PROCESS BOOK
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CONTENTS
3
define
11
research
27
design + execution
83
outcome
97
exhibition
113
reflection
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DEFINE
the problem
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It all started with a request. My grandmother gave me a book of photos, documents, and personal handwritten memoirs and asked me to find a way to preserve them. She and I have always had a special relationship, developed through both time together and apart in snail-mail letters sent across the country over the years. I so much value my Grandmother’s words and wisdom and don’t take my time with her for granted for I know our days here are limited. An urgency arises from that reality, to soak up the time together and her words to preserve them for tomorrow and future generations who may not have the blessing of knowing her personally.
PROBLEMS 1. These memoirs and family history need to be preserved in a sharable way. 2. They need to be organized and presented in a coherent manner, integrating photos and stories to clearly connect the dots between people, places and events included in her memoirs. 3. We’re on the clock. Time is precious, and we are not guarunteed time her with one another.
influences
work by Bella Forte
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CRAFT I have always been fascinated and inspired by quality hand craft, especially within the realms of book arts. The memoirs held tremendous potential and unlimited possibilities for their physicality in book form. In particular, in my research I was inspired by Margot Ecke’s work at Smokey Road Press as well as another book binding company called Bella Forte. Each piece of theirs is unique, hand-bound with beautiful hand-picked ribbon, buttons, thread, linens, etcetra that create a unique, intimate reading experience.
work by Margot Ecke
objectives
PHYSICALITY
!
The memoirs need to be preserved without losing the sensoriality, tactility, & personal touch the handwritten pieces embody. What will the weight and extent of handwriting’s role in achieving this be? The physicality also needs to address a variety of audiences...it needs to be personal, yet inviting into a distinct experience to be enjoyed by all.
TIME
!
How will these memoirs address time? They need to have a logical flow, and need to be rearranged chronologicaly according to their content in a way that effectively maximizes their literary flow.
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+
+
INTEGRATION
!
Grandma entrusted to me photos, organized catalogues of family members, family trees, and her personal memoirs. I need to find a way to make these elements work together in visual and contextual arrangement.
INTEGRITY
!
As the designer, I must preserve the writer’s integrity and character as I develop this project. I want it to reflect her personality, style, and values as accurately as possible.
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RESEARCH
previous studies
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LETTERS Since I was about five years old, Grandma and I have nurtured our relationship from oppositte sides of the country through letter writing. Not only did it develop our relationship, but I would posit that it developed my writing skills and perhaps sowed the seeds of my affinities for writing, letters and typography. Looking back at all the letters I have collected over the years, I began to wonder about underlying trends throughout the letters. Are there indicators of various developments embedded within the writing? Is there a quantitative way to measure our change over time? How can that development be visualized? Can I preserve all these years of correspondence through design?
previous studies
CUSTOM VISUAL SYSTEM 100%
50%
0%
ENCOURAGEMENT INFORMATIVE TRAVEL ADVICE
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I ended up creating a flip book, featuring a large handful of the letters. I took various measurements including word count, evaluated writing style (large print all the way to almost illegible cursive) to determine the age of the audience written to, and assigned the content into an overall category. Each of the measurements for each letter was then assigned a color, size and shape as part of a tool bar on the right of each spread. As one flips through the book like a flip book animation, they can get a feel for the evolution of the letter collection through the color fluctuation, size growth, and rhythm the shapes make as they appear in rapid succession.
previous studies
The cool Montana summer breeze swept through my long blonde hair, the clear blue Big Sky fully outstretched above us. I sip on Grandma’s homemade strawberry Lemonade on the back porch, Papa serenades me on his guitar. The tall river birch trees surround us on the deck, joining in song as their leaves rustle in the light breeze, dancing. Mighty mountains, humble in their giant splendor sit quietly in the background, yielding security like a nest to the river valley that is Red Lodge, Montana.
1999
I still remember the sweet simplicity of those summer days spent with my Grandparents through the summers growing up. The safety and openness that country and company provided everything a young girl needed and more to run carefree, to imagine, to talk, to breathe, to learn. In this letter, to be honest, I have no idea what the “fish bowl” was about. Or the bottles. Regardless, I must have been attached to them if they required my ‘big girl’ panties to part with them. The way Grandma’s encouraging words made me feel, however, stuck with me and pushed me along to continue working hard as a “big girl,” however that manifested itself. Her words of love and encouragement bring me back to those simple summer days, making way for my creativity to run free with confidence. Her abridged signature “Gama and Papa” (spelled phonetically to identify with my loose 6-year-old pronunciation) really dates this letter, along with what we’ll call the beginning explorations of my hand lettering and abstract drawings, exhibited on the left.
pre -2000 5 X 7” 29 words
6
“Loved your pastel! Don’t forget to blend the colors,” Grandma gently reminds me in this letter. Every now and then glimpses of her artistic prowess like this escape from beneath her shroud of humility, covering years of experience and expertise in the field. She taught art classes across the country, opened up several original art stores and owned a commercial one. Apart from her body of experience, her work speaks for itself. Beautifully painted driftwood pieces and canvasses, exotic fibrous weavings entwining handmade woolen threads and pieces of western culture like old leather stirrups and a bridle bit adorn the walls of her home. I admired her work before I was even tall enough to see it hanging at eye-level. Needless to say, I take her artistic advice seriously and count it a huge blessing to share a great passion with her.
2004
2004 5 X 6.5” 67 words
12
This book set the stage and served as a stepping stone to the Montana Memoir book. The letter book is still live, as letters keep coming and are added to the collection. I would like to maintain closeness with this personal project and continue to explore and develop this concept.
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120 110 100 90 80 70 60 avg.
50 40 30 A MO U N T OF WORDS / L ETTER
20 L ETTER
200
175
150
125
100
75 AMOUNT OF WORDS/TOPIC
50 INFORMATION
TO PIC
ENCOURAGEMENT
TRAVEL
ADVICE
interviews
MARGOT ECKE Smokey Road Press, owner
QUESTIONS What are ways to preserve the physicality of Grandma’s handwritten memoirs? Is there a way to marry the straight-forward practical direction of this project with a more conceptual, experiemental direction?
WHAT I TOOK AWAY Think about creating the entire experience...a space. Allow viewer to enter into a scene, more than just written words on the page. What elements bring Grandma’s persona to life? Artifacts? Box concept...create an art box with artifacts, cubbies...recreate the act of exploration Think about how to guide viewer through the experience.
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BOX AND SPACE IDEAS The above antique chest has been in my house me entire life, right under my nose, and only recently I discovered its story and significance. The next photo pictures an idea for a personal, hand-crafted book, enclosed in a clam shell box for safe keeping and added personal touch.
photo collection
Photos of her family; distant relatvies, generations past.
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MEMOIR BOOK STRUCTURE Along with the memoirs, Grandma enclosed over 75 numbered photos and other print artifacts that compliment the stories in some way. With this kind of volume, I had to determine a way to filter the photos. I accomplished this by selecting memoirs with content related directly to her family structure: her family, parents, brother, husband, children and grandchildren. This naturally gave the book a chrologogical order. I then curated photos relating to that branch of family structure, pulling from the collection she gave me. For a few cases, I had to call her and ask her to send a few specific photos that were not originally included to fill a few holes.
photo collection
Photos of her parents; father Ted Archer and mother Thelma Archer
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Photos of her brother, Donald Archer
photo collection
Photos of her and her husband, Eldon Jensen
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Photos of her children, Marc and Wendy
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DESIGN & EXECUTION
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color studies
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logo | sketches
BRAND FOR A LOGO Grandma entitled her piece “The Montana Memoirs,” written by Yvonne Jensen. Inspired by western cattle brand designs, I created a logo for the work with the title letters “MM,” joining in the middle to create the ‘Y’ in her first name. Cattle brands were an emblem of pride for ranch owning families, and were kept and passed on through the generations, just as Grandma’s memoirs will be.
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logo
The process of making cattle brands and their very physicality guided my design of the logo. I tried to imagine actually bending the iron bars, creating more rounded curves in the letterforms, all connected on one piece.
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logo
FINAL LOGO After exploring several options for a logo, trying to push myself out of my comfort zone, I decided to explore a hand-lettered option— back in my favorite realm of design. The handlettered options feel more personal, reflecting the nature of hand written memoirs more accurately. The final logo also set the precedence for an entire visual system for headings and quotes used throughout the project in the same style.
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logo
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letter project
LETTERS For a while, I explored the idea of returning to the Letter Project (see RESEARCH) and incorporating it into the memoir book. I tried to find potential in it to use as a conceptual thread and connection to myself to weave through the memoirs. The letters are one of the most tangible ties from my Grandma to me, so there was some potential, however in the end I found the the memoirs and letters still seemed better as independent projects, perhaps as part of a design suite or series about aspects of our relationship. The following pages include my explorations into this idea.
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s letters grandmother’ collection of my a story red ve co dis As I studied a life, I throughout my ctively, to me written message. Colle al du ivi ind e y on greater than an nt of our me lop ve de the they document ough time. relationship thr
letter project
After counting the amount of words writen in each letter, I discovered a steady increase in words over time. I think this increase is a physical testament to the growth of our relationship, having more to talk and relate about, more to tell each other.
1998 19 words
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1999 27 words
38
2002 8 words
2003 40 words
2004 67 words
2006 76 words
2007 79 words
discovery
SURPRISE As I investigated and worked to preserve my grandma Yvonne’s memoirs through this project, I also happened to be planning my own wedding. The two themes ran parallel to each other for a while, before beautifully intertwining when I discovered that my mother had posession of her own wedding dress and her mother’s (Yvonne’s), Grandma had her grandmother Carrie Cooley’s, and of course I had mine! Upon gathering the four dresses together, my family history came to life. The defining styles of each era— the early 1900’s, 50’s, 80’s, and a contemporary style of the millenium are distinct when juxtaposed alongside one another. The dresses became a more unique, visual timeline of our family history. They also serve as a family tree, documenting the evolution of family names from Hamre, to Archer, to Jensen, to Mooney, to Jones.
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discovery
DRESS DETAILS I wanted to take the opportunity to capture the essence of each dress, notice how they reflect the era of their use and the character of each family bride.
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poster series
HER WORDS As an important facet of conveying Grandma’s character and words, I wanted to create posters of some of her most important quotes. I did this in the same visual system of hand lettering as in the logo. This idea first manifested itself in the form of quotes pulled directly from some of her most impactful memoirs. However, as the layout of the actual memoir book developed with the use of pull quotes, pull quote posters seemed redundant. I turned back to my research, particularly my first interview with Grandma. I found quotes she’d spoken about the importance of memoirs, passing through generations, and details of her experience in writing them. Her words about her experience and memoirs compliment the memoirs beautifully.
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poster series
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poster series
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poster series
— from Red Lodge, Montana, 1997
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— from North Texas State, 1953
layout
LOMPOC, CALIFORNIA & BUREAU OF PRISONS We arrived in California in a red Carmen Geha with a little dog Phobee an all our stuff on a roof sack. Eldon taught classes to the inmates and I did substitute teaching. A year later Marc arrived and three years later Wendy arrived. California is like a different country especially along the coastline. Lompoc was a small old Spanish town with Burpee flower fields all around. Beaches were wonderful and we camped out with other couples many weekends. Bridge, Mexican food, ball games and church were some of our activities. We spent ten years here. Several of our friends have visited us here in Red Lodge in recent years. We have also been back many times to visit there.
Marc & Wendy Marc and Wendy were born in Lompoc, CA. in 1962 and 1965, respectively.
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BOOK LAYOUT After sifting through the twenty memoirs, I selected a handful of them to focus on. Each spread became a part of her family, also representing a range of time in timeline of her life. This also helped me filter all the photos to use only the ones that pertained to the included characters and stories. The book began vertically-oriented, but as I developed a more particular visual system, it began to feel too cramped. I finally changed the entire layout to a horizontal orientation, and everything flowed infinitely better from there. This also helped it fulfil its function better as more of a look-book album than an all text novel.
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1958 1987
1906 BERTHA & NELS HAMRE
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NORTH TEXAS STATE Four years of college, I enjoyed every minute. I loved to dance and skipped a lot of classes on Wednesday because that was the afternoon the Union Building (UB) had sock hops. Linda Gibson McCaully was a fun roommate. She was always trying to steal the cute boys I found on the dance floor. Denton was only 30 miles from Dallas so I could go home on weekends often. My major was art but in those days everyone suggested strongly that you get a teaching degree “just in case.” I tried hard to do department store windows ($25 a month) or stage scenery (free) but in the end it was teaching. I looked down the list of teaching jobs after I graduated and hound a job that paid well and was teaching art. I left for Galena Park, Texas without