Init building, Grossman & Partners Architects

Collaboration with Thonik
2003

Visual concept for glazing by thonik

Amsterdam, The Netherlands
The graphic design bureau thonik was commissioned by Grossman & Partners Architects to produce a signage or 'identity' for the init building. Since the building is a commercial building, hosting different types of businesses originally based in Amsterdam, thonik's design for the exterior glazing was based on an image concept that would zoom in the city Amsterdam, to represent 'Amsterdam in colours'.
My brief was to create a visual concept for the interior of the building within this broader design context.
Top left: colour scheme for the building developed by thonik.
Top right: detail of glazing showing extract of collage of images before they are being put through a filter (southeast façade).
Middle: the image is then changed into a bitmap-mode image and subjected to a filter, similar to a halftone screen conversion. The method was successfully used by Karel Martens in his book on the designer Wim Crouwel. Instead of placing the colour dots side by side -as it is the case in traditional full colour printing, the dots are placed on top of each other, creating a particular aesthetic, similar to halftone printing of bitmap-images.
Bottom right: individual dot of image above visualising that the dot is created out of 4 dots placed on top of each other.