The racing car is the product of an endless search for a high speed and precision performance machine, both in terms of engineering and aesthetics. Sven Voelker’s latest book Go Faster: The Graphic Design of Racing Cars looks at how the exterior graphic design of racing cars has become just as important as the engineering that lies underneath their form-fitting shells. To kick things off Sven Voelker takes a deeper look into the history of the racing car design since the turn of the 19th Century. Highlighting milestones such as the adoption of colour—first to signify the country each racer was representing then later shifting to represent each team—then progressing to look at one of the most iconic markings, the double racing stripes. Moving on into post-war racing, Voelker focuses on the shift in the role advertising has played on the car’s bodywork where previously advertisers had been more concerned with ad space on the track sidelines. The essay presents interesting anecdotes including differences of opinions between sponsors and teams (Martini and Porsche 912/20 butcher’s diagram car springs to mind) and the numerous artists who were invited to paint unique artwork directly on the cars.

Documented with beautiful archive imagery to bring context to the essay, the rest of the book’s editorial direction is much more analytical. Using replica collectable toy cars sprayed with white chalk powder—juxtaposed with their liveried counterparts—they’re displayed both side on and in top down profile views. This works really well in showing just how effective the graphic design of these classics really were. Everyone will have their favourites (though the Porsche 917K 1971 is a bit of a beauty), the uncluttered approach to the layout of Go Faster in conjunction with the index makes for a great visual reference.

What Go Faster highlights well is how surprisingly no graphic designers have ever been involved in creating the aesthetics of any of these racing cars. Instead the responsibility falling on a combination of engineers, car designers or sponsors. Yet looking at them as a body of work it’s clear how successful they’ve been at creating visually faster cars as well as being accepted as icons in contemporary culture in a wider context than just design.

Sharing the racing car designs in Go Faster and the process that Sven Voelker went through to research the book, it’s obvious that it was a labour of love for him. A lot of car racing fans will really appreciate this attention to detail and access to archive imagery. Hard bound and produced to a high standard as usual from any Gestalten title the production imagery of Sven at work interleaved in the book mirrors those who created these stunning racing car designs. Go Faster is pretty niche in its content but even if you don’t have a specific project where this sort of reference material is likely to come in handy, most will relate to the work on show. It feels reminiscent of those imaginative doodling days of childhood, dreaming up frivolous designs full of kudos and speed much like the real things.

For anyone looking for further reading, have a look at the interview with Sven Voelker on Gestalten TV.

Go Faster: The Graphic Design of Racing Cars is available from Amazon and all good local book stores now.

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Words: Gil Cocker
Photography: Malcolm Menzies

Like always we’ve put high resolution versions of the images on the Facebook Fan Page and in the FormFiftyFive flickr group. So what better chance to have a look around.

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Some great portrait photography from Bradford Gregory. By the looks of things he’s got a thing for models with gaps in their front teeth.

   

This weeks Postal Ephemera is Pick Me Up inspired bumper edition.

I got the chance to have a look round Pick Me Up before it closed and I must say it was a cracking showcase of image making talent that brought a lot of publicity to those artists exhibiting and the graphic design industry.

To coincide with the show lots of printed materials were created including this sweet, lo-fi curation booklet documenting the artists exhibited as well as providing some background context to the show. In the spirit of what felt like a degree show like exhibition the booklets dainty A6 size is printed on a variety of coloured stocks in single colour prints. This really helped to create a hand made low tech feel that mirrored the essence of what Pick Me Up and a lot of it’s artists work was about.

Fitting in with Pick Me Up and Landfill Editions who were exhibiting along with their beloved Riso machine, I thought it’d be a good chance to show off this print method that’s growing with popularity. I managed to get some samples from Landfill Editions and they’re very good. Riso printers are somewhere in-between litho printers and photocopiers—if you’re interested in finding out more I suggest you read this article. They’re aimed at projects with relatively short runs but at an affordable price. Their low-tech nature is making them a big hit with indie publishers and zine makers and it’s no surprise as the single colour aesthetic that retains the litho halftone look is very appealing. It’s a process I’ve marked up for using in the near future on some new projects.

