D&AD Blog

10 Years of Black Pencils

The noughties are no more, but it was a decade of huge change in advertising and design.

Since the turn of the century, D&AD Black Pencils have been awarded to everything from coins and stamps to posters and TV commercials.  The digital world was awarded its first Black Pencil for ground-breaking creativity in 2006 and since then, the industry ‘rules’ have been entirely rewritten.  We've loaded up each year's winners onto reels for you to reminisce about the good old days.

2000

The decade got off to a roaring start with a double Black Pencil win going to AMV.BBDO with Surfers for Guinness.  Apple's Cinema Display won in Product Design, and RSA/ Black Dog Films won a Black Pencil for 'All is Full of Love' for Björk.

 

2001

Four Black Pencils were taken home, two in environmental design.  Casson Mann won for ...Comment, their huge visitor feedback installation in London's Science Museum.  Marks Barfield Architects were awarded for the design of the London Eye.  Apple won it's second Black Pencil of the decade with the Pro Mouse.  Ground-breaking work by Mother won them a Black Pencil in Ambient for the controversial Britart.com campaign. 

2002

Three Black Pencils were awarded.  Two entries won in direction, Frank Budgen for Levi's Twist with BBH and Michel Gondry for Star Guitar for the Chemical Brothers. Apple also won for the very first iPod.  

2003

No Black Pencils.  None.  Nada.

2004

It was design's year.  Atelier Markgraph won for the Ship of Ideas, which floated down the Main in Frankfurt.  johnson banks meanwhile injected ground-breaking innovation to a project much smaller in size (physically, of course).  Their fruit and veg stamps changed the 'face' of mail.

2005

Another year of double wins.  Wieden+Kennedy London was awarded not once, but twice for 'Grr'.  4Creative walked off with a Black Pencil for their revolutionary Channel 4 idents and Foster & Partners were recognised for the breathtaking Millau Viaduct.

2006

The first digital Black Pencil was awarded to Leo Burnett Canada for the redesign of the global network's corporate website.  Another redesign was recognised for breaking the mould, with a Black Pencil going to the UK's Guardian newspaper.

2007

Illustration crafts and cutting edge technology were recognised this year.  Kolle Rebbe won in Illustration for 'War Orphans'.  R/GA were awarded for Nike+ - the site that made running a social activity.

2008

An unprecedented 6 Black Pencils were awarded this year.  Apple won for the iPhone and fourth generation iMac. Fallon's Phil Collins loving, drumming gorilla snatched up another.  Japan's first Black Pencil went to Projector Inc for Uniqlock.  The first Black Pencil for digital crafts was awarded to Goodby, Silverstein & Partners for Get the Glass.  Last, but definitely not least, The Partners were awarded a Black Pencil for the National Gallery Grand Tour.

2009
Four Black Pencils were awarded across multiple categories.  Droga5 set a new standard by winning 2 Black Pencils for separate entries; Million - the mobile technology driven solution the the problem of student apathy in New York; and The Great Schlep - mobilising young Jewish voters to engage with their grandparents in Florida.  Graphic Designer Matt Dent became our youngest Black Pencil winner with his redesign of the reverse side of UK coins.  Art+Com were awarded for the Kinetic Sculpture, installed in the BMW Museum.

Find out more about what we do.

Have a look at the best advertising and design in the world.

See what the best up and coming student work looks like.

Creative Faces: W0W

"W0W try to re-define how images are used. Their work is like a journey discovering a new relationship between images and the media in which they’re used.  I'm passionate about W0W."

Koichiro Tanaka, Creative Director, Projector Inc.

Istanbul and Beyond, Istanbul and Beyond, Tabanlioglu Architects, Another Perspective 01, Another Perspective 02

Japan Car, Japan Car, Design Platform Japan, The View From There

Milano Salone, Tokyo Wonder, Lights and Shadows

Sony Ericsson Xperia, Tent London 2008, Sony Ericcson, Black and White

Tenspace, Tent London 2007, Tenspace

Creative Faces: Home, Inc

"A few years ago I was asked to judge at the Sapporo Art Director’s Club.  I was really impressed by the work from Home Inc, the design studio that is home to Ryohei ‘Wabi’ Kudow and Kazushi ‘Sabi’ Nakanishi.  In Japanese, ‘wabisabi’ means imperfect or impermanent beauty and this ethos flows through all of their work.  Their graphics have such a distinct ‘japanese’ style, but I think they can be understood by anyone."

