Awards Book Archive

Beautiful Mess
  • Shortlisted

Designed by
Imogen Stubbs
Category
Best Designed Young Adult Cover
Year
2018
Publisher
Text Publishing

About the Designer

Imogen is the art director at Text Publishing, where she has worked as a book designer and production manager since 2011. She manages the book and marketing design program while also designing covers for literary fiction, non-fiction, young adult and middle grade titles. In 2015 she was shortlisted for Young Designer of the Year at the Australian Book Design Awards. Previously she designed and art directed the literary magazines Harvest and The Key of Sea Journal. Imogen served on the…

View profile
Design Rationale

This cover portrays the turmoil of two teenagers lives, connected through grief, mental illness and friendship (one that grows through letters). The Japanese art of Kintsugi is referenced throughout as a way to reconcile the beauty in the broken and that not everyone needs to be fixed, they’re better with their flaws. I used this to bring a beauty to the chaos and overlay the torn notes. Bright colours convey a sense of youth and fun, as the characters find their way in the world, with accompanying messy type as imagined how one of the characters would write.

Details
Dimensions
128 x 198 mm
No. pages
304
Special finishes
Matt lamination, gold foil on cracked lines of front cover
Credits
Internal Design
Imogen Stubbs
Illustration
Imogen Stubbs
Typesetting
J&M Typesetting
Printing
Griffin Press
Author
Claire Christian