Background
A client kindly recommended me to a chap who worked in the music industry. Operated as a one-man-band, putting together compilation box-sets. Mostly pre-80s stuff, both American and British. Seemed to know everyone in the industry so was able to to get round the usual copyright and royalty barriers with a simple phone call or a quick beer. Living in Nashville probably helped too. Cut out retailers by selling direct through 5 and 10 minute info-commercials on American and European cable TV, featuring old film clips and, of course, the box-set packages. So pack design was critical to the sales process.
Brief
Design a box set for a 4cd compilation of mostly late 60s hits from the pre-Woodstock 'hippy' era entitled 'The Love Generation'.
Solution
Box cover featured a close-up of an iconic two-fingered 'peace' sign, photographed against a blue sky. Smallish title logo but with the word 'Love' drawn in 60s calligraphic style with the 'o' drawn as a heart shape. The four cds and their sleeves each featured a variation of the two-fingered salute - e.g. cd1 had just one finger pointing up, cd2 repeated the two fingers, cd3 three fingers and cd4, yup, you guessed, four fingers.
Result
Quickly became one of the best selling compilation sets ever. Wish I'd now gone for a royalty deal rather than a straight fee.
As a student I was fortunate to be taught by the great Bob Gill. In one of his projects we had to phone in our design solutions - clearly illustrated the superiority of ideas over style. It was a lesson that stayed with me throughout my time spent slaving away in various design and ad agencies. And it leads to a creative showcase using words, not pictures (well, maybe a couple).
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