Hand Lettered Book Titles for Jane Fallon

By Ruth Rowland

Publishing: Jane Fallon Lettering I Penguin Books

I had a lot of fun working on these hand lettered book titles for popular author, Jane Fallon.

Commissioned by Penguin, these fresh and witty designs were the perfect excuse to get my marker pens out and create some casual script to work with the photography.

So far I’ve created two titles for her novels, Strictly Between Us and My Sweet Revenge. The third in the series, Faking Friends, is about to come out in January (but if you’d like a sneak preview of the cover, click through to my website … shhhhh!).

Journal: Thirty Days of Digital Lettering

Thanks to everyone who followed my thirty day journey experimenting with digital lettering with an Apple Pencil on the new iPad Pro. If you missed the posts on social media, you can see all thirty of the hand lettered pieces in the new journal on my portfolio website.

Hold Fast to Dreams Lettering for Scholastic Scope Magazine & Pinterest Update

It was great to work on this project about American poet and social activist, Langston Hughes for Scholastic's Scope, The Language Arts Magazine. Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance in New York City and this short play is an introduction to his life and poetry for students to read aloud in class.

The title for the piece, Hold Fast to Dreams, a quote from one of his poems, is drawn in a loose, fresh, brush style Read On ...

Online Update: Pinterest

I’ve just set up a folder of lettering sketches on Pinterest. It’s an eclectic mix of pages from my sketchbooks, featuring ongoing obsessions and late night scribblings. Head over there to take a look if you'd like to see some of what’s going on behind the scenes in the studio ...

Love is all ... Logo

It seems appropriate to post some news about my latest logo design in time for Valentine’s Day.

Commissioned by internationally acclaimed British designer, Rebecca Street, I was asked to develop a script logo for her new designer bridal wear venture, ‘Love is all …’ by Rebecca Street.

Aiming to give the logo a light and airy touch, I decided that a fine brush would give the freedom and elegance I needed. As with all jobs, I put together a set of initial roughs for Rebecca to view and we struck up a dialogue to develop the lettering and pin down the final artwork. Used online as well across printed packaging and stitched labels, the logo needed to be strong enough to work across a variety of media and at a range of sizes. Rebecca Street already has an established brand, so my lettering was designed to work neatly with her existing logo but can also stand alone if necessary.

It was a pleasure to collaborate with another designer, albeit in the medium of fabric rather than ink and paper - if you have a moment, take a look at her beautiful designs.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Simple Minds v The Stranglers Limited Edition Single Lettering

Thrilled to work on the lettering for a new single brought out by these two era-defining bands, Simple Minds and The Stranglers. 

To celebrate their forthcoming tour together, when The Stranglers will be special guests of Simple Minds, the bands got together to record a version of The Stranglers' 1977 punk classic, '(Get A) Grip (On Yourself)'. Influenced by The Stranglers and the Punk ethos in general, read Jim Kerr's thoughts on first seeing the band live when they performed in Glasgow.

Created with a pen I made specifically to capture the raw energy and anarchism of Punk, I hand lettered the single title and added it to distressed versions of the bands' iconic logos. I had some fun working on a range of options (some of which you can see on my website) before this version was settled on.  It was then printed as a limited edition onto collectible 7" white vinyl in black and vibrant green.

You can see more of my work for Simple Minds and the music industry here.

Hand Lettered Author Logos - Kristin Hannah and Cathy Woodman

I’ve worked on quite a few author logos over the years, so I decided to gather them together and add them to a folder in the publishing section of my site. Today, I’m adding two new authors - Kristin Hannah and Cathy Woodman. 

Two very different approaches for two very different authors. A soft mono-line script for Kristin Hannah’s beautiful dream-like covers and quirkier, more angular lettering to work with the lovely watercolour illustrations on Cathy Woodman’s series.

Becky Chilcott Design Logo

I was delighted to work on a logo for a new website launched this week by Becky Chilcott Design. A talented designer, working predominantly for the publishing industry, Becky also finds time to curate the talks at the wonderful St Bride Print Library here in London. Check out her blog if you get a chance - it’s a fascinating read.

Becky wanted to keep the site fresh and simple, so we decided on a loose mono-line script with open counters and a flowing line to complement the grid layout. The cool palette of grey, green and white with a touch of red adds to the open, uncluttered feel of the site.

Over the past few years I’ve enjoyed working on a range of logos. Clients include entrepreneurs with new products and starter businesses, authors (for both publishing houses and self-publishers), musicians (established and starting out), restaurants, wine merchants, magazines, confectioners, food manufacturers, hotels and even stately homes. You can see a selection of this work in the logos folder on my portfolio site.