Prada Wall
Prada Wall
Prada approached us with the brief where they needed graphics for one of their showrooms. They wanted the design to be some sort of collage of old photos of sport, with a possibility of referring to the Olympic games. In all of that, they also wanted to include winter sports and some images of Russia.
When thinking about vintage sport photos of Olympic games, we couldn't but take into consideration the work of Leni Riefenstahl, whose film Olympia from 1936. was our inspiration and initial idea for creating a collage on such a big surface. Our research on landscape imagery that would dominate the final design, brought us to the idea to use it all well in the form of collage and to use halftone patterns. We also wanted to enforce image of Russia even further, so we added an industrial note to it. Visually, we were considering printing the collage on a paper with metal-like finishing, but afterwards we changed our minds as we were convinced that the final result on the whole would be much more pleasing if done in similar tonalities only, rather then with a mixture of materials as well. It was a challenge to work on such a large scale project, especially when working on detail that later form the final piece that was over 120 square meters big. When working on such a project you only see the whole that is as big as your monitor or some trial prints, and the real experience of the details is possible only when the design is put on the wall, which is magnificent moment; only then, you realize the dimensions of it and what effect that have on the spectator.
Prada Wall at Spaghetti Grafica 2010
fleka had the honor to have Prada Wall featured at the famous Italian graphic design exhibit – Spaghetti Grafica 2 at Triennale Design Museum in Milan.
The exhibit is organized by Italian Ministero della Grafica, every three years. The participation is on invitation only. This time, more than 1300 works arrived from over 400 studios all over the Italy, and only 125 project from 95 studios made it trough selection. Since it basically was both studio and project showcasing, organizers decided to divide studios into 6 categories based on their sizes.
Groups varied from 31 to 500 square meters, but it was by no means measure of their respective qualities. For example, there were gigantic 500 m2 studios that presented themselves with bags and envelopes, and there were us, with work that was almost 4 times as big as our beautiful fleka studio.
Overall, it was immense pleasure and honor to both work on this project and have it featured at one of the most influential exhibits of graphic design in Italy today.
