NAME: Rob Giampietro, Kevin Smith | Giampietro+Smith
LATIN NAME: lorem ipsum
AGE: 27, 29

Rob Giampietro and Kevin Smith met while they were working at Jessica Helfand and William Drenttel’s design firm and publishing house Winterhouse Studio. The studio is located in a remote rural community in Connecticut, so Giampietro and Smith were forced to spend a good deal of time together as they worked on editorial and identity projects. Luckily they got on well … so well, in fact, that in 2003 they decided to move to New York and set up a design firm of their own.

In addition to their day-to-day design work, Giampietro and Smith both teach and write. Since 2005 they have been writing a regular branding column for BusinessWeek Online called “Logo Doctors,” in which they critique newsworthy logo designs. They have covered the Sprint/Nextel merger, the replacement of the DC Comics “bullet” with the DC Comics “spin” and the highly controversial AT&T logo redesign, among others.

While the designers admit it’s tough writing for a business publication where their articles tend to be only skim-read, a clear sense of mission drives them on. Their tone is authoritative— they see the column as an “educational tool”—but also entertaining and approachable. “We think it’s really important to figure out how to communicate to the interested non-designer what we consider when attempting a successful identity,” says Giampietro. “If we can educate the decision makers out there, better design will be the result.”

When Giampietro and Smith write for BusinessWeek, they feel as if they are speaking for the entire design community—encapsulating and disseminating the tenets of good design that the community holds dear. When Giampietro writes for a publication such as dot, dot, dot, on the other hand, he sees himself as “trying to prod the community into thinking about some things that they may be uncomfortable with.”

He characteristically addresses the “romantic” or “lyrical” aspects of design, which he feels are overlooked by other critics. In an essay such as “Pärt Notes” in which he deconstructs, almost in real time, the packaging of an album by the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt, Giampietro attempts to put the reader inside his consciousness and allow them to see design through his eyes. “It’s a self-consciously literary piece,” Giampietro reflects, “and I think design criticism really needs to make room for things like that.”

Giampietro and Smith do not separate the practices of writing and design. “It’s like a workout where you focus on your arms one day and your legs another day, but your overall body is getting stronger in the process,” says Giampietro. They already function as editors as well as designers on many of their client projects, but their goal is to have as much editorial control as possible. In order to do that, says Giampietro, “you need to walk the walk.” Alice Twemlow

(TOP) FAR LEFT: BARBARA KRUGER: MONEY TALKS catalog design, an exhibition of money-related works by Barbara Kruger, organized by Skarstedt Fine Art in November 2003. Instead of Kruger’s signature red, the catalog’s cloth binding was custom printed with a fiscal green, which surfaces on the design of the interior as well. Includes a scholarly essay by Lisa Phillips and writing by Kruger herself. NEAR LEFT: AIGA POSTER concept and design for announcing an improved website for the American Institute of Graphic Arts. Overprinting on a sheet of newsprint gave the poster a feel that was both vintage and futuristic.