Designing with emptiness

Demian Conrad

We designed the New Year card for EPFL (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne), the most cosmopolitan of all European technical universities. Taking inspiration from its central building, designed by SANAA architects, this card is an homage to the use of paper and its sculptural and haptic qualities. A metaphoric journey into EPFL architecture where the organic shapes of the building, cut-out from the paper, creates unexpected overlap and surprising shadow effects.

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    Demian Conrad, Switzerland (2017)

    Demian Conrad is a Swiss designer, researcher, educator and artist. He established its own independent studio Automatico in 2007 working mainly for visual identities, editorial design, wayfinding and signage. Emptiness...

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    We designed the New Year card for EPFL (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne), the most cosmopolitan of all European technical universities. Taking inspiration from its central building, designed by SANAA architects, this card is an homage to the use of paper and its sculptural and haptic qualities. A metaphoric journey into EPFL architecture where the organic shapes of the building, cut-out from the paper, creates unexpected overlap and surprising shadow effects.

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    Demian Conrad, Switzerland (2017)

    Demian Conrad is a Swiss designer, researcher, educator and artist. He established its own independent studio Automatico in 2007 working mainly for visual identities, editorial design, wayfinding and signage.

    Emptiness, lightness, proportion are an intrinsic part of the studio’s visual language. Automatico safeguards the elegant and essential, believing that less can be more.

    He has worked for clients such as Le Grand Palais de Paris, Art Basel, EFPL, Mudac (Museum of Design in Lausanne), MCBA (Museum of fine Art in Lausanne), ProHelvetia, EFPL among others.

    Demian won many awards such as Art Director Club in 2017, First Prize at European in 2013, 100 Beste Plakate in ’08, ’09, ’11, ’17 and several Nominations at German Design Awards among others.

    He studied Visual Communication at SUPSI Lugano and since 2015 he is teaching editorial design at HEAD-Genève, where he also co-founded the experimental laboratory Center for Future Publishing.

    He’s currently leading a research project on the topic of “creative coding” and he is running a series of instagram lives on the topic of “simplicity”.

    Publications

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    Famous Ordinary Things

    (2015)

    • Demian Conrad,
    • Rob van Leijsen

    DABOOK

    "Famous" Swiss actors from the creative, artistic, or political field contributed to the book by taking a snapshot of a design item from environment. The resulting images underline the contemporary landscape of home and office interiors in Switzerland and remind us how these objects impact our everyday lives. With contributions by Mario Botta, Olaf Breuning, Alain de Botton, Hans Ulrich Obrist, and many others.

    Education

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