Time Capsule
Three books, one brief — testing time, care, and design under pressure.
Three distinct editorial outcomes, one brief. Time Capsule pushed my time management and creative stamina to their limits — an ambitious set of three separate publications exploring personal and conceptual themes through tactile, research-led design.
Tactile research in libraries and bookshops shaped every decision; I design best with materials in hand. Time constraints limited iteration, especially on covers, but focused research carried each piece through.
The highlight was Take Your Meds — a personal, collaborative ADHD publication designed not just about a community, but for it. This project marked a turning point: learning to prioritise, make hard calls, and produce work that feels true to the designer I'm becoming.
I've lived with ADHD since I was 10. This experience has shaped how I think, design, and navigate the world — but even now, at 22, I'm still met with stereotypes and misunderstandings. People treat ADHD like it's one-size-fits-all. It's not. This project is a reaction to that.
I'm creating a book — part time capsule, part toolkit — that explores ADHD through the real experiences of four individuals, including myself. It won't be dense with academic jargon or government-style leaflets. Instead, it features raw interviews, visuals, and textures that capture the lived reality of ADHD: the sensitivities to sound, light, and touch, the guilt cycles, the forgotten tasks, the beauty and the burnout.
The structure is rooted in design. I initially drew inspiration from the visual format of my own medication pamphlet — Concerta 54mg — which sparked the idea of creating something functional yet personal. But I quickly realised that reusing clinical formats stripped away the emotion.
The real insight came from participant quotes, like Millie's:
"ADHD to me is a self-sabotaging cycle... I want to do the task, but I always wait until it's too late. Then I avoid it altogether."
Her honesty reframed the project. Instead of trying to explain ADHD, I needed to show it — visually, emotionally, and truthfully. Too often, ADHD is reduced to infographics, cartoons, or simplified lists of symptoms. These resources can be helpful, but they rarely reflect the internal chaos or nuance — they make the research feel like a chore. This book pushes back on that.
It's designed to be understood by people with ADHD — and appreciated by those without it. Ultimately, this isn't just a publication. It's an act of clarity and care. A space where neurodivergent people can see themselves properly represented — and where others can finally start to understand us.
Camera Roll — A Modern Time Capsule. This project began with a simple observation: everyone around me was staring at a screen. That led to a deeper question — what are we all capturing on our phones, and what do those photos say about us?
I explored the camera roll as a digital time capsule, using my own archive of 4,867 images to reflect on the banality and beauty of everyday life. Each photo, tagged with time, date, and location, became part of a curated sequence that asks not just what we document, but why.
Public opinions ranged from memory-keeping to performative habits, revealing how photo-taking reflects both societal norms and personal expression. The book's layout, influenced by tactile research and works like Signs and Item 020, handles hundreds of images with clarity.
Using every 10th photo, paired with energetic typography from Pangram Pangram, I created a stripped-back design that lets the images speak — turning a personal archive into a broader cultural commentary.
Questioning Identity began with a simple curiosity: how do people define identity? Too vast a topic for one project, but by asking a small group of individuals, I could start to build a picture. Identity shapes how we live — from the clothes we wear to how we speak — which makes it deeply personal and unique to everyone involved.
As an editorial project, I used experimental typography as a core method to reflect each person's identity — pairing responses from a Typeform questionnaire with typefaces that visually represent them. The typography becomes the imagery, a canvas for their personal stories.
Each participant has a typographic profile. Harmony, a fine art student at CSM, was paired with Quarantype to match her gritty, punk-inspired work, layered with Crédible — a dripping, graffiti-style font that echoes her contrasts. Her answers, raw and unfiltered, shaped the tone of the whole book:
"Without a solid identity, you won't be acknowledged... without identity, I don't think you are a true creative — just a bit of a copycat."
Social media and memes fed into the project too — ironically questioning identity in ways that reflect how digital culture shapes self-perception. The final cover layers each participant's typeface with texture and question marks, printed on 150gsm off-white stock and hand-bound, reinforced with muslin cloth under a 300gsm cover.