take a bow

Flicking through this months monograph from creative review I came across this image.

It is a for a punk band in the 80's. Copy writing was by Malcolm McLaren - but more importantly it was design by my dad; Peter Shepherd.

I think from his time at EMI where he worked with artists from Hot Chocolate to The Beatles. He speaks little of his achievements, but has some amusing stories of his time there, which he will recall after a few wines! Particularly getting artwork signed off by The Rolling Stones in LA or was it Paris!

Bus side visualiser

See it here

This cool new toy on the CBS outdoor website.
Our work in all its glory. Without sitting around waiting for a bus!

Festive Puzzle

In time-honoured tradition we present the MSDC festive puzzle.



Print out this year’s puzzle and while you are sitting by the fire with your family roasting chestnuts, see if you can spot all 12 festive objects. 



Alternatively if your brain is not addled by too much alcohol at the Christmas party and you have a quiet moment at the office, just drop us an email with your answers.

Download the PDF here.

Good luck and Merry Christmas

King Mall Advertising Live

On a rainy day last week I popped to Hammersmith to see our outdoor campaign for Kings Mall Shopping Centre. Sadly due to the rain it was hard to see anything, apparently we have had about 80 metres fall over the past weeks. So it was tough to get a great shot of our work.

I did find this 6 Sheet at Hammersmith tube station so my efforts were not totally in vain. We have designed 48 sheets, Ad gates and bus sides but you will have to take my word for it.

creative new business

I have sporadically attended a morning meeting called The Designer Breakfast. It is for like-minded designers and small agencies to share their thoughts and insights and look at alternative ways to approach business and work with designers so that they can be best in class.

As you can imagine new business is a popular theme. A topic that is much discussed is co-creation and partnering with start-ups, taking on some of the risk and therefore the reward. This might take the form of share options in the start up, a deferred payment or even a share in the business. BBH (Bartle Bogle Hegarty) have taken this further and created an offshoot company, ZAG to create new consumer brands. They develop an idea and bring the insight and marketing nouse and then they look for a business partner to take it forward. The partner maybe a manufacturer or specialist logistics firm or tech company that would then deliver the product.

I find it hard to get my head around the complexity of this, a business that creates business (2 -3 a year apparently) and then runs them, markets them etc...

It's a very interesting experiment - realise it not total unique and theres a TV show called Dragons Den but I think the approach or where they start is.

from start to finish

MSDC have been hard at work on creating the advertising for Kings Mall - the advertising which features 48 sheets, bus sides, ad-gates and 6 sheets is not due to hit the billboards until later in the month but the website is up and raring to go.

As you would expect its majors on fashion and style, but also your everyday shopping needs. The site features up-date-able branding masthead. Interactive mall map, site search and a news and events section that can be updated. The is all built on a CMS system called Modex.

speak the lingo

Good design translates no matter what the language.


We recently completed  this brochure for Estama Real Estate Management, who operate nationwide in Germany, we also adapted our concept for their exhibition stand at ExpoReal 2009.