Naturejobs Podcast

Graphic designer Jakob Trollbäck remembers a 2014 meeting with film director Richard Curtis and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, then very much a work in progress, coming up in conversation.Curtis, whose movies include Four Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill, Love Actually and the Bridget Jones series, is also a UN Advocate for the SDGs. The meeting in Trollbäck’s New York studio suddenly turned to the 17 goals, with Curtis telling him: “I think this may be our last shot of fixing a lot of the things that’s wrong with the planet. And I also think that these goals are going to fail if we can't make them popular. Do you want to help me?”Trollbäck, founder of The New Division agency, rose to the challenge. Over the course of a year, alongside designer colleague Christina Rüegg-Grässli, he designed the now famous multi-colour palette, individual icons and logo of the SDGs.Their design had to tick three boxes: be accessible, universal and positive. The interconnectedness