c studio design hero pt 2

Hannah Lesser
Martin Margiela
Published in
8 min readFeb 24, 2022

2.21.22

initial sketches

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i decided to sketch in indesign because i knew from the strat that i wanted to experiment more with type in my booklet. however i think this may have constrained me more than i would have liked. im also a little worried my sketches look too different from my posters.

2.22.2022

  • make it look more grungy and distressed like poster
  • bring in camel brown color
  • stitch is cool
  • tabi prints?
  • text wrap — use portrait and work to form rag
  • utilize gestalt principles
  • maybe use red on cover and in center spread and brown in the rest

brett reminded us to think about the story you want to tell the reader, not just pretty design principles. he also reminded us to think about subtlety as we’re designing. sometimes having more easter eggs that take the reader more time to understand can foster more joy than flashy page design.

i want to try to incorporate printer errors and coffee stains into my booklet.

2.23.22

pages for class tmrw:

2.24.22

having alice and angela as a new set of eyes to look at our ideas was nice. alice said to make sure my type system was consistent if i want to focus on that. she also suggested bringing in more of the tech typeface, possibly as caption for my images. my classmates wanted to see me bring in more of his work into my book. i enjoy the motif of the running stitch throughout the book, but alice said i need to make it look more like stitches instead of just a line. i also need to play more with the justification of my type because there are a few moments where the spacing is really crazy. alice said she likes the rectangular shapes but i should be more sleective about where i put them because they’re starting to lose their meaning bc i have so many in so many different sizes. she also said the quote from raf simons is confusing, ie she thinks it would be from martin. maybe i need to make this more clear.

2.25.22

i talked with brett today and he said to add more images of work

2.27.22

i talked with brett again today. these were his suggestions

  • one or two images bigger
  • first spread is weaker
  • need to include text portrait somewhere
  • get rid of image portrait bc it feels too much like a portrait

2.28.22

i feel like i’ve made a lot of progress over the weekend. this is what the book looks like now:

3.1.2022

for the cover: brett liked the metaphor of the front and back but suggested i move the text on the back into the middle of the tag. he also thought there was too much text on the back

3.2.2022

langston had some suggestions for how to make the story flow better. suggested:

  • bumping up the point size a tiny bit on the text portrait
  • adding more imagery on the first two spreads — craziness kind of hits you in the face in the first spread
  • didn't love confetti idea
  • maybe make one of the veil pictures big

right now the spread where the text goes around his head is not the center spread, but the text is small and goes over the gutter. i’ve tried putting the portrait on either side, but i think its more effective when it’s centered. right now my center spread aso had text that goes in the gutter.

3.3.2022

i was tired of looking at manofa and now i hate it, so i did some type explorations and now im using acumin with acuta (the names go nicely otgether which is an added bonus).

i decided to “kill my darlings” as they say in the industry and get rid of the image on the last spread. i’ve tried really hard to make it work but it is not. i think i can come up with something better.

i’m making the text wrap portrait the center spread. i talked to brett about it and he said that the text on my other spread is large enough that it shouldn’t be an issue if it goes into the gutter a bit. this is where i am at right now.

overall i am feeling confident about the direction of my booklet. today during crit brett told me that it might anger some people in this institution. it is very “anti-cmu”. if this occurs, i would like to make a disclaimer that my intent was not to ensue anger in the creation of this booklet. i hope others can understand that i am only pursuing creative endeavors and utilizing artistic license.

over spring break, i will continue to refine:

  • caption system
  • add more lines with blocking out text?
  • add more images in first two spreads — hits too hard in third
  • add line out of 2001 model and makit is flow into timeline

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Hannah Lesser
Martin Margiela

design, social and political history at carnegie mellon university