OUGD503 - Penguin Design Awards: Concept Development

OUGD503 - Studio Brief 1/Penguin Design Awards 

Concept Development

Analysing my initial sketches I concluded that the strongest concept was the design that articulated the satirical tone of voice of the book and the personality of the author. This concept works well to engage an audience giving then an initial shock factor when seeing the cover from afar, this will make them double take and engage with the cover to look closer before realising that it is fruit. This then creates a bold playful statement that is appropriate to display in a public environment with no offensive imagery being used, its all in the connotations from the audience. This effectively highlights the sarcastic and playful language used within the book and creates a bold statement that will work well to ensure the book stands out against a busy retail environment. 

Developing the concept further I looked at alternative fruits that resembled vaginas however through feedback from other design students found the papaya was the most effective image in displaying a clear message, comments included 'the papaya is the most noticeable one, some of the others like the kiwi looks too vague' and 'the papaya is also tropical and exotic so will engage an audience from that perspective as it is fairly unusual to see in Britain.

FEEDBACK

Before beginning more detailed development it was important to receive feedback from students and tutors based on the concept of my design direction. Tutors liked the informed nature of the concept reinforcing the colloquial and playful tone of voice within the aesthetic to create a sense of continuity between the cover and content. Students felt the design was bold in its nature using fruit to represent the vagina but felt the concept was engaging laughing at the idea with comments including 'I can't wait to see how it looks' and others simply laughing at the humour nature of the design direction. From this feedback I can start to develop a more distilled aesthetic for the concept which can later be refined into the most appropriate resolution.