From large-scale installations to pocketable publications: Studio DDBBMM tackles briefs of every size

With great taste in typography and a knack for all the fun and tactile elements of graphic design, this studio is leaning into analogue approaches.

Date
9 January 2025

DDBBMM, the shared design practice of Lee Yunho and Kim Kangin, has executed a whole range of creative projects for the likes of Google and Wieden+Kennedy Tokyo as well as large cultural institutions such as The National Theatre of Korea. From the studio’s beginnings in 2013, it’s tackled just about everything; from large-scale installations to pocketable publications and stationery — be sure to take a look at their series of calendar rulers (a wonderful invention that we didn’t know we needed).

Always working with precision and a curiosity toward materials, something that coloured the pair’s collaborative work together over the years is their keen interest in, and love for typography; as evidenced in their recent postgraduate studies, where Kangin’s final project focused on “rubber stamps and self printing” and Yunho spent his time playing with “poetry and typography”. This typographic interest always finds its way into print for the pair, and is often something they feel is “a particular strength”.

When it comes to where the duo find their creative inspiration, like many of us coming into the new year, the studio have made a resolution to “let their interests lead into studio work” – which for them, means committing a bit more time to tinkering away at things that don’t sit on a screen. So, the pair have recently set up a small workshop space in the corner of their Seoul-based studio dedicated to making and experimenting, with future hopes to hold events and exhibitions in the space based off their more free-flowing research.

Above

DDBBMM: National Repertory Season (Copyright © DDBBMM 2020 - 2022)

Above

DDBBMM: DADA FACTORY (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2019)

Above

DDBBMM: Kangin’s Graduate Study (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2023)

Above

DDBBMM: Re-Union (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2020)

Above

DDBBMM: Calendar Ruler 4 (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2022)

Above

DDBBMM: Calendar Ruler 4 (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2022)

Above

DDBBMM: Meeting point (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2022)

Above

DDBBMM: Rest Forest (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2019)

Above

DDBBMM: Tiger Lives (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2020)

Above

DDBBMM: Art Bank New Acquisitions (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2021)

Above

DDBBMM: Unparasite (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2021)

Above

DDBBMM: Unparasite (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2021)

Above

DDBBMM: Calendar Ruler 3 (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2021)

Hero Header

DDBBMM: Re-Union (Copyright © DDBBMM, 2020)

Share Article

About the Author

Ellis Tree

Ellis Tree (she/her) joined It’s Nice That as a junior writer in April 2024 after graduating from Kingston School of Art with a degree in Graphic Design. Across her research, writing and visual work she has a particular interest in printmaking, self-publishing and expanded approaches to photography.

It's Nice That Newsletters

Fancy a bit of It's Nice That in your inbox? Sign up to our newsletters and we'll keep you in the loop with everything good going on in the creative world.