James Brook / Design

Build It! Leaflet

Build It! Adventures with LEGO® Bricks

Designed by James Brook for National Museums Scotland, 2016

Leaflet | 99 x 148 mm | 4 pages

Build It! Adventures with LEGO® Bricks runs at the National Museum of Scotland from 29 January until 17 April 2016 as part of the Festival of Architecture 2016, which will celebrate Scotland’s fantastic built environment, as a key part of the 2016 Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design celebrations.

Press Passing at Allander, Edinburgh

I went to Allander in Portobello to press pass Below another sky, the book that I have been designing for the British Council. Below another sky is a book that documents a set of international residencies, which resulted in a collection of prints by twenty artists, including prints by Turner Prize nominees Jim Lambie, David Shrigley, and Janice Kerbel. Curated by Alexia Holt, on behalf of the Scottish Print Network, the project was supported by Creative Scotland and was included in the Glasgow 2014 programme coinciding with the Commonwealth Games. Below another sky was exhibited across Scotland in 2014-15 and the prints have now been acquired by the British Council Collection and will become part of the British Council’s international touring exhibition programme.

As always, everyone at Allander was extremely helpful and, after a few adjustments, I am very happy with the quality of printing of images and text. The book will have an interesting binding that will allow translations and other local information to be inserted as the exhibition tours the world; the printers are as excited as I am to see the end result, which should appear in the middle of next week.

More information here: http://belowanothersky.org/

Dovecot What's On Guide 2

Dovecot What's On Guide | January-June 2016

Designed by James Brook for Dovecot Studios, Edinburgh, 2015

210 x 148 mm | 12 pages with half cover
Printed by Allander, Edinburgh, on Vision Superior

This is the second edition of the Dovecot Gallery What's On Guide that I have designed. The guide follows the same format as before and is twelve pages plus half cover, which reveals half of a full bleed image of a detail from a rug by the artist Linder, Diagrams of Love: Marriage of Eyes, created with Jonathan Cleaver, Dennis Reinmüller and Kristi Vana Coleman at Dovecot Tapestry Studio in 2015. The rug became the 'eighth dancer' in a new ballet titled Children of the Mantic Stain, choreographed by Kenneth Tindall, with music by Maxwell Sterling, performed by Northern Ballet with signature sportswear designed by Christopher Shannon, commissioned as part of the Hayward touring exhibitiion British Art Show 8.

As with the first guide that I designed for Dovecot, full-bleed images are used throughout in contrast with pages of pared back typography in black, grey and Dovecot Pink, printed on the clean white of Vision Superior, an uncoated paper with a pleasing feel. The format and template is adaptable to accommodate new types of information: in this case, to include more exhibition sponsor logos, the page layouts were tweaked slightly, whilst still retaining the look and feel of the first edition.

Next of Kin Poster, Low Parks Museum

A4 poster designed and illustrated by James Brook for Next of Kin, a National Museums Scotland touring programme commemorating the centenary of the First World War across Scotland through a touring exhibition, learning programme and online resources.

Find out more about Next of Kin here

Adventures with LEGO Bricks

I've been designing various items for Build It! a forthcoming show at the National Museum of Scotland. Build It! Adventures with LEGO® Bricks features the work of renowned brick artist, Warren Elsmore, displaying some of his amazing and intricate mini-buildings and models – including a three metre model of the National Museum of Scotland, which will be built during the show.

'LEGO® is more than a toy. It makes architects, sculptors and storytellers of us all.'

I loved LEGO® as a child and, as an adult graphic designer, I love grids so this project has combined two of my (many) obsessions. The concept for the design was created by Jan Dawson of the NMS design team and I have been artworking Jan's idea into banners, posters and a leaflet – an interesting experience for me as I am more familiar with working on projects all by myself, from initial concept, pitching to the client, art directing, then artworking through to finished print-ready design. I'm happy to say that my banner designs have been approved and have gone to print – watch out for them in Forrest Road and throughout the museum.

Build It! Adventures with LEGO® Bricks runs from 29 January until 17 April 2016 as part of the Festival of Architecture 2016, which will celebrate Scotland’s fantastic built environment, as a key part of the 2016 Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design celebrations

More information here.

Selected 2015 Logo

This is the logo that I designed for Selected 2015, Dovecot's selling exhibition of craft and design. Now in its third year, Selected 2015 brings together makers selected by an industry panel. Jewellery, silversmithing, ceramics, glass, textiles and furniture are all represented by talented craftspeople with Scottish connections. The logo was used on a leaflet – which also doubled as an invitation – as well as banners and posters, which I also designed. The logo appeared in the gallery, reversed out of metallic bronze paint, which was hand-brushed on to the wall for a tactile craft feel.

Alongside Selected 2015, + Dovecot Selects showcases the work of three established studios: Timorous Beasties, Dashing Tweeds and Method Studio, who will present signature pieces from their collections.

Selected 2015 runs at Dovecot Gallery from 21 November until 23 December 2015.

Click here for a short film of the exhibition.

Selected 2015 Leaflet | Invitation | Wrapping Paper

This is the leaflet and logo that I designed for Dovecot Gallery's Selected 2015, an exhibition that brings together makers chosen by an industry panel, in a selling exhibition of high quality craft and design. Jewellery, silversmithing, ceramics, glass, textiles and furniture are all represented by the most talented craftspeople with Scottish connections.

The brief was to create something sophisticated and refined to reflect the standards of the work on display. I was shown a mood board that included various metals – whilst there wasn't a budget to use metallic ink on this leaflet, I was able to produce exhibition graphics that were stenciled to the gallery walls in bronze metallic paint. The leaflet had to serve several purposes: as an invitation to the private view; as a guide to the exhibition; and as wrapping paper! I created a repeat design for the reverse of the leaflet based on photographs from the Dovecot weaving floor that invited visitors to 'Please re-use as wrapping paper for your Selected gift!'

Leaflet | 297 x 420 mm folded to 210 x 148 mm
Designed by James Brook
Printed by Allander, Edinburgh

Kmossed Card

Kmossed Card

Designed by James Brook for Kmossed, 2015

Folded card | 148 x 210 mm

www.kmossed.com

Dovecot Festival Banners

These are the two banners that I designed for Dovecot Gallery's 2015 Edinburgh Art Festival exhibitions: A Life in Colour, a celebration of the life and work of Scottish Borders based textile designer Bernat Klein; and Aggregations by Korean artist Kwang Young Chun. The exhibition ran from 31 August until 26 September; as you can see from the photographs, Edinburgh did not have a very sunny summer! There were two sets of banners, one outside Dovecot on Infirmary Street and another larger set with slightly different proportions on Chambers Street, near the National Museum of Scotland. Each exhibition title had its own typographic treatment while still fitting in with the general Dovecot identity that I have been developing. The typographic treatment on the banners was continued on posters, cards and invitations, which I also designed. More images to follow.