ISTD 2017 Brief: Project 3: Fickle Fads and Dedicated Followers of Fashion
The lava lamp was an obvious choice for the ISTD brief of fickle fads and dedicated followers of fashion. The lava lamp was a popular fad among the counterculture of the 1960s as they were increasingly on the prowl for mind-bending experiences. As teens became the main demographic of lava lamps in the 1960s, I have decided to target this publication to teens by using a fresh appealing vibrant aesthetic. The looks and materials of the lava lamp influence my concept, with bright bold colour to reflect the colourful blobs of wax that move inside the lava lamp, and transparency to represent the see through glass bottle that holds the liquid and wax. My colour palette has been derived from the 1960s, the bright bold 1960s colours were iconic as it was a break away from the dull boring practice of the 1950s. The lava lamp wax is round, thick and globby so I have used a thick weight rounded typeface as my decorative typeface to represent this. Some of the typographic systems I’ve employed in this publication consist of overlapping methods, transparency, colour and scale. Through using those systems the publication has movement, flow and intimate moments throughout.
The placement of my body copy text is scattered to show the up and down movement of the lava lamps wax, this has been controlled using a modular grid and horizontal alignments throughout the publication. I decided to go for an informational narrative to really convey the lava lamps life and experience to date. I have used a colour system to help the pace of the book flow, I start with pink on the inside spread and transition from there. I decided to print on silk paper to help the colour shine and stand out. I perfect bound the publication to create a polished look, where I was able to open each spread fully. I left the perfect bound uncovered, as I liked the colour that you can see come through from my coloured pages, and the clear glue
