ABOUT
I was tasked with creating a promotional mailer for B Gallery (a Columbus art gallery) for an exhibition of work by an artist from my country that is sponsored by the tourism office I created. I chose Karel Martens, a Dutch modernist designer who is widely known for his use of experimental type, abstract figures/numbers, and vivid colors.
As for creative direction, I kept the tone consistant with the branding I created for Netherlands Tourist Agency. I wanted a simplisitc layout and to incorporate Karel Martens use of shapes throughout the mailer.
MOOD BOARD
For my mood board, I took inspiration from type focused design. I wanted a minimalistic design all while experimenting with type layout. I also wanted to include aspects of Karel Martens work and use shape overlays as well.
THUMBNAILS
Here are some prelimary sketches for different layouts of the mailer. I wanted to play with the layout of the headers, include aspects of Karel Martens works, and possibly use text wraps for the body copy.
MOCK UP
Here is my rough mockup of the mailer. In the end, I incorperated a few aspects from each thumbnail into the final layout with a few tweaks along the way.
OUTSIDE OF MAILER
As I started the outside of the mailer, I immediatly ran into an issue with how I had orginally laid out my type and die cut. As a result, I had to move the type off of the die cut and play with the layout more.
OUTSIDE OF MAILER CONTINUED
After playing with the layout of the type some more, I decided to keep it simple. At this point, I added color and some of Karel Martens work to the ouside of the mailer.
OUTSIDE OF MAILER FINAL
Here is the completed outside of the mailer. I kept the overall layout simple and through the diecut it will showcase another one of his circular pieces.
INSIDE OF MAILER
Afterwards, I started laying out the inside of the mailer. I started with basic blocking of the text and images. Then I added images of Karel Martens work and a portrait of him. As for the RSVP layout, I wanted to mimic some of the graphs seen in his work.
INSIDE OF MAILER CONTINUED
I started to add color to the inside of the mailer and converted the images I gathered into monotone tiffs.
INSIDE OF MAILER CONTINUED
Here was my first version completed. However, after some feedback I decided to play with the type some more. I also recreated some of Karel Martens work in order to have crisper images througout the mailer.
RECREATING HIS WORKS
In order to have high resolution images, I selected a few of my favorite works by Karel Martens and moved them to Illustrator. I recreated them using simple shapes and color selected from the originals.
INSIDE OF MAILER FINAL
Here is my completed mailer with the suggested edits and updated imagery. I used text wraps to help the type flow around the imagery better. I also overlayed some of his works on top of some of the text to mimic his style.
