In Brief BY Armin

In Brief: December Miscellany

For a slight change of pace today, I have a few interesting tidbits worth posting.

Earlier this month a story broke out, first on Popsop, that the Russian police was rebranding as part of its name change from militsia to politsia. A full-on website at newpolice.ru made it quite convincing. Turns out, as Design Week found out, the brand exercise was just that, executed by SmartHeart. And, yes, it looks a lot like Studio Dumbar’s work for the Dutch police.

Some interesting books:

The title of Identify: Basic Principles of Identity Design in the Iconic Trademarks of Chermayeff & Geismar leaves little to the imagination. It’s exactly what it says and it’s fantastic.

Indie Brands is a lovely designed new book that takes a look at 30 independent brands and what makes them work. A dedicated site has videos and excerpts.

In Brand Thinking and Other Noble Pursuits master interviewer Debbie Millman talks to 22 branding world personalities to get to the bottom of it all.

As a follow-up to the review of Atlassian, here is a behind-the-scenes look and explanation by their in-house designer, Jeff Kriege.

Graphic tinkerer Von Glitschka takes a stab at a better rendition of the Baltimore Orioles recently redesigned and reintroduced cartoon oriole. In the image above, Von’s is on the right.

Speaking of baseball, a new minor league team (not affiliated with the MLB) based in London, Canada that will begin play in the 2012 season has unveiled its name and logo: The London Rippers. Featuring a, well, ripper. Controversy ensues.