In preparing fro a Pichi Kicki style presentation about the work of the British Designer Peter Saville I was most interested on the impact he has seemed to have on the most recent generation of designers and how his work has stood the test of time.
Peter Saville CBE was born on the 9th of October 1955, he studied graphic design at Manchester Polytechnic from 1975 to 1978. Peter was a founder and graphic designer for the famous Manchester record company Factory Records. Where he designed many iconic graphics. He’s most famous for his work on numerous album covers and sleeves over the years, working with many famous bands as well as designing the branding for factory records and the famous Manchester nightclub Haçienda.
You will all probably recognise the cover for Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures album from 1979 on the far left in the middle row which he designed. It has had huge cultural significance and can be seen on numerous objects as it has been reproduced many times since its release. Also New Order’s Power, Corruption and Lies album (bottom, middle, right) from 1983 which is probably their best-known album. The cover features a painting by Henri Fantin-Latour and the same colour code used on the bands famous single Blue Monday. Saville is said to have been using the colour code to contrast the renaissance painting and make an ode to the new age of punk with this contrast of futuristic coding overlapping the old floral image.
From Raf Simons runway to streetwear brands like Supreme his designs have had a massive influence, probably due to the music they often go along with. He has collaborated on advertising campaigns for brands like Jill Sanders and been responsible for art direction of Yohji Yamamoto and Dior in his career. His graphics are synonymous with modern culture.
Below is another example of his forays into fashion, this time with Adidas for the PulseBeat Spezial. Inspired by the beating heart of Manchester and his aforementioned icon cover for the Mancunian band Joy Division. The collection also included a collaboration with Manchester United FC for a special edition match kit.
Peter is a proud Mancunian and was actually the creative director for the city of Manchester in 2004 when he redesigned the metro link and the cities logo.
He has worked on many weird and wacky projects including another Adidas shoe in 2006 where he started questioning consumerism, a trend that many have started to follow in more recent times and wondered why now everyone wanted the same expensive clothing when in the punk era he grew up in everyone wanted to be different. He worked with Umbro on the England football teams shirt in 2010, he was tasked with making a vibrant white shirt and was inspired by the many ethnicities of modern england to create a shirt covered in small rainbow coloured st Georges crosses. For the anniversary re-design of the Lacoste logo in 2013, he was told he could do anything with the logo except change the crocodile but instead decided to obliterate it into 60 or so iterations. Finally in 2019 he designed the Pornhub awards trophy depicting sex hormones.
He has had an eclectic career and struggled at times after his early success in album cover design to find work but has had one of the biggest impacts on fashion, music and culture in the past 40 years. He has inspired many designers I am a fan of today and paved the way for the next generation of creatives such as the late Virgil Abloh who was inspired by his knack of thinking outside of the box and always capturing so much with one image. I think he's great, what do you think?
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