We are deeply saddened by the sudden death of one of our supporters and fundraisers Mr Ian Noble, we thank him for all the hard work over the years. Thank you Mr. Ian Noble you will be sadly missed.

“Ian was a great lecturer and possibly the wisest man I ever knew,” one of his former Kingston University Communication Design MA students, Alice Keegan, 23, said. “Whatever you said to him, he’d always come up with something new, something surprising.”

Standing well over six feet tall and with a formidable reputation in the world of design,Ian was a big man in every sense. He cut a distinctive figure with his hair swept back in a quiff, blue jeans and brogues. He had a tattoo which read: “The future is unwritten”.

Ian was widely published in a number of influential design magazines and academic journals and wrote Picture Perfect – a study of contemporary international illustration released in 2003. He also co-authored several books with fellow designer and friend Dr Russell Bestley. The pair delivered workshops at colleges and universities across Europe and North America and ran their own design group, Visual Research. In 2005, they used the same title for a textbook which rapidly became required reading for students on undergraduate and postgraduate courses around the world. A second edition of the book was published shortly before Ian’s death and has been translated into six languages.

The friends also shared a love of punk, contributing to several journals on the subject as well as being heavily involved in the sub-culture itself. Ian was a leading fundraiser for Strummerville, which supports up-and-coming musicians worldwide and was set up in memory of Clash lead singer Joe Strummer in 2002. One Twitter user reacted to Mr Noble’s death by urging his friends to listen to the Clash “loudly and in inappropriate places” by way of tribute.