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.

Next of Kin Poster, Hawick 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 

Dovecot What's On Guide 1

Dovecot What's On Guide | August-December 2015

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

I was asked to redesign the Dovecot Gallery What's On Guide, building on the pared back identity that I had started to develop on Dovecot's invitations, posters and banners. This is the first piece of print that I have designed for Dovecot that uses Whitney, the typeface that appears in the Dovecot logo (which was not designed by me) rather than Callibri. I'm very proud of this design and delighted with the way it turned out - I've enjoyed spotting it around Edinburgh! This is the cover of the guide, which I photographed earlier in the summer when I was busy with other things; I didn't get a chance to photograph the inside pages. The guide is twelve pages plus cover which is cut away on the front to reveal half of a full bleed image of a detail from a work by the wonderful textile designer Bernat Klein. The guide was printed by Allander on Vision Superior 200gsm for the cover and 120gsm for the text pages. My original intention was to have a gloss UV varnish on the outside of the cover to create a contrast with the uncoated stock on the inside but it turned out to be too expensive. I think that, in the end, the guide works perfectly without the gloss: the white of the paper looks crisp and clean against the image and is also pleasing to touch; and the half cover adds another layer of visual appeal. I'm looking forward to designing the second guide for January-July 2016.

The Improbable City Book

The Improbable City

Published by Edinburgh Art Festival, 2015

Edited by Sorcha Carey and Emily Gray

Designed by James Brook

ISBN 978 0 9929909 1 6

48 pages with soft cover with pockets front and back containing a set of 8 postcards
Book size 210 x 165 mm; postcard size 105 x 148 mm
Printed by Allander, Edinburgh, on Cocoon Preprint 100% recycled paper with Colorplan smoke grey cover; postcards printed on Cocoon Offset 350gsm

☞

The Improbable City is the second book that I have designed for the Edinburgh Art Festival. The book accompanied a programme of commissions that 'celebrate the work of visual artists who vividly conjure alternative imaginary worlds through their work, and considers how it is often the improbable which illuminates the real'. The programme included work by leading and emerging Scottish practitioners and includes new work by three international artists showing in the UK for the first time. The Improbable City ran from 30 July – 30 August 2015.

The set of postcards was an attempt to include last-minute images of the installations that were being created specially for the Art Festival and that were still being made when the book had to go to print to meet the deadline of the opening of 29 July; as the postcards had a shorter production time we hoped to include images of the finished installations that were not ready in time for the book. The postcards slot in to pockets on the front and back cover, strengthening the idea of a book as a guide for visitors to 'The Improbable City'.

There are eight postcards in the set with work by the seven artists featured in the exhibition – Charles Avery, Marvin Gaye Chetwynd, Julie Favreau, Emma Finn, Ariel Guzik, Kemang Wa Lehulere, and Hanna Tuulikki – as well as an eighth postcard by Neil Mulholland, which features a text written in response to Marvin Gaye Chetwynd's work.

The 'map' of Edinburgh on the cover is by Hanna Tuulikki; rather than running the map over the spine, I ran the map over the fore-edge of the book, cutting it in two. I had fun using a glyph of a pointing hand to further emphasise the feeling of a guide book or travel guide; I later learned that this symbol is known as a 'manicule' (from the Latin root manus for "hand" and manicula for "little hand") or fist.

Platform Leaflet

This is the leaflet and logo I designed for Platform: 2015, a new Edinburgh Art Festival initiative 'intended to showcase Scottish artists at the early stages of their career'. Four artists – Antonia Bañados, Ben Callaghan, Ross Hamilton Frew, and Jessica Ramm – were selected from an open call by artists Christine Borland and Craig Coulthard working with Edinburgh Art Festival Director, Sorcha Carey and curator Emily Gray.

Today is the final day of the Edinburgh Art Festival and your last chance to see Platform: 2015, the exhibition can be found at the Festival Kiosk, 9-11 Blair Street, Edinburgh EH1 1QR. Catch it while you can!

More information can be found here.