September 30, 2022

Conrad Gargett Wins Good Design Award for Communication Design Excellence

Good Deisgn Award Trophy with Conrad Gargett Station Design Manual

Conrad Gargett has scooped a prestigious accolade at the 2022 Australian Good Design Awards for the Queensland Rail Station Design Manual in recognition for outstanding design and innovation.

Chris Wardle, Associate at Conrad Gargett, attended the ceremony on Friday 16 September in Sydney. The Queensland Rail Station Design Manual won a Good Design Award accolade in the Communication Design category with the jury commenting:

“Super slick and strong new brand for the Queensland Rail Station Design Manual. It addresses the brief well and uses clear information hierarchy to explain elements of the manual through use of chosen typography and colour. The new illustration and iconography are fitting to the brand. This project sets the new brand up for success due to strong consistency and learnability. Well done.”

The Queensland Rail Station Design Manual is a purpose-designed tool for reference and engagement by both new and experienced station designers and consultants.
With Conrad Gargett having worked with Queensland Rail in the past, we combined our station design experience with our communication design expertise to undertake the redesign of the manual, in what was a highly collaborative effort from our in-house multidisciplinary design team.

The outcome is a complete and concise guideline which establishes a set of objectives, design principles, and requirements for a consistent approach to the design, construction and refurbishment of stations. The Station Design Manual has given Conrad Gargett an intimate understanding of Queensland Rail station design requirements for the whole of state.

Queensland Rail Senior Design Manager Andrea Kriss said the Station Design Manual (SDM) was a guide for Queensland Rail and external design consultants when it came to all things station design.

“With game changing projects like our Station Accessibility Upgrade Program underway delivering major network improvements for generations to come, having tools such as the Station Design Manual is vital to helping us achieve our vision of being a world-class service,” Ms Kriss said.

“A strong focus of the manual rewrite was to make it as user friendly as possible and the feedback to date has been very positive by internal Queensland Rail users and industry” said Ms Kriss.

“The success of the Station Design Manual is born out of our collaborative team approach: the complementary skills of our communication team, our architectural team and the numerous client stakeholders in a genuinely connected and collective way. The visualisation and graphic approach is designed hand in hand with technical aspects, based on our knowledge of station design. This was essential for its use as a working guideline and a new connected visual look and feel for Queensland Rail.”

— Project Principal, Amanda Kershaw

The Australian Good Design Awards is the country’s oldest and most prestigious international awards for design and innovation with a proud history dating back to 1958. Projects recognised with an Australian Good Design Award demonstrate excellence in professional design and highlight the impact a design-led approach has on business success and social and environmental outcomes.