Continuing the theme of a visual language being structured by an overarching idea, graphic design can learn a lot from looking at architecture.
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| Wales Millennium Centre |
The Wales Millennium Centre was designed and built in Wales. The brief to the architects, Percy Thomas, was that it had to be unmistakably Welsh and internationally outstanding.
Wales’ identity is conveyed through the materials used to build the Centre. They connect to Wales’ culture, landscape, and history.
The exterior walls are clad in horizontal layers of welsh slate, inspired by the architects’ memories of the stratified cliffs along Wales’ Glamorgan coastline around Ogmore and Southerndown.
This visual language ties the building to the Welsh landscape, and the structure of the fascia and colonnades also echoes the tunnels and galleries of the mines that once dominated Welsh industry.
You can see the clear line of thought that developed from the architect’s sketch books through the design drawings to the finished building. The success of translating the architects vision into a structure with a coherent visual language has produced a powerful statement of Welsh identity.
