Modernism
These items have been very influential for me and Hey because they reflect the Modernist movement that is ultimately at the heart of what we do. It’s a style that has always been attractive to me. We’re not trying to replicate classics from the past but rather to reinterpret them a little bit by giving them a contemporary twist. I love timeless designs, and not just for the sake of aesthetics; they’ve been tested over the years and clearly work.
Side projects are the chance to be more experimental
Also, I find it interesting to try and create things that can’t immediately be fixed to a certain style era. Hopefully, this also means we have made something that doesn’t instantly date and appeals to a wide audience. We want to create designs that work for everyone which means you have to find the common denominators that draw people in and develop things from there.
Colours tell their own story and invoke certain feelings
Side projects
Side projects are the chance to be more experimental, try out different approaches and things. None of this time is wasted because, apart from whatever personal satisfaction you gain from the project, it is also going to make your commercial work better.
The Colour In Everything
Colour is very important; it’s one of the most important things for us. Colour is a way of sending a message that is every bit as strong and powerful as an image or illustration, if not more so.
Colours tell their own story and invoke certain feelings, consciously or subconsciously. These emotions probably go a long way back into our past as human beings so the power they have over us can be considerable.
Hey Studio Shop
We intend to increase the range of items we have for sale as well as our presence. We are setting up a physical HeyShop to sell our own work directly to people is something that we value a lot.
Caravelle
Caravelle is a restaurant and microbrewery based in the old quarter of Barcelona; we worked with them on a lot of different aspects of design but it was the labels we made for their craft beers that I particularly enjoyed.
The designs have classic elements to them but there are also contemporary influences. The intended result is hopefully something that appears accessible but at the same time suggests the exclusivity and knowingness that craft beer desires.
PAPYAY
PAPYAY was another recent project that required finding that same balance between broad appeal and uniqueness. The product is a children’s building block toy which needs to attract both the buyer (the adult) and the user (presumably a child!) but also has to convey its quality and specialness in a pretty crowded marketplace.
We used bright colours and geometric forms which make them both timeless and interesting for children to play with. We’d like to think that when these toys come out of storage in 20 years time for the next generation of a family to play with that they don’t look out of place and provoke screams of “oh my god this is sooooo 2018!”. I guess time will tell on timelessness.
Shop Verònica’s ‘I Want To Break Free’ T-shirt designed for International Womxn’s Day here.
