Sarah’s hardworking and cheerful style makes her the choice of clients with difficult corporate communication briefs, tricky creative collaborations and gant charts four and one half kilometres long. Sarah is committed to making images and communication that touch people from all walks of life.

. . .

Sarah Furzer
Designer and Image maker

Sarah has a degree in communication design from Monash University, graduating in 2006.

As the studio’s second intern, Sarah worked for six weeks in May 2007 and never left. Sarah is the Studio’s third full time designer and claims to have never liked using the computer during her time at university. The studio soon thrashed this anti computer thought out of her.

Sarah developed the images and design outcomes for the 2007 Moonlight Cinema Campaign, Department of Primary Industry, Fever Italia II, 2008 Melbourne Fringe Festival, and 2010 Australian Institute of Architects – extra/ordinary conference.

Type, white space, ink and cut paper, big dots, headlines and digital reckoning Sarah is ready to make work that stands out is seen, sell ticket and raises awareness.

Recruitment consultants or competing studios keep your sticky mits off Sarah, she’s ours.

Highlights

• 2006-7 developed communication campaigns for Moonlight Cinema
• 2007-8 developed communication campaigns for Melbourne Fringe Festival
• 2010 developed communications for Australian Institute of Architects – extra/ordinary conference

. . .

Our key people

Andrew Ashton
Designer and Director

Works directly with clients, drives the communication research and approach, manufacturing partners, develops projects and drives studio practice.

Click here for more information about Andrew

. . .

Studio interns
Assistant to designers

The studio runs an renowned internship programme running in four to eight week blocks. Our interns are typically design and communication students or recent graduates. The programme has been successfully running for five years and offers invaluable experience for emerging designers.

Our interns work directly with our designers, liaises with client under instruction, assists with image making, and project development.

Meet our latest intern here

Click here for more information about our internships

. . .

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Andrew enjoys the process of using creative communication as an instrument to effect change, across a range of media, for brand, commercial, cultural and community projects. Against the tide of pursuing an international design style, Andrew is committed to exploring and defining a contemporary Australian approach to communications and creative expression.

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Andrew Ashton
Designer and Director

Ashton was trained as a traditional designer. In over twenty years Ashton’s practice combines the rigors of making design in our recent past, with the push and pull of contemporary communication, traversing communication strategy, conceptual thinking, writing, art direction image making, and craftsmanship. Ashton has a cross discipline approach and actively works in brand, print, digital, environment, product development and public actions.

Highlights

• 1994 Established design studio Nelmes Smith Ashton in Sydney
• 1994 – 1996 developed the ground breaking campaign for the Australian Chamber Orchestra with photographer Greg Barrett
• 1997 celebrated suburban life in a poster series for Australian Graphic Design Association
• 1998 Awarded the coveted Australian Graphic Design Association Pinnacle Award
• 1999 redeveloped the corporate packaging range for fashion retailer Country Road
• 1999 rebranded Computershare Limited worldwide
• 2000 – 2009 evolved Saxton paper brand and rolled out a comprehensive professional and student campaign
• 2002 Awarded a second Australian Graphic Design Association Pinnacle Award
• 2002 appointed creative director of the Australian Graphic Design Association Award in Melbourne
• 2003 developed communications for the Melbourne Chamber Music Competition

• 2003 Established design and communication practice Studio Pip and Co. in Melbourne
• 2004 created paper brand Stephen
• 2004 – developed brand and communications for Jardan Australia
• 2004 developed communications for first State of Design Festival in Victoria
• 2004 devised the Australia’s first design Market ready Made Market (now Melbourne Design Market)
• 2005 Rebranded Chamber Music Australia
• 2005 developed communications for first State of Design Festival in Victoria
• 2005 Alliance Graphique Internationalé membership
• 2006-7 developed communication campaigns for Moonlight Cinema
• 2007-8 developed communication campaigns for Melbourne Fringe Festival
• 2010 developed communications for Australian Institute of Architects – extra/ordinary conference

. .

Biography

Andrew Ashton, was born in 1969 and spent his childhood in the suburbs of Sydney and country New South Wales in the 1970s and 1980s.

In 1989 he graduated from Randwick Graphic Design School and worked at Sydney based graphic design companies Lam-po-tang & Co and Gallaher + Associates. Ashton was trained in the all of the traditional skills of graphics – layout, type, mock up preparation, photography, illustration and mechanical artwork. Ashton started at the drawing table (with rulers and t-squares, pen and ink, galleys of type, mechanical artwork and fax machine), and in ten short years witnessed and participated in the roll out of the desk top computers, digital graphic equipment,  business software and the rise of marketing services.

In 1994 Ashton formed a design studio and partnership with designer / art director Graeme Smith and entrepeneur Rick Nelmes – Nelmes Smith Ashton (NSA). In ten years that followed NSA produced, experimented, pushed, reinvented and eventually evolved into Precinct Design – an organisation that was purchased by media company – The Photon Group. Atthe peak of Ashton’s involvement in 2001 Precinct had fifty staff, studios in Sydney, Melbourne, and Hong Kong, producing corporate design for government, financial services, corporate services and technology sectors. Precinct design continues to operate today.

In 1999 Ashton relocated to Melbourne to start and head up a new studio and evolve his design practice – a commitment to research, developing content, exploring design practice, philantrophy, education and community works. Highlights include: design event Ready Made Market, sessional teaching at Swinburne University (3 years), design student publication Read Me First, cross discipline design  series forty-eight (8 events), design blogging and writing, design presentations across Australia, New Zealand, Korea, Hong Kong, Beijing and San Francisco.

