The Edit: five projects including République Studio’s spatial identity for Bien Vieillir Ensemble

Each and every day, we're lucky to discover dozens of interesting and inspiring projects from around the world. From global identities and campaigns to side projects and independently published books, The Edit is home to five of them; every two weeks. Between 17th December 2021 and 13th March 2022, Bien Vieillir Ensemble at the Cité de l’Architecture in Paris reflected on France’s approach to housing for their elderly population. Taking on the challenge of creating the exhibition’s identity, signage and catalogue, Parisian design practice République Studio found inspiration in the game of Scrabble – which is one of the most popular games in French retirement homes. The result is a striking yet straightforward typographic system that utilises the game’s stacked tiles as a referential starting point – with the stark forms of Forgotten Shapes’ sans serif Gerstner Programm appearing as the one and only typeface. Throughout 2022, London and Lisbon-based design agency How & How are playing their part in saving the world by contributing £200,000 towards the launch of four climate-tech startups. The initiative, titled GetSet, will see How & How choose one company per quarter to take on a four-week intensive branding programme, from which they’ll leave with a presentation worth £50,000 – but completely for free. Rightfully shouting about what’s on offer, GetSet’s identity balances tongue-in-cheek messaging with a loud graphic tone representative of the important issue at hand. “We want GetSet to be a positive, exciting opportunity to tackle something scary,” Co-founder Cat How explains, adding that they selected Blaze Type’s Arges as the display typeface for the striking cuts in its letterforms and its “contemporary flourish.” They actually bought NSW 01 from Buy Fonts Save Lives as their original choice – with the fact that all of its proceeds go to charity making it a rather fitting typeface for the project. “We’re keeping NSW 01 on ice for another project though as it’s an absolute corker,” How concludes, “watch this space ;)”