The Stone Twins is a creative

branding agency A branding agency is a firm that specializes in creating and launching Brand, brands and rebranding, rebranding. The role of a branding agency is to create, plan, measure, and manage branding strategies for clients, including support in advertisin ...

based in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...

. It was founded by twin brothers Declan and Garech Stone (born 8 November 1970,

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

), graduates of the

National College of Art and Design The National College of Art and Design (NCAD) is Ireland's oldest art institution, offering the largest range of art and design degrees at undergraduate and postgraduate level in the country. Originating as a drawing school in 1746, many of th ...

, Dublin. The Stone Twins have a reputation for ideas-based, engaging and strategic design solutions. Their body of work is quite eclectic, with no fixed visual style - as it equally embraces the palettes of

graphic design Graphic design is a profession, academic discipline and applied art whose activity consists in projecting visual communications intended to transmit specific messages to social groups, with specific objectives. Graphic design is an interdiscipli ...

, art-direction and

copywriting Copywriting is the act or occupation of writing text for the purpose of advertising or other forms of marketing. The product, called copy or sales copy, is written content that aims to increase brand awareness and ultimately persuade a person or ...

. The firm's award-winning work includes a coveted

Dutch Design Award Dutch Design Awards (DDA) honours the best Dutch designs across eight categories. It awards design initiatives and designers in the Netherlands each year, in first place by relevance and impact, but also to the extent to which they relate to thei ...

, several European Design Awards and 12

D&AD Design and Art Direction (D&AD), formerly known as British Design and Art Direction, is a British educational organisation that was created in 1962 to promote excellence in design and advertising. Its main offices are in Spitalfields in London. I ...

Pencils. Their work forms part of the permanent collections of the

Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is a design museum housed within the Andrew Carnegie Mansion in Manhattan, New York City, along the Upper East Side's Museum Mile (New York City), Museum Mile. It is one of 19 museums that fall under the ...

, New York and the

Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

. The Stone Twins regularly write for trade magazines, including ''Communicatie'' (Wolters Kluwer) and ''Eye'' magazine: the International Review of Graphic Design. They are authors of the book ''Logo R.I.P.'' (A Commemoration of Dead

Logo A logo (abbreviation of logotype; ) is a graphic mark, emblem, or symbol used to aid and promote public identification and recognition. It may be of an abstract or figurative design or include the text of the name it represents as in a wordma ...

s); the updated 2nd edition was launched in the

, New York in 2012. They are keen educators, and were Head of the ‘Man and Communication’ department at

Design Academy Eindhoven Design Academy Eindhoven is an interdisciplinary educational institute for art, architecture and design in Eindhoven, Netherlands. The work of its faculty and alumni have brought it international recognition, and is widely regarded as one of the w ...

from 2008 until their resignation in 2013.

Books

The Stone Twins have written the following books: * ''Logo R.I.P., (A Commemoration of Dead Logos)''
BIS Publishers
2012. (ISBN 9789063692902) * ''A Catalogue of Curiosities, Relics, Art & Propaganda (CRAP)'', 2010. * ''Hello, I’m A’DAM (The Creation of a New Amsterdam Icon)'', A’DAM Toren C.V., 2021. (ISBN 9789082075885)

Magazine Articles

Selected articles written by The Stone Twins: * ''Chameleons (Single-character logos provide rich, raw material for identity design)'' – Eye, No. 67, Vol. 17, Spring 2008. * ''Logos without words'' – Eye, No. 80, Vol. 20, Summer 2011.

Exhibitions

Selected exhibitions: * 2015 ''Liminal – Irish design at the threshold'', Eindhoven, Milan, New York and Dublin (group show) * 2012 ''New Graphic Design Collection'',

Stedelijk Museum The Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (; Municipal Museum Amsterdam), colloquially known as the Stedelijk, is a museum for modern art, contemporary art, and design located in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Amsterdam (group show) * 2012 ''Graphic Design: Now in Production'',

Walker Art Center The Walker Art Center is a multidisciplinary contemporary art center in the Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is one of the most-visited modern and contemporary art museums in the United States and, t ...

, Minneapolis and the

Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is a design museum housed within the Andrew Carnegie Mansion in Manhattan, New York City, along the Upper East Side's Museum Mile. It is one of 19 museums that fall under the wing of the Smithsonian Inst ...

, New York (group show) * 2011 ''Underground'' by The Stone Twins, Zeeuws Museum, Middelburg (art installation) * 2008 ''1600 X Zierikzee'' by The Stone Twins, Zeeuws Museum, Middelburg (art installation)

Controversies and criticism

Since 2020, the agency has been responsible for questioning the

fearmongering Fearmongering, or scaremongering, is a form of manipulation that causes fear by using exaggerated rumors of impending danger. Theory According to evolutionary psychology, humans have a strong impulse to pay attention to danger because awareness ...

around

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

and the proportionately of the measures/restrictions.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stone Twins, The Design companies of the Netherlands Companies based in Amsterdam Alumni of the National College of Art and Design