Jobs from the past - Number 60

Regular followers of this blog will know that my first post of every month is a "job from the past" so that I can show some of the really good work from years gone by...

Quartet: 27.01.06

This is a stunning piece of literature produced for an event at the museum back in 2006.  Quartet: Four Literary Walks Through The V&A Quartet contains commissioned short stories by Nicholas Royle, Lucy Caldwell, Peter Hobbs and Shiromi Pinto.

Inspired by the V&A and its collections, the four stories in ‘Quartet’ were annotated with directions, mapping the routes described in the writers’ narratives and thus enabling readers to follow the stories as they moved through the museum.

Size of the publication is 307x255mm, portrait. It is totally unbound, just folded and loose, which given the materials just looks and feels right. Matt and Zoë, who were the designers on the project wanted an interaction between the pages which ties in the words with the layout and different floor levels in the museum. They wanted a lightweight material and a high amount of show-through which of course is NOT what our Offenbach Bible does - it has the most amazing opacity for such a lightweight sheet of paper. I suggest the use of a 'high density' black ink or what is soemtimes termed 'double density black' - this is normal ink, except it just has a higher percentage of pigment (colour) so results in a deeper black - thereby ensuring maximum show through - and a nice solid black as well! The picture below shows the way the design and type was structured to work through the paper.

The 4pp cover is printed on StarFine Natural White 200gsm, which is a good match to the shade of the Offenbach Bible. The text is all printed on Offenbach Bible 60gsm.
Below you can see the schematic which links the stories and their position in the museum.

Detail of the schematics:

The routes were also made available as downloads for Sony PlayStation Portable consoles as the show was upported by Sony Playstation

You can read more about the project here:
http://www.mattwilley.co.uk/Quartet-Four-Literary-Walks-Through-The-V-A

Design is by Studio8 where the Creative Directors were Zoë Bather and Matt Willey. Sadly, Studio8 closed in May 2012 and Matt and Zoë now work on their own projects, many of which have also appeared on this blog. This piece of work was awarded both Type Directors Club (TDC53), 2007 Citation for Typographic Excellence and an ADC 86, 2007 Merit (Corporate & Promotional Design)

This piece was printed in two colours, offset litho, by Principal Colour.

www.zoebather.co.uk
www.mattwilley.co.uk
www.principalcolour.co.uk

Posted by Justin Hobson 02.10.2014