In 2003 Ashton founded Studio Pip and Co. The studio’s clients have included the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Australian Institute of Architects, Australian Paper, Chamber Music Australia, Computershare, Jardan Australia, Dame Elisabeth Murdoch, Melbourne Fringe Festival, Moonlight Cinema, Robert Horne Paper,  Spicers Paper and rising fashion design Yeojin Bae.

Ashton is a member of the prestigious Alliance Graphique Internationale (AGI), Switzerland. Ashton’s graphic design work has received industry awards and recognition. He has served on numerous design awards panels in Australia and overseas.

Along with commercial projects, Ashton produces an array of studio publications and products. Ashton volunteers for a range of cultural and industry organisations, periodically teaches design, writes often, takes photographs, follows contemporary Australian art and chases after his young family.

. . .

Our key people

. .

Sarah Furzer
Designer and Image maker

Works directly with clients, develops projects, directs manufacturing partners, image making, and studio practice.

Click here for more information about Sarah

. .

Studio interns
Assistant to designers

The studio runs an renowned internship programme running in four to eight week blocks. Our interns are typically design and communication students or recent graduates. The programme has been successfully running for five years and offers invaluable experience for emerging designers.

Our interns work directly with our designers, liaises with client under instruction, assists with image making, and project development.

Meet our latest intern here

Click here for more information about our internships

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Klopper brand and roll out / January 2011
Brand, print, signing communication.

If you trawl around the internet looking at design sites, many, like us, are spruiking their brands, graphic design and such things. One could could be forgiven to think that graphics is a complex vocation – coming up with ideas, making images, developing messages and putting them together. At the other extreme, one could think that graphic designers can rattle on about things that don’t matter in the scheme of things. In such a space, one of our favourite approaches (if you hadn’t guessed already), is to strip it all back – and their is nothing like a looming real deadline to keep the complexity of what our work can be in place.

Jenny from Klopper dropped into the studio just before Christmas and said – in two weeks I have a shop site in a really hot spot ay the South Melbourne Market, and I need some imagery and graphic presences to pull the whole thing off. Late the next afternoon we delivered the first round of visuals, and the day after we had graphic files going off to manufacturers.

Jenny is an imaginative and hands on person. She likes to make things, find things, move things, turn great objects without a home into objects of desire – a visit to her shop, which simply emerged from stuff collected out in her garage, confirms this.

Jenny’s store is filled with many great / sometimes designer / retro objects. One loves inspecting such objects – the object itself is typically seductive, considered, unique and turn it over and there a simple brand mark staring back you saying – see, we don’t need some fancy symbol, or typeface with rounded corners. All we had to do is do some confident unassuming type.

We made for Jenny, three custom ‘K’s, two type marks, a big sheet of stencils, stamps, stickers, paper suggestions and rough instructions and Jenny brought her brand to life. This project is another great example of D.I.Y design. From these images the brand has a life, variation and we sat on the side lines and watched it happen.

A favourite project is the signs for the shop. Jenny has a load of florescent light covers needing a use – long frosty perspex boxes. We measured one up, positioned the type mark and then instructed a reverse vinyl sticker to be made. With a little encouragement Jenny learned how to position the vinyl sticker on the inside find a light source – an then we have a type mark with soft edges.

Next stop is Stall 224, South Melbourne Market, Klopper love to see you and bring some money. Thanks to Jenny again, wonderful fun.

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Inspired by Paul Macartney’s – Maybe I am Amazed. Song lyrics, love graphics, six text posters, six graphic posters, half on Pink Optix, the other half on Baby Blue Optix, 180 copies, 90 Melbourne sites.

We commenced the project mid last week. We acknowledged that design required clear and uncomplicated design values. The work had to be made in house as it could be easily damaged, trashed and recycled. We started by developing an uncomplicated concept, dug through our visual archive, made some romance inspired visuals in half a day, fine tuned Friday and then installed on Valentine’s Day. There is plenty of overprinting for our friend Mr Tony-I-Design–Sans-Overprint ta boot.

Valentine’s Day has become a bit of retail sell fest. In response we thought we could put a feeling out there that celebrates the special connection that people make with each other, beyond the sex thing. The feelings, the thoughts, the physical, are things in a friendship that transcends retail fix its. We wanted to simply communicate these ideas to the public on V Day.

Lesson 1 /

Even in the matters of love, commerce shows no mercy – unless one has a garage sale, or lost pet notice. It appears that the act of public notice, displaying flyers or posters, an act that has been around for two thousand years, is a highly controlled social medium and potentially not the space to create a grass roots campaign or action. The majority of the sites were killed by the street poster cartel, a very tidy job too, it seems well before 9am.

Our best intentions were there never-the-less. We enjoyed making a public action which brought together an idea with print, environment, digital media devised to create many public responses and interactions. Happy V Day everyone.

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To coincide with our exclusive open studio night AGIdeas have developed a multi studio event … to celebrate we have put together a series of bespoke invitations for 16 invitees. To be a part of our night register with the AGIdeas crew at the 2011 AGIdeas website. Thanks again Kristen, Eleni and crew.

If you have one of our invitations please visit our password protected space here, with your password of course.

Visit AGideas here

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