Haig Armen

Haig Armen is a designer and composer born in Hatfield, England in 1967 and a principal at Lift Studios in Vancouver, BC Canada.
Haig Armen has been producing internationally recognized graphic and interactive design, developing logos, ads, promotional items and CD covers for clients that include Warner Music, BMW, Travel Cuts, Canwest Global, Future Shop, Rocky Mountaineer, @Mobile and Chanel.
Haig transitioned from a career as a jazz guitar player with a degree in Jazz composition and a degree in Architecture. Although he still dabbles in both he is now officially an Interactive Designer, who also teaches Design and Web Strategy courses at Simon Fraser & Emily Carr Institute in Vancouver. Occasionally Haig still gets the chance to compose music for film.
Armen is considered a prolific designer with nearly 50 CD covers, 50 book covers and over 100 websites to his credit. In 2002 Armen re-designed Yellowknife outdoor magazine Up Here followed by his work with CBC during the design of their internationally acclaimed 120Seconds.com , JustConcerts.com , NewMusicCanada.com , cbcradio3.com and Home Delivery websites.
Awards
Armen's design and interactive work has been recognized by Communication Arts Magazine, Applied Arts Magazine, and Art Directors Club, among others.
In 2001 CBC Radio 3 was honoured on their work on 120Seconds.com with a Prix Italia award, the oldest and most prestigious International Radio, Television and Web competition.
In 2003 CBC RADIO 3 won two prestigious Webby Awards as Site of the Year in the Radio and Broadband categories.
In 2004 the CBC Radio 3 team including Armen was awarded an Innovation Award for his work on the innovative CBC Home Delivery website.
Macromedia honoured the CBC RADIO 3 website by including it in their top "Inspiration Picks"
Macromedia honoured the CBC Home Delivery website by including it in their top "Inspiration Picks"
Leadership
In 2005 Armen was elected to the board of the Armenian Cultural Association of British Columbia, a non-profit organization that strives to preserve and promote the heritage and the contemporary culture of the Armenian people and to foster the dissemination of a wider appreciation of Armenian history, traditions and values.
Music career
Before and during his career as a designer Haig Armen also was able to sustain a career with a number of bands from Ottawa and Montreal. In the late 1980s Haig played guitar and composed music for the Pale Descendants who played shows at places like Barrymore's and One Step Beyond. After moving to Montreal to study music Armen formed Babelfish who would go on to tour the maritime region and Mexico.
Recently Haig collaborated with Thomas Anselmi of Canadian bands Slow and Copyright on a new music and video project called Mirror. The first Mirror album will be released in 2008 and was produced by Vincent Jones, who has worked with The Grapes of Wrath, Cowboy Junkies, Sarah McLachlan and Morrissey. The album features performances by Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode, longtime David Bowie pianist Mike Garson and actor Joe Dallesandro, as well as usual MIRROR stars Frances Lawson, Laure-Elaine, Thomas Anselmi and Ronan Boyle. See the official Mirror site here.
Teaching
Armen speaks and lectures at various Canadian Universities.
1997 - 2006 Simon Fraser University - taught classes in Book Design, Web Design, Web Strategy and Print Design
2003 - 2007 Langara College - developed curricula and taught courses in Interactive Design & the History of Design for the Electronic Media Design Program.
2007 - Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design - teaches Interactive Design in the Core Studio course.

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