This week’s episode is with Mike Dempsey - he’s been a practising graphic designer since 1964. From the late sixties, he worked as an Art Director for two leading British publishing houses. In 1979, he founded the design consultancy Carroll & Dempsey, which later became CDT Design Ltd. His work has earned him many awards, and in 2012, he was presented with a unique Black Pencil for the most-awarded designer in D&AD’s 50-year history. To listen, click HERE
I had the great pleasure of interviewing graphic designer Fernando Gutiérrez RDI. His career began in 1986 at CDT Design in London. In 1992, he relocated to Spain and joined Sumer in Barcelona. After briefly returning to London, he formed Studio Graphica in Barcelona with fellow designer Pablo Martin. In 2000, Gutiérrez moved back to the UK as a Pentagram Partner, where he worked for six years. In 2006, he established Studio Fernando Gutiérrez.
Originally born in London in the 1960s to Spanish parents, Fernando displayed artistic talent from a young age, often drawing and painting on the walls of his room. Despite being initially directed towards a trade job with the London Electricity Board, his art teacher recognized his potential and steered him towards a different path. Gutiérrez’s unique upbringing contributes to his identity as a genuinely European designer, with a unique way of choosing projects and the clients he works with.
To listen to the interview, click HERE.
These disembodied elements set against an otherworldly backdrop are a perfect image for this novel about Benjamin Vaughn, a young illusionist who dies under mysterious circumstances at the height of his short career. New York-based Joan Wong designed it. She spans both the world of book cover design and editorial illustration commissions. Published by Nouvella in 2019
A real-life thriller about a CIA contractor who vanished in Iran and the international search to find him: this perfect sophisticated, sensitive cover by US designer Alex Merto knocks spots off the usual bombastic creations for this genre. Published by Farrar Straus & Giroux in 2016.
Peter Mendelsund’s cover design for the minimalist American poet Robert Lax gives minimum information for maximum impact. What more do you need? Published by W. W. Norton & Company 2019.
A collection of short stories of often absurd situations derived from the strange in the everyday and the everyday in the strange. Canadian designer David Gee used the title to inspire his witty cover, Published in 210 by ECW Press.
A novel that takes aim at contemporary mating practices, middle-class values, and marriage for love as the glue of society, but not in the digital world, but using the traditional mode of placing a personal ad in a newspaper. The piercing arrow is an excellent metaphor. Published by Esplanade Book in 2010. Designer (?)
How to graphically express a book on the history of masculinity in Canada? If you are the talented designer David Drummond, you do it with wit and symbolism, as here for UBC Press in 2007.
'The Life and Death of Sophie Stark' is about the troubled indie filmmaker told from the perspective of those who knew her. Using a cinematic close-up is a perfect metaphor to express this story. Spencer Kimble designed the cover for Blue Rider Press in 2015.
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