Friends In Therapy
CLIENT
Friends In Therapy
SERVICES
Editorial & Graphic Design
YEAR
2023
Friends In Therapy is a photo narrative book project that aims to showcase the beauty and power of therapy. The book will feature portraits of friends taken on 35mm film, accompanied by their response to questions about their personal journey and relationship with therapy. By sharing these candid stories, I want to help reduce the stigma around therapy and encourage more people to seek the help they need.
By creating a photo narrative book that features portraits of individuals and their experiences with therapy, the purpose is to foment a positive and safe space to express these experience in order to reduce the stigma surrounding therapy and mental health. By sharing personal stories and highlighting the positive impact it can have on people’s lives, people can be inspired and encouraged to seek therapy. The book also raises the awareness about mental health as a topic in society, it’s taboo status and the importance of asking for help.
I aspired for readers to have a calming and tranquil experience, stemming from the book to all digital formats. The aesthetics, the textures, the sounds you hear should induce a calmness in the user. Almost as if getting lost in a forest, or in a sea of tranquility. Just you, and your thoughts. Because the subject matter can be heavy at times. The environment it is presented in should aid in making that emotional weight feel light through the design aspect. Every detail rendered has a purpose to facilitate the reading and processing of the information displayed. The hardness, and at times harshness of the human experience is hence wrapped by softness, by light, and by space.
The book was taken to Tarlatana to be hand sown and made into a hardcover book. I chose a soft linen cloth for the binding as the texture was welcoming. The titles were printed in black on both the front and back cover. Each of the 11 individual booklets was sewn then glued.
I wanted to use the texture and opacity of the vegetable paper to visually represent human layers – like onions, we all have layers and masks that we present to society. I wanted to start with a thick layer first, in representation of our name and our image. It’s the first layer that everyone sees. As you explore a person’s story, and go deeper and deeper into their life you shed a layer. Each answer to each of my questions was set to a different height in order to use the transparency as a format to create a visual puzzle of the information. Representing the human connection formed when getting to know a person. As each page revealed new information, you can visibly see that the was more hidden beneath. That there was always more depth to the person and their story. By making all the text layouts different, each person has their own unique layout representing their life story and personality.
