With flexible identity becoming more and more prevalent in general design discourse, I had been intending on writing an inventory of the different types of flexible identity currently deployed, but this johnson banks thought for the week, from last year, covers it in far greater detail and with much better examples than I would have ever mustered.
In terms of the sub-genres of flexible identity, we’ve so far located the identity which is for a short lived event and the designers who originated the design have control over the flexibility, the type where a degree of flexibility is built into the ‘brand-system’ for others to use, and the type where randomness provides the flexible aspect – but not much as yet which is truly open ended. Could this be next?
Rather than paying an agency to construct a brand/identity system which they then hand over to others, might organisations start employing ‘creative directors’ who can work intuitively in a more fluid role, collaborating with other designers as and when necessary to oversee a visual identity that evolves, embraces diversity, and uses excellent design/designers but requires non of the ‘brand-guideline/rulebook’ stuff of the past. Perhaps, other than the AA (not the motoring organisation – the Architectural Association), there are other examples of this? Let us know. I imagine this is the kind of set up that would work best for organisations of a certain scale and with a certain outlook.