 Takayuki Soeda, Founder, Soeda Design Factory

Ayoyama Flower Market
Bear's Kingdom
Do Music, AIR DO

Hormon, a font created for special ‘wabisabi’ projects
UKA

Creative Faces: Hironao Tsuboi Design

"Virgin Atlantic once ran an advertising campaign, with the strap line – ‘some say why, others say why not’. This expression could be used to summarise Hironao Tsuboi’s work. He has the ability to look at everyday objects in a completely new way.  Only a real design talent could breath new life into mundane objects such as umbrellas and light bulbs.

He refrains from adding unnecessary details. Making a leather-writing mat look exquisite without adding any details is such a difficult trick to pull off. In fact making simple designs look good is one of the most difficult things to do. Who would ever have thought that a watch could become exciting if you entirely remove the watch face – this guy clearly did.

He turns a negative into a positive. Hironao Tsuboi’s glass design creates a beautiful detail from essentially a condensation drip. I feel this glass captures his positive take on life, which is both admirable and infectious.

By creating great designs that make people smile, Hironao Tsuboi is definitely a creative face of the future."

Joe Ferry, Head of Design, Virgin Atlantic

Rubber Calculator

Lamp/Lamp

LED Watch

Cherry Blossom (Sakura) Glass

Stand Umbrella

Creative Faces: GT Inc

"It’s a brave team that sets up their own, but to have done so and won a D&AD nomination and a host of other awards within the first couple of years of operation is a real achievement.  Some may feel that GT Inc’s collection of international awards doesn’t make them a ‘face to watch’, but I’m really impressed by their determination to be recognised on an international level.  It shows a real sense of self-belief, which is a critical element to the success of any studio.  And as for that other critical element – talent – they are clearly not short of a big dose of that either."

Garrick Hamm, D&AD President & Creative Partner, Williams Murray Hamm

Big Shadow Project, Microsoft, Xbox 360

PikaPika the Movie, Go! Go! PikaPika; So-net

REC YOU, Sony Marketing, Walkman

Love Distance, Sagaami Rubber Industries, Sagami Original 002 (condom)

UNIQLO MARCH, UNIQLO, Flannel Shirts

Creative Faces: Oshiuri

"I would like to recommend the vision and way of thinking of the group behind Oshiuri.  A few years ago, Design Barcode was a surprise success. Just by adding a design twist, a barcode became fun and entertaining instead of something the majority of people want to remove.

Oshiuri is the latest business from Design Barcode. The premise is that ideas should not be passive but something you proactively sell.  “OSHIURI” literally means hard sell; to sell something that is not in demand.

Anyone can post an idea on internet for anyone to buy.  The originator of the idea also sets the price of the idea.  One of the intentions of this system is education.  Oshiuri want to make the process of idea generation open to the public – not for specialists behind closed doors.  Another intention is to make the idea generator very self-aware of the quality of the idea they develop."

Akira Odagiri, Co-Chairman and Board of Directors, Chief Creative Officer, Ogilvy & Mather Japan

Creative Faces

We're getting out of Vauxhall a lot more these days. 'Creative Faces'  is our way of highlighting talent in different regions producing great creative work.  We held the first outing in Japan, while launching the D&AD exhibition at ADMT. 

With Akira Odagiri of Ogilvy & Mather Japan as Chairman of our panel, we invited 2 top creatives from Japan and 2 from the UK to take part. Each judge championed a creative team or person they admire.  Each member of the panel brings a different area of creative expertise to the selection.

Panel - 

- Akira Odagiri selected Oshiuri
- Garrick Hamm, D&AD President and Creative Director at Williams Murray Hamm selected GT Inc.
- Joe Ferry, Head of Design at Virgin Atlantic selected Hironao Tsuboi Design
- Koichiro Tanaka, Creative Director at Projector, Inc selected W0W.
- Soeda Takayuki, Founder of Soeda Design Factory selected Home Inc

In the following posts, you'll see the work of the Creative Faces with a bit of background about why they were chosen.