After researching into the New Wave Design of the 80's I found Peter Saville, an English art director and graphic designer. His work contains various geometric shapes and bold colours, I took inspiration from this into my final design with some simple New Wave patterns.


The aim and purpose of this brief was for me to discover how imagery is used in a wide variety of graphic disciplines including print and digital media. Designers need to be multi-disciplined, adaptable and understand the software tools that are available to them, including typographical and illustration packages so that they are able to create innovate and exciting visual communications. I had to create a 48-sheet sized poster for the London Underground to promote the V&A Club to Catwalk: Fashion in the 1980's exhibition.


I researched into several artists including Reno Msad, Billie Jean, Patrick Nagel and Jasper Goodall. I also looked at two designers whose work featured at the exhibition: Anthony Price and Katharine Hamnett. I included Anthony Prices' garment on one of my main illustrations to give a small insight on the many wonderful garments within the exhibition.

After looking into the styles of these artists, I decided to experiment and try the styles of Patrick Nagel and Billie Jean, these experiments can be found on my blog. I am happy with my experiments and feel that they were successful. I have incorporated both of these styles into my final pieces and found that this has worked really well together.

Both Final 48-sheet posters include 2/3 Illustrations, the V&A logo, the exhibition name, times, dates and also underground travel information. I have used complementary colour schemes which are simple and effective. However, I feel that my second poster has the stronger link to the 80's after using bold blue and orange hues instead of the pastel green and pink of the first poster.

Overall I would say that I am happy with the result of my final outcomes and had fun experimenting with illustration styles and the Adobe software. If I were to do a project similar to this again I would have a deeper look into the theme, in this case the 80's as I often found it hard to pull the 80's link through, I feel as though I managed to do so. However I could have made a stronger effort to get a better understanding of the 80's by asking a variety of people what was iconic about the 80's etc.

This is my first final 48-sheet poster, I am happy with the finished result. I have included 2/3 Illustrations, the V&A logo, times, dates and Underground travel details. I have used complementary colours as a simple colour scheme that works effectively. I have been influenced by the Club to Catwalk exhibition itself along with several artists such as Billie Jean, Reno Msad, Patrick Nagel and Katharine Hamnett. 
This is my second final (also) 48-sheet poster, I am very happy with this finished result too. I have included 2/3 Illustrations, the V&A logo, times, dates and Underground travel details. I have also use complementary colours within this piece, I feel that the bold blue and orange shades have a stronger 80s feel to them rather than the pastel pink and green of my first poster. I have been influenced by the Club to Catwalk exhibition itself, including Anthony Prices' "Birds Wing evening dress" featured on my illustration. However, the original "Birds Wing" evening dress is Ivory. I was also influenced by a variety of artists including Patrick Nagel, Billie Jean and Reno Msad.

This is my first final illustration, inspired by Katharine Hamnett - the bold type on tops, Patrick Nagel - black outline, square eyes and white skin, Reno Msad - the juicy lips and blonde hair and the Club to Catwalk exhibition. I am happy with how this illustration turned out and think that it's evident that this model would fit into the 80s. 


This is my second model, inspired by Reno Msad - Juicey lips, large, detailed facial features, Patrick Nagel - White skin, black outlines, Anthony Price - whose dress "Birds Wing"(garment in illustration) featured at the Club to Catwalk exhibition.
These are the "Club to Catwalk" illustrations/type I created these in the same way I done my Billie Jean experimentation, I thought that this is a funky yet smart way to display "Club to Catwalk".


For this experimentation I took an image by Patrick Nagel and tried to recreate it in his style. His style consists of black outlines, black hair, white skin and squarish eyes.
Here is my recreation of Patrick Nagels image, I took a small section. The section I took was of the womans face, as Nagels models seem to contain the same attributes, dark hair, square-eyes and full lips. I am happy with how my recreation turned out and feel that it is very alike the original apart from the highlights within the hair could have been more realistic. To create this I used the pen tool on Photoshop and created black outlines, similar to the way that Patrick Nagel would've done. I will bring this style forth into my final piece as it looks very effective and meets with the ambiance of the 80's decade.


Below is my experimentation inspired by Billie Jean.
Billie Jeans piece of work consists in the word "LOVE" and uses colours that people relate to love, for instance pinks and reds. The quality isn't perfect, but it isn't "messy" as such, either. Before I begun my experimentation I thought that Jean had created the piece by drawing freehand on Photoshop.

Here is my finished experimentation, I chose to oppose the "LOVE" with using "HATE". For this I used Photoshop. Starting with a standard Sans-Serif font I traced over it freehand with the pen tool, however I found that this made it a bit too messy, unlike Jeans "LOVE" piece. I therefore used a pen tool, which created a sharper and straighter edge, although it's more pristine than Billie Jeans piece I feel that it still created the same effect. I used colours that represented hate, and to me this is a variety of greys. Hate is a draining emotion and I feel that grey perfectly presents this in the way that red/pink represents LOVE. I also added noise to the background, to give it a bit of a rustic and rough look.

I am really happy with how this turned out, even though it's a bit too straight-edged I still think it was a successful experimentation.


  • An English illustrator who was at the forefront of reinventing illustration in the late 90's.
  • Clients range from music, fashion, advertising, publishing and editorial.
  • Goodall has his own swimwear label: JG4B, a limited edition range of "wearable art".
  • Has worked for Gucci, Nike, Adidas and Dazed & Confused.
  • Jaspers work shows a symbolic look at eroticism and contemporary culture.
I really like this flowing and sophisticated piece, it has a mysterious aura about it with the use of shadows and silhouettes.

I also like this piece, it represents Dior really well, he has stuck with his popular silhouette theme and this fits impeccably well with Dior, a sophisticated and expensive company.

Although this piece is purely computer manipulated and produced I really like the geometric shapes and the space-like features. I find this piece very mystical and random but I like that there's no specific theme.


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