One for our Scottish readers, we’ve got a hundred tickets to give away for this coming Monday’s (17th May) Made in Italy: Milan Design City talk at The Lighthouse in Glasgow in collaboration with The Design Museum. Curator and lecturer Daniel Charny, designer Fabio Novembre, and curator and editor Joseph Grima, will explore how this city and the annual Salone de Mobile provoke and promote new Italian design.

To grab your free ticket email tickets@designmuseum.org, first come first server. If that wasn’t enough there’ll be free drinks and Italian nibbles—you lucky folks. If you’re not able to get any of the free tickets before they all go, they’re on sale at Tickets £10/ £5 members via tickets@designmuseum.org.

I made this giant yeti as part of Helen Frik’s Difficult exhibition on at Chapter in Cardiff earlier in the year. Unfortunately didn’t get the time to make the trip to see it in situ but it he was a hell of a lot of fun to make. At roughly 75cm standing tall and easily that again for his arm span, he dwarfed the regular sized. Although he’s not officially available to buy I’d be interested in making this sort of size to commission.

For my next project a life sized yeti?

I’m sure a lot of you are very excited by the World Cup coming up and to celebrate that fact, we’ve teamed up with Ryan Tym who’s very kindly donated one of his vintage Subbuteo screenprinted pitches. Hand-pulled in an ultra limited set of 20, Ryan has printed the poster on vintage Subuteo pitches. The prints look amazing and jealousy inducing and it’s clear Ryan’s put in a lot hard work to make this project happening as well as documenting the print process in the following video.

For more details at www.ryantym.com and full set of images on Ryan Tym’s flickr.

Finally above is the very poster up for grabs—each one is a little bit different.

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For the competition, we’re giving away one of the pitches to a lucky reader who answers the following question correctly.

In which country is this year’s World Cup 2010 being held?

A. Japan

B. South Africa

C. Brazil

Send your answers to win@formfiftyfive.com with the subject line: I want a Subbuteo poster so bad. Don’t forget to include your full name, postal address if you win and a contact number. The competition closes at 11:59 GMT on 17th May 2010 and we’ll be announcing a winner the following Monday 18th May.

The competition is open to UK residents only, one entry per person and we’ll be picking a winner at random after the closing date.

Best of luck.

Over the last month I’ve had a great streak of luck finding typewriters including some practically brand new models. A collection of portables the most colourful and best looking was this Silver Reed SR 180 circa 1965.

Painted in a subtle but alluring light blue and housed in a dark black case, it screams class. The SR 180 also has a key I’d never seen on typewriter before which when held down would advance the carriage rapidly. I always find it really interesting how typewriter manufacturers did their own thing, some deciding to include fraction characters such as 1/2 and 1/3 but no 2/3 or including the number 1. I guess they just didn’t have as much standardisation in the hay day of the typewriter.

But by far the best find of late, by complete accident as I didn’t realise at the time I found it, was this Olympia Splendid 66. An accompanying model to the Olympia Splendid 33—my first ever typewriter—the Splendid 66 has a cursive typeface. Unlike the usual monospaced courier-like font most will associate with typewriters, the impression the Splendid 66 makes on the paper looks more handwritten. Much more of a personal touch, I can’t imagine the cursive typewriters sold much to businesses but their unique personalities and rarity makes for a great typewriter to add to the collection.

Next I just need to find the god of all typewriters, Olivetti Valentine.

Having a slick, pimped out treehouse has to got rate pretty high in the list of childhood dreams and this creation from architects Tham & Vidgard have brought that nostalgia to life for adults.

Situated in the far north of Sweden and open for business on July 3rd, the treehouse hotel is covered in mirrored glass to reflect it’s surroundings—like living inside a massive Predator. The structure is anchored around the tree’s trunk which offers stunning 360 views of the surroundings.

There’s plenty of other interestingly designed spaces in Tham & Vidgard’s portfolio.

Orange’s branding and communication recently have been pretty top notch especially with their recent campaign employings creations from Peep Show collective. Their most recent advert though for Free Internet is short and too the point, capturing the interwebz culture in 30 seconds. Who doesn’t find a pug wearing a wig funny is dead inside.

Dominic Clifford brings some texture and print workshop inspired style of illustration to his editorial commentary.