Student project. Poetry Northwest Magazine was not a client and did not commission this work. Coursework, Everett Community College — Graph 299.
Poetry Northwest is a literary journal that has been in continuous publication since 1959. The project for Graph 299 was to design a cover for the Spring 2013 issue, plus explore a logo direction for the journal's ongoing identity. The journal's editorial board supplied the issue's poems and the photographer's image; my job was to build a cover that honored the literary heritage while making something a reader would pick up off a shelf.
The final cover pairs a striking botanical photograph with the journal's title set in a classic serif. The photograph carries the emotional weight; the typography stays quiet and lets the image lead. The title treatment respects the journal's literary heritage without feeling dated — a serif that has been in use for decades, set with enough air around it to feel contemporary.
I explored a second cover direction using a spherical photographic image — a more abstract approach that treated the cover as a single visual statement rather than a photograph with a title on top. It was a stronger design object, but the editorial board felt the botanical image connected more directly to the issue's themes.
