Studio Mennicke's work avoids cliche with smart, understated design

Chatting to designers about what being a “designer” means these days, you’re often met with the same response – that titles like “digital designer,” “graphic designer” and “motion designer” are becoming blurred. The advertising and design worlds are increasingly passionate bedfellows, too, and as such studios are often looking to become jacks (and masters) of all trades. One such studio is Cologne-based Studio Mennicke, which can take care of pretty much any design task you care to throw at it, from film to advertising to curation to copywriting, illustration, packaging, wayfinding… you get the idea. It sums it up far more concisely than us: “We deliver straightforward creative services for all mankind.”

For all its wide-ranging expertise, it’s the studio’s editorial design we’re really digging: in particular the work for charity organisation Care Affair and the No Future book, which interviews former punks about their youth. Very different subject matters, and very different design approaches, but what’s impressive is the clever avoidance of tired stereotypes (no ripped pages and ransom-note typography in the punk project, thanks very much) to create work that’s innovative, understated and smart.