ribbon Medal, New York ADC Hall of Fame Prize, Tokyo Art Directors Club, Japan Cultural Award, and many more. The Art Directors Club wrote:

Strong, clean, and impactful are the best descriptives you could use to describe Ikko Tanaka’s work. They are universal images, honed with a fastidious eye: finding the natural flow of photographs in a book spread, steadying the central point of a corporate symbol so the mind retains every detail, and enriching the typographic and illustrative forces of a poster into a pure, homogeneous form.

Graphic Design of the 1920s-30s | 2

Link: Website of ”pink tentacle“ ...

Source: Modernism on Paper | Japanese Graphic Design of the 1920s-30s (published 2003)

Graphic design of the 1920s-30s

Link: Website of ”pink tentacle“ ...

Source: Modernism on Paper | Japanese Graphic Design of the 1920s-30s (published 2003). Quote:

In the 1920s and 1930s, Japan embraced new forms of graphic design as waves of social change swept across the nation. This collection of posters, magazine covers and advertisements offer a glimpse at some of the prevailing tendencies in a society transformed by the growth of modern industry and technology, the popularity of Western art and culture, and the emergence of leftist political thought.

Museum Leaflets - The Mizuno Museum of Art, Nagano

Link: Browse the website …

Here’s another listing of colorful museum leaflets. In the collcetion of 2004 I noticed a little change of the footer design with the dark-red bar - it was made more consistent through all following publications. These well-designed leaflets are indeed inviting to visit the museum.

My favorites are: the 3rd and 5th from 2003 and I also like the last of 2007. Everyone is welcome to post a comment with your favorites ...

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

This is the design of my this year’s Christmas Card. This is not really Japanese design, but it's a Japanese inspired card, using ideas like simplicity and ’verticality’, and it's printed on Japanese paper. I’ll try to get closer to a typical but modern Japanese design for Christmas 2012.

2nd picture shows the additional objects displaying the same design: a mini-card with envelope, a bookmark, a small jewelery-box and the ’mono-version’ of the card.

Sony Website

Link: Sony website …

Similar to the website of Panasonic (see blog article), also Sony shows an international web-design, based on at least 4 Japan typical attributes: box-design, densley packed informations, many pictorial icons, personified product presentation.

The pages are headed by a massive black navigation bar, which can be seen the main parameter of the visual identity.

Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo

Link: Browse website …

The main event of this website is the artwork of the exhibitions and of the collection. The website itself just gives the frame. If it steps back behind the artwork with an unobtrusive design, it would be any website beyond recognition and without a unique appearance. This might be the reason for the remarkable color-concept, which gets more attention on some pages, than the contents.

Panasonic Website

Link: Panasonic website …

At first glance the Panasonic website shows an international and functional design. Additional it appears with that “box design” with densley information-filled pages and many pictorial icons. This seems to be typical for this category of Japanese websites. It’s conspicuous, that many products are presented with good looking people, mostly women. Very chic and descriptive: On image 1 (in picture-viewer) the colors of the cameras are visualized by tasty goodies (bottom center) or also by different styled women (top left).

Earthquake and Tsunami

On March 11th happened an earthquake of 9.0 on the Richter scale, followed by a destructive Tsunami to the north east cost of Japan. Additional a nuclear power station got out of control and threatens millions of people. My heart is sad, but I also believe in Japan's abilities to manage the disaster. My thoughts are there, I hope for worldwide solidarity.

Ikko Tanaka, Japanese Graphic Designer

Quote from Wikipedia:

Ikko Tanaka (1930 – 2002), a well-known Japanese graphic designer. The characteristic of his designs is a blending of deeply rooted Japanese traditions with western modernism to produce contemporary visual expression. Ikko Tanaka’s work includes the design of the symbols for Expo 1985 in Tsukuba and World City Expo Tokyo 1996. Amongst others he has worked for the Seibu Saison Group, The International Garden and Greenery Exposition, Hanae Mori, Issey Miyake, and the Mazda Corporation. Tanaka has curated and designed exhibitions for the Victoria and Albert Museum (London) and throughout Japan.

Recruiting Site

Mitsubishi UFJ Real Estate Services Co. LTD

Link: Browse website …

Perfectly made website with a unique Flash-based interface and pleasing color-concept. Also take a look on the nice hand-drawn letters of the logo-design. Great!

Asian Emoticons

On Wikipedia you can find a list of notable and commonly used emoticons or textual portrayals of a writer’s mood or facial expression in the form of icons. The Eastern emoticons are ‘eye-centered’ (^_^) while Western emoticons are ‘mouth-centered’ :-) Browse emoticons on Wikipedia ...