Jet Purdie ∵ Book Cover Design ∵ Art Direction ∵ Illustration

by
Candy Harper

Kiana Palombo at White Fox commissioned me to create Candy Harper’s new cover, for a book about two girls that wish for different lives and time travel through an old hand mirror.

Kiana, WhiteFox and Candy were all really cool and gave me loads of creative freedom and the end result was something everyone - including myself - was really happy with : )

Parts of the girl in the top right corner came from an old public domain illustration of Cinderella by the hugely talented Arthur Rackham (1867 – 1939). I gave Arthur’s character new shoes, new arms, a pearl necklace, a new dress and changed her body so it looked more like Alice in Wonderland time travel falling, rather than Cinderella running. I think Arthur Rackham might be my favourite silhouette artist.

As I created the cover I thought about what kid’s my daughter’s age were into… boba (bubble tea), “aesthetic” bedroom posters, smartphones, horribly expensive Jordan sneakers and Olivia Rodrigo. I did my best to inject some of those onto the cover to help convey one of the characters was contemporary and the other from the past. Bubble tea, mobiles and trippy background textures weren’t in the brief, but Kiana and Holly were very cool and went with it… maybe because they know books are competing with these things. To make the cover extra dramatic I gave the iPhone a dying battery symbol - every child’s worst nightmare : (

Here is my hilariously terrible stick person doodle. Had Kiana seen this she may have kicked me off the project : )

This project was an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much Kiana

by Luke Marchant
Art Direction and Design by Jet Purdie
Illustrations by Rory Walker

I wanted the rodents to be the stars on the cover of book two, as I knew they’d bring the mad energy, humour and give the main characters something to react to.

Published by Everything With Words

Thanks for the fun project Mikka : )

Books 1-3 based were based on US covers by Patrick Crotty at Random House Graphic. I switched-up the colours and stripped them back for the UK editions.
On One Smart Cookie - which is very funny and well thought-out - I montaged the little squirrel ninja from the US cover into a take-out container illo taken from the interiors.

by Luke Marchant
Art Direction and Design by Jet Purdie
Illustrations by Rory Walker

Thank you for the fun project Mikka

by Antonia Maxwell

Book cover design / illustration by Jet Purdie
Published by Neem Tree Press

Design by Jet Purdie
Illustrations by Mary Murphy

Mary’s was an absolute pleasure to work with. She didn’t judge me during a skype call when I had my underwear drying on a clotheshorse in the background : )

The Minute Minders has hundreds of illustrations - all of them gorgeous! Mary also wrote the the book. The story is lovely!

Illustration by James Lancett
Design and lettering by Jet Purdie

I’ve been wanting to work with James for ages.
If I had my way, the character would’ve only have three fingers like the promo image and half of the cartoons in the world ; )

Illustration and lettering: David Dean
Art Direction: Jet Purdie

David was an ABSOLUTE PRO and worked really hard to make When The War Came Home perfect for us. Thank you so much David - another gorgeous cover!

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustartion: Laura Ellen Anderson

Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Quentin Blake

I always enjoy working with old art and giving them a new lease of life.
The A Penguin Classic books have a fairly strict design grid but I managed to bend the rules slightly and get Quentin's lovey signature on the cover instead of plain text. I also added a spider to the alarm clock price tag, plus a mouse on the title type. The title type font was selected by a designer who created the ebook editions a few years ago. Between myself and freelance designers Kim and Ken, we found some cool colours that went with the purple robe Uncle always wears.

Illustration by Dapo Adeola
Design and lettering by Jet Purdie

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: David Dean

I REALLY loved this story as it is based in a mining town by my Nan’s house in Wales, plus the characters, dialog, plot twists and values are great.

Thanks to illustrator David Dean, The Valley of The Lost Secrets cover and interior artwork all went super smooth. David even created the gorgeous lettering - what a STAR!

Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: David Dean

David is a delight to work with and an absolute pro.

Illustration by Levi Pinfold
Lettering by David Wardle
Design and layout/typesetting by Jet Purdie

Levi’s art is flippin’ excellent! Stay amazing Levi!

Illustration and lettering by Chaaya Prabhat
Art Direction by Jet Purdie

Illustration by Dapo Adeola
Design and lettering by Jet Purdie

Illustration by Nicola Kinnear
Design by Jet Purdie

Nicola was brilliant to work with. Thank you Nicola.

Oh, and, brilliant author, Alexander "Sandy" McCall Smith is an absolute dream to work for. Sandy completely trusts the Design department, the illustrators we work with and just lets us do what we are good at. Thank you Sandy

Design: Jet Purdie & Jan Bielecki
Illustration and type: Nina Tara

I briefed illustrator Nina Tara as my one year maternity cover at Penguin ended. I passed the project over to talented senior designer Jan Bielecki who did a brilliant job of ensuring the project stayed on brand. When I saw the book in the shops I thought everything looked lovely.
 

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Design: Jet Purdie / Jan Beilecki
Lino Cut / Illustration: Alexis Snell 

Art Direction / Design by Jet Purdie
Design / Illustration by Jim Tierney

I'd always wanted to work with Jim so when I found out Jim had already illustrated Charles Dicken's A Tale of Two Cities. I went to Jim's site but was gutted to find a notice saying he was booked up for a year. I tried my luck and emailed him anyhow. Thankfully Oliver Twist was the first big book Jim read - from start to finish - as a kid and Jim kindly agreed to illustrate.

