Suburban Legends was a letterpress poster exhibition that was held in 2012 to raise money for the Starlight Children’s Foundation. The exhibition celebrated Sydney’s amazing diversity. We invited 13 artists to produce a poster and allocated each artist an individual suburb, encouraging them to tell their own stories drawn from personal experiences through their design. We designed and produced an invitation to the exhibition that featured a die cut package, 3 ‘postcards’ and a poster. Each postcard featured a pictorial vignette based around the idiosyncratic temperament of the city; driving under the harbor bridge or eating noodles in Cabramatta.

For these post cards we used an old technique called ‘kineticards’. Overlaying film transparencies we created single images that became animated when pulled through a viewing device. With these mini animations we were able to introduce a narrative element into the design. The design of the poster was based around the map of Sydney, its form rendered using halftones and punctuated by icons that represented the suburbs each artist had chosen to work with. These posters were printed using a split fountain to create a colour gradient effect.

FINALIST – AGDA AUSTRALIAN DESIGN BIENNALE 2014 – DESIGN FOR GOOD – SUBURBAN LEGENDS