Personal & Professional Practice: Creative Convos - Day 2

Rose Nordin is a freelance graphic designer and illustrator based in London, with a particular interest in self-publishing and DIY culture.

She is co-founder of One of My Kind (OOMK) a collaborative publishing practice, alongside Sofia Niazi and Heiba Lamara. Working together since 2014, they make, publish and distribute books and printed works developed from self-initiated projects. Additionally, the practice commission new works by female artists, and also co-curate DIY Cultures - one of the UK’s largest annual independent publishing fairs. OOMK also work with galleries, museums, educational institutions and self-organised groups to deliver workshops and produce collaborative publications.

The OOMK zine is a biannually-printed, highly visual, handcrafted small-press publication. Its content is supplied via the imaginations, creativity and spirituality of women, with each issue centering around a different creative theme, with more general content exploring topics of faith, activism and identity.

In addition to OOMK, Rose also co-founded and runs Rabbits Road Press, a community Risograph printing press in East London.

Advice:

Don't use mock-ups if possible.
Show relationship with mediums.
Know your daily rate (as a freelancer).
Avoid doing any work for free.
Artists residencies are great - British Council, Book works

Zine Workshop - A Lexicon of Design

Inspired by one of Rose's projects critically considering issues around work, The Lexicon of Labour, we spent the afternoon making our own Zine, A Lexicon of Design.

First, we individually listed an A-Z of words relating to the design industry:

A - Animation

B - Book Binding

C - Collaboration

D - Digital Design

E - Employability, Experimental, Editorial

F - Finishing

G - Graphic, Galleries

H - Holistic

I - Infographics

J - Journey

K - Kerning

L - Layout

M - Motion

N - Not for Profit

O - Opportuntiy

P - Print

Q - Questions

R - Residency

S - Social

T - Typography

U - User Experience

V - Versatility

W - Work

X - Xerox (Print)

Y - Youth

Z - Zines

Following these, we each volunteered to design a page representing just one of the words, which would then be photocopied and formatted into the zine. I letter 'F' for finishing, as this is of great importance to my practice.

For the design, I listed 9 finishing techniques, each featuring a letter from the word 'finishing.' I ordered the words accordingly to spell out the word with emphasised letters spelling out the word. These letters mimicked foil via a gradient representing shine/light reflection. These letters were further emphasised through contrasting typographic style (these were sans-serif, while the rest of the word(s) were serif).