Knowing Jim was crazy busy, I tried to do as much research as possible and get him a fairly fleshed out rough. We agreed to stick with the quadrant corners that appeared on A Tale of Two Cities, with a little scenes in each. The coolest thing I came up with was the pocket watch as the letter 'O'. I didn't know if Jim was going to get annoyed by me forcing the pocket watch idea on him... but Jim way really cool and an absolute pleasure and pro to work with. Thank you so much Jim.

The colours were chosen by the Creative Director

Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Laurence Hutchins

I really enjoyed working on this cover and was really glad Pat Hutchins approved of my comping-together interior illustrations to create a new cover scene.

My daughter Loa was unwell the day I designed this cover so I worked from home and let her choose the colours.

Apart from the obvious colour and type changes, I moved the bus to the back cover, included the a bad guy stealing away with the Mona Lisa, gave the little blond girl a new head, made the kids react to the scene more, with shocked mouths and a pointing finger, sprinkled some more cops in the background and released some of the balloons for drama.

Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration and type: Nina Tara

When I joined Penguin Random House the Cream Buns and Crime cover rough was cream and blue, with gold foil and no girls. Unlike previous Murder Most Unladylike titles, Creams Buns and Crime is a collection of stories and the plan was to make it have a point of difference... but I felt it was going off brand. Without the girl's on the cover and the bright background colour it felt a tad grandma cozy crime. But in the end it looked great, and all the additional energy it took to keep it on brand was well worth it.

Design: Jet Purdie and Lisa Horton
Illustration: Danny Noble
Interior text design: Mandy Norman

When I arrived at Penguin everyone was already fairly happy with freelance designer Lisa Horton's rough, so I didn't want to mess with it for the sake of it, plus author Adrian Edmonson (The Young Ones and War & Peace) had already found a great new illustrator. 

The main changes I made were to:
•  Make Tilly bigger and have her lean out of the porthole
•  Strip back the number of elements
•  Make the title a little more legible
•  Shape the title and wires into more of a time travel vortex shape
•  Reduce the number of colours and make everything brighter

While I did work my butt off to ensure this cover looked slick, it would definitely not look anything like this had it not been for the talented Lisa Horton who 100% set the foundations and made my job WAY easier.

Danny kindly illustrated cupcakes, crowns, ships, cogs and teapots, but Adrian wasn't keen on the cover being so busy. I agreed but fought to keep the stars as they looked cool. I then went away and added a cog into Tilly's hand to better convey her independent and adventurous personality. Bingo! Everyone was happy  : )

Wanting to ensure the colours were bright, I created a lot of the textures in Photoshop and layered them over Danny's lovely art.

Danny and Ade make a splendid team. I have a good feeling about this book. The story and art have the ability to make you chuckle plus also tug at the heartstrings.

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Levente Szabó

Shortlisted for the ABCD (Academy of British Cover Design) awards 2015.

Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Alex Cabal

Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Vicky Barker

Vicky was lovely to work with. Vicky was found by Designer Tom Hartley before he left Egmont.

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Freya Hartas

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Gemma Correll

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Adam Stower

Based on a Will Dozer tattoo I have with a reaper holding a Martini.

Art Direction / Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Paul Blow

Art Direction / Design:  Jet Purdie
Illustration: Vera Brosgol

Illustration: Kate Hindley
Design: Jet Purdie and Katie Everson

When Katie Everson left Bloomsbury to go freelance, one of the first titles I was given to oversee was Max Champion And The Great Race Car Robbery by Alexander McCall Smith. Katie had already briefed the cover and what came back from super professional illustrator Kate Hindley was pretty much perfect... but Bloomsbury had a bit of a re-brand an the logo was now bigger and higher up which meant the bottom of the cover needed re-thinking, plus the Bloomsbury team weren't happy with the title type. So, I created some italic type with little movement serifs on the left sides of certain characters, inspired by racing car lettering, all the while trying to mimic Kate's bubbly series type style. I then gave my type to Kate and she re-drew it with a slightly softer, more bubbly edge and - BINGO! - it felt speedy and race car, but still very Kate.

With regards to the interior art, Kate is such a pro I only had to forward Editorial's interior illustration brief and wait for roughs and final art.

I am honoured to have worked on this cover as my daughter and I love Alexander McCall Smith's Freddie Mole Lion Tamer.

Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: David Dean

A lot of colours don't re-produce well when working with CMYK process printing... but this artwork prints so well! It's almost better printed than it is on screen, which is very rare. Oranges and purples can be real tricky, but David has a knack of selecting certain shades that hold their vibrancy. David is a pro and he's wicked at type too.

Art Direction / Design: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Julian Crouch

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Tim Wesson

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Jamie Littler

Design: Jet Purdie

A.K.A.: Maisy’s Trick-or-Treat, in the U.S.

Design and illustration rough by Jet Purdie
Final gouache art by King Rollo Films, in the style of Lucy Cousins

I also created the interiors roughs and the sticker die-cuts. The Editor, Charlie Gardner and Character Publisher, Donna Casanova, both gave me a lot of freedom when it came to deciding what would be on each spread… which was lovely as I was new to publishing at the time. Thank you Charlie and Donna for believing in me! ; ) xX

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Kate Hindley

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustration: Chris Riddell

Art Direction: Jet Purdie
Illustartion: Laura Ellen Anderson

Art Direction & Design: Jet Purdie

Winner of The Kitschies Inky Tentacle (Cover Art) Award 2015.