“Sophisticated but at the same time dramatic and seductive, Tangerine Tango is an orange with a lot of depth to it,” added Eiseman, “Reminiscent of the radiant shadings of a sunset, Tangerine Tango marries the vivaciousness and adrenaline rush of red with the friendliness and warmth of yellow, to form a high-visibility, magnetic hue that emanates heat and energy.”

Download Palette for Adobe applications.

The “Unhate” campaign, which is part of a plan to relaunch Benetton’s brand, features posters for Benetton clothing stores across the globe, as well as ads on the web and in newspapers and magazines such as Newsweek, New York Magazine, Monocle, and the Italian Corriere della Sera and La Repubblica.

But this is not just another advertising campaign, but a global peace initiative with a strong message of fostering tolerance and global love. The new UNHATE Foundation will be the centre of a series of initiatives around the world,  involving institutions, international organisations and the civil society, and a Global UNHATE DAY with events in 50 different cities in Europe, Asia and Latin America.

The new website states: “What does UNHATE mean? UN-hate. Stop hating, if you were hating. Unhate is a message that invites us to consider that hate and love are not as far away from each other as we think. Actually, the two opposing sentiments are often in a delicate and unstable balance. Our campaign promotes a shift in the balance: don’t hate, Unhate.”

Alessandro Benetton, Executive Deputy Chairman of Benetton Group, said that  ”while global love is still a utopia, […]  the invitation ‘not to hate’, to combat the ‘culture of hatred’, is an ambitious but realistic objective. […] At this moment in history, so full of major upheavals and equally large hopes, we have decided, through this campaign, to give widespread visibility to an ideal notion of tolerance and invite the citizens of every country to reflect on how hatred arises particularly from fear of ‘the other’ and of what is unfamiliar to us. Ours is a universal campaign, using instruments such as the internet, the world of social media, and artistic imagination, and it is unique, in that it calls the citizens of the world to action.”

The campaign got a strong negative reaction from many world leaders and from the Vatican, while many creatives and advertising gurus around the world have given thumbs up. The Vatican has issued a statement expressing “a firm complaint for the unacceptable use of his Holy Father’s image, manipulated and exploited in an advertising campaign with a commercial purpose.” The White House has also condemned the campaign, arguing that “the White House has a long-standing policy disapproving of the use of the president’s name and likeness for commercial purposes.”

Moon CEO, Anouk Darling commented “The new brand celebrates the power and beauty of the diversity of people, and is about having the right to love who you want, just as the Mardi Gras inspires the world to love each other.” Moon creative director Greg Logan added ”some people see lips, some see asses, some see tits, that’s the power of it – it’s all-embracing.”

The new logo – the infinite love symbol – is made from two hearts touching each other at their points, as “an expression of our one endless resource, love”. I think it has a positive and simple look which will definitely become iconic and instantly recognisable. The font used in the logo is Simple by Lineto. The logo will be used in the different colours of the rainbow flag to underline the nature of the event and the idea of its richness and diversity.

The perfect balance between aesthetics and functionality is essential to be able to turn cold statistical data into effective communication. Facts, data, ideas, subjects, issues and statistics are translated into forms, icons, colours, diagrams and pictograms to reveal the hidden connections and patterns underneath.

Every document and every bit of data and information can be translated into a more meaningful visual experience. I have used this approach in design  current resume.

On the web:

• Good has an extensive collection of infographics on religion, politic, economy, natural resources, health, immigration and many other topics.
• Datavis is an inspirational collection of Charts, Maps, Graphs and Diagrams
• Information is Beautiful has stunning infographics by David McCandless.
• Visual Complexity hosts an impressive collection of infographics on science aiming at making understandable to everyone the most complex data.

Examples:

The Global Timber Trade, Who’s Buying, Who’s Selling?

Infographic made for the World Wildlife Fund and designed by Section Design. Countries with lots of forest stand to benefit from the lucrative timber trade, but at what cost to their ecological footprint? Here are five major timber exporters, and who is buying their wood. [Source: Good ]

Legalising drugs: would it work?

An interesting infographic published on the Guardian, showing the economic ramifications of legalising narcotics, and taxing and controlling their supply in the United Kingdom. [Source: The Guardian ]

Education & the Workforce of the Future

An infographic visualising the discrepancy between the qualifications of Americans and the requirements of tomorrow’s workforce. [Source: Hyperakt ]

The new publishing platform will run on Macintosh computers and will make easy to layout and publish interactive digital books without writing code, using text, images, audio, video, maps and embed interactive graphics that use iPad and iPhone’s features as the microphone and the accelerometer. The tool will allow to update the content without having to update the app. I think this product is the answer to a real need for an easy to use tool to create digital content and I definitely look forward to find out more as soon as it is released to the public.

The first book published using this new tool is Al Gore’s “One Choice“.