ARCADE Issue 41.2 Collaboration

SCOPE
Design a 60-page publication over the course of 5 weeks

TOOLS
Adobe InDesign
Adobe Acrobat
Pantone Matching System

ARCADE 41.2 - The Collaboration Issue brings the theme of “collaboration” to life through the pairing of each essay with a professional or mentor currently working in the field who is adjacent to the student’s topic.

As the guest designer for the issue, I worked to intertwine the introductions with the corresponding student essay to create an engaging flow for readers. Each spread was thoughtfully crafted to highlight all the hard work that was done to make this issue a reality.

For this issue, we chose two spot colors, a purple and a teal, to complement each other in the print issue. Working with spot color printing allowed us to bring a special vibrancy to the magazine, and the limited color palette was an exciting design challenge.

The cover design was inspired by Cat’s Cradle & other playground string games. Through the illustrated hands and strings, I hoped to visualize what the collaborative process sometimes feels like. I grew up with these string games, and I got to explore how deeply intertwined collaboration is in the history of string games. I explore more of this theme in my Letter from Design.

The spot color printing process required a creative approach to image processing. To achieve the dynamic look I had imagined, I had to process the images in multiple layers. Each layer blended on top of the other, creating the vibrant images seen in the issue.

You can view the entire publication at arcadenw.org

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Natalie O’Rourke is a visual communication designer & photographer based in Seattle, WA. Currently she is designing publications @ARCADE, occassionaly taking pictures of buildings, & curating the perfect playlist to make it through a gray Seattle winter.

Natalie O’Rourke is a visual communication designer & photographer based in Seattle, WA.

Currently she is designing publications @ARCADE, occassionaly taking pictures of buildings, & curating the perfect playlist to make it through a gray Seattle winter.