Anna-Katrine Parker
Central Saint Martins
Vicky Simmons
Camberwell College of Arts
Explanation of work
Flowers, like relationships, often have a well-groomed artificial aesthetic for public display. Throughout history, flowers have been used to convey ideas, feelings and messages. They create a strong metaphor for relationships as they belong to different families and have a short lifespan when cut. Both friendship and love can blossom and wilt.
We used roses, baby’s breath, white carnations, matricaria and double chrysanthemums for their hidden meanings. As the flowers create a complicated element, we decided to stick to an all-white palette and to use Gill Sans to keep it legible and elegant. This was also appropriate as all Penguin books used to be set in Gill. We wanted to make it look like the flowers had physically grown through the book. Finally, we also wanted the back of the book to read ‘On Beauty’ backwards – no beauty.
