Hurrah. The Incidental has been shortlisted for Designs of the Year at the Design Museum. “Recognising the best of contemporary design around the world” the little tiddler is in heady (and eclectic) company indeed. Which is one of the things we have enjoyed about the reformatting of the award from the previous Designer of the Year – we’re with Patrick Bourgoyne over at Creative Review who last year enjoyed the ‘the quirky and the controversial’ array on display…

It’s been interesting though. Apart from our surprise at making it through to shortlist, there’s a couple of other things about the process that have left us scratching our heads. Not least the credit: The Incidental was a genuine, honest to goodness, collaborative project (rare as hens teeth in our not inconsiderable experience). We might have initiated and steered it but Berg, Abake, electronest and the client were key, and foremost of dozens who input not least the reporters and tweeters. Plus the category question – what exactly is The Incidental? To reference it as newsletter or a website is to underplay some of it’s more interesting aspects – in particular the novel production and dissemination processes which are equally part of the design.

But hey we’re not complaining; very happy to be there and looking forward to seeing the exhibition (opening 17 February at the Design Museum).

O dear, whatever we’ve been doing recently it evidently hasn’t included updating this website. We’ve been busy busying ourselves with:

• The Incidental, back (better?) for the British Council at the London Design Festival. Abake refined and polished and Jerome Rigaud at electronest crafted this online.

• Grassworks at the Aram Gallery – utility driven, flat pack, exceptional design – one of the better shows of the London Design Festival? Icon thinks so.

• The Design Museum has signed on their new building and we’re helping them think about their future.

• And last but not least a growing number of consultancy projects see us advising strategy and delivery issues on a number of museum, digital and branding related projects.

Now heads down and turn up the heating. It’s getting cold outside and we’ve got a top secret project to develop. More here (eventually).

The British Council asked Daniel to guest curate the traditional British Council showcase in Milan Furniture Fair this year.

We put our heads together and steered them out of an exhibition and into a ‘new media experiment’.

The resultant project is a daily news sheet, map and website: The Incidental. It offers an information channel and platform to visitors, exhibitors and special guests via Twitter, Flickr, paper, pens and bicycle couriers. See an explanation of how it works here. A whole host of the most interesting people possible have contributed to the development and execution including Matt Jones, Schulze & Webb, Abake, Oscar Narud and Damian Barr.

The press release says:

It’s an admirable excursion the British Council have taken into uncharted territory. At best it will be the must-have document of this temporary coming together. At the very least it will be a fascinating demonstration of the possibilities and limitations of social networking technologies when pushed to engage real time in the real world with tangible outputs.

Even if you’re not in Milan you can contribute or observe…. Have a look – and then let us know what you think?