| Works:
How come your work’s got so many and varied styles?
The variety of our output is strongly related to the different skills of the BD-workers. If a new project comes in we check it carefully in order to put a team together that covers all its needs. There’s normally one of us providing the communication with the customer and putting in charge the others for their special tasks. Please also read question no. 3 under section ’philosophy’.
You often compare your work to the one of the bees. What is this all about?
It's about the hardness of work when we talk about bees. Labour is devided according to the needs of the individual project and the skills of every BeeD-worker. But after all, we share the name and a lot of time together. Each member is responsible for his own ’division’ and work.
Do you work for international clients?
Yes, we do. To be precise: About 65% of our work is for Swiss clients and 35% for clients all over the world.
Switzerland, is known for order and cleanness. Do these attributes also qualify your work?
Yes, we think so. But the description would not be complete by just using these words: We chose our name ’Büro Destruct’ to communicate a vision of tension between two poles. ’Büro’ stands for order and ’Destruct’ for breaking with conventions and aiming for new results. But in the end it mostly turns into order again – so yes: we are very Swiss;-)
How would you describe Swiss graphic design?
Swiss graphic designers take care of good forms, clear shapes, legible characters and order. These things are installed in the people of Switzerland. Mention Swiss graphic design, and the first names that come to mind for those raised on a diet of modernism are Max Bill, Josef Müller-Brockmann, Richard Paul Lohse and Armin Hofmann. These designers, whose work has come to epitomize an approach to graphic design adopted internationally, have also defined the way the rest of the world sees Swiss design – as economical, austere and formal.
Why do you think Swiss graphic design is so popular these days?
We’re truly seeing a revival of Swiss tradition all over the world nowadays. No other region has got such a high density of high-quality graphic designers like Switzerland. Even though Swiss Designers were always very well educated, the ’70s and the ’80s did not necessarily bring forth the greatest achievements. That changed in the beginning of the ’90s when the new technological developments were adopted by young and upcoming designers. Since then, they have been confronted and inspired by new cutting-edge design from the outside world. Now, Swiss design has the advantage of a typographic, font-related design, combined with pictography and the ’folklorist’ habit of reducing elements, breaking things down and making them simple – a strong proposition. Swiss graphic design has become a trademark again that is here to stay.
What do Swiss and Japanese graphic designers have in common?
Both tend to make it perfect: They are very disciplined, aim for a high quality standard and demonstrate a big love concerning details. Swiss graphics are still a bit more reduced and clean than Japanese ones. Contemporary Japanese graphic design is very similar to the minimalistic and formal Swiss design from the ’40s and ’50s: Designers are very much inspired by a lot of Swiss fonts from that time.
Do you contact any clients or do you live by word of mouth?
Mostly we live by word of moth which we do think is the best
promotion you can have. And: the better your work, the better gets word
of mouth! This is the case for each of us.
How did
advances in technology over that time impact your business and your
output?
Computer technology helped us to produce and present a wide variety of work. We refine individually our own skills and choose to explore our favourite programs. Some boys in our team still use illustrator 5.0 which is a very sophisticated tool. Others like the ones using 3D Software are more bound to the technical development. But we do not try to catch the actual tech-train – We focus on beautiful design with whatever tool is necessary to achieve it. The most important hardware is the brain and the eyes. Our graphic design tends to be reaching back to the very roots of design. We’re doing a lot of work by hand – drawing and painting – and then mixing these creations up using technology.
What would your work look like if BD were based in a busy european
city like Berlin, London or Paris?
Maybe the work would be the same, but the customers would be different
because we still work a lot for local customers.
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