Itu Chaudhary, Darling of typography.

Itu Chaudhuri has practiced design since 1984, when he first began to tack the word “design” after his name on his letterhead. Itu Chaudhuri Design (ICD) specialises in helping clients’ businesses through design, seeking out those who believe that design can make a difference to a result, whether economic or social, and are willing to approach their project in this way.

Itu loved to draw letters, buildings and other wierd inventions as a child. He chose Architecture from School of Planning and Architecture, considering it as the most challenging course. Encouraged by Aurobind Patel, the amazing publication designer and typographer (he redesigned India Today in the early 80s, and The Economist in the 1990s) to make a shift to graphic design, he made the transition in his course, that changed his life. On being asked about the dsitinct style of design he carries " I do not have a distinct style at all. And every passing year, it’s less and less of me. We like to think we try to develop a language for every problem, rather than approach it with a style of our own. A way of thinking, yes; style, hopefully; but “a” style, well, that’s not out way." Itu has deeply admired Rajesh Dahiya, and Lisa Rath (now my partner for some years), another great designers. Also Ankur Choksi, Aditya Pande, Dev Kabir Malik.

"Perhaps the lack of achievement in the existing practice holds one back from starting something new. To burn bridges, you must build them first."

An excerpt from an intreview:

You have a great love of typography. Given the digital revolution and the explosion of digital type foundries, how do you view type design today?

A wonderfully open field. The explosion you refer too, of course was clearly foreseeable by 1990 when we met. What has happened is that type was democratized and our relationship to type therefore changed. The sheer number of typefaces has made it difficult to have a relationship with particular typefaces. Back then, I ‘d be bothered if I could not name a typeface in use, but it became more and more difficult due to so many independent foundries. In today’s digital climate, we are starting to see an increase in the sheer numbers of good typefaces and here and there an original idea. However, the way information is currently transmitted on the web and mobile, form is separated from content. We have less and less control of the way our content is represented. As an aside, the larger issue is that our interaction with the internet is functional, and we could make a case that true brands in their fullest sense do not exist on the net. If a brand is supposed to override my rational preferences, I am not sure if the internet has brands from a brand expression standpoint.

Are Indian businesses open to design as a form of thinking and planning – or do they focus on expression to production? Where do you place yourself on the continuum of on one hand “design to seed, provoke, or direct change” and on the other design management?

We try to look at businesses and find out what they do and try to find out where design can have the greatest impact. This means you need to find an opportunity that is vision led, like brand consultancies, who discovered the value in what was called trademark design before the firms that originated this business came to the fore. The discovery of the structure of the value started with branding (of products, mostly, for most of the 20th century) and then really matured with the creation of corporate identity as a profession. In India, too, the more successful design firms have morphed into brand firms. Our practice has so far avoided calling itself a brand consultancy — we’d rather focus on wherever the values is. If you look at companies and how they create value, you can often spot a design intervention that could make something better. The brand is just one perspective, but it’s perceived as commercially valuable, even though its understood mostly as organizing communication, and mostly advertising at that. To get clients to see it as broadly valuable however is more of a challenge. A planning process that systematically explores client assumptions and plans is what we are moving towards. We needed to surface the issues that can challenge clients and make a case for planning process. Clients who eventually see the result of this process, have so far have been surprised with our insights and recommendations. We have just begun to hire non-designers focusing on the business side and on research and planning. We are developing this planning function to be able to shape a more confident strategy offering and also be able to sell design more effectively, for how you sell an engagement effectively determines how it will run. To rephrase the old line: good selling is good design.

How has design in India changed since we met in 1990? How is design thought about and practiced in 2012 in India?

Unrecognizably different. The number of firms practicing design today has created a very competitive environment. It’s harder to make a decent living in design despite the greatly expanded consumption of design. Now you need to start at a much higher level due to greater exposure and learning curves are much more compressed. Designers learn in five years than what I learned in15. Design is much closer to being a profession – and a serious one at that. In India, many advertising agencies are adding design firms to their bouquet. These outfits will be, and are, very competitive with graphic design firms in this country. Independent graphic design studios will feel the heat sooner rather later. Time was I used to joke (and half seriously) that I owed my firm’s survival to advertising agencies, since their work would drive clients to us. This is no longer the case. In India most of the design firms are six to ten people and have not come from a great tradition of design. For example the planning activity in design is not very strong. We are also seeing international brand consultancies build footprints in India, due in part to the west’s economic woes and the continuing growth of emerging markets. For example, Saffron (Wally Olins’ second inning) is here in India as is Landor. I expect the Dutch to be here soon. The next goal or bar seems to be around convincing business that there is a better way of doing things. For example AEG in Germany, or Olivetti in Italy, or IBM in the US – all saw design as a way to create a competitive edge.

#author #literature