Graphic Design: Popular explore Brutalism through photography and design

There are few architectural styles that split the room (excuse the pun) quite as much as Brutalism. Fo some it’s a concrete nightmare of harsh and unsympathetic 1960s developments, for others though it’s a curiously beautiful, utopian throwback.

Peter Chadwick of Popular Studio is firmly in the latter camp and has launched This Brutal House, a new website which will “will focus on architecture and in particular Brutalism, Modernism, post war and social housing from the view point of a graphic designer.”

Not only will the site document interesting and sometimes disappearing examples of the controversial genre, but Peter will also create and collaborate on various visual responses ranging from posters to logos, display fonts to screenprints.

Alongside the super smart site (designed by Joel Baker and Matt Flynn), Peter has released four posters inspired by London’s Thamesmead estate, made famous as the backdrop to Kubrick’s iconic film A Clockwork Orange. That’s where the colour scheme comes from while the text is taken from the publicity surrounding the estate when it was first built and was frenziedly trying to attract tenants.

All in all an exciting visual project and one that we’ll be keeping a close eye on as it grows over the coming months.