In Tim Robinson’s book, Connemara, he identifies a pleasant Irish phrase for a nostalgic return: Cuairt an lao ar an athbhuaile.
Design West is an international summer design school located in the village of Letterfrack in Connemara, on the West Coast of Ireland. When Course Leader Conor Clarke asked us to design the promotional poster for the school’s third edition, taking place in 2020, we wanted to capture a sense of the unique Design West experience, and ‘Cuairt an lao ar an athbhuaile’ came to mind.
It is a reference to the landscape and to designers returning to their design roots, what got us all into this game in the first place, going back to the physical act of making, and having the space and time to think and reflect on your practice. We chose to represent this concept through an experimental letter W, created by repeating and overlaying a tangible shape, to capture a nostalgic journey of return in order to build and move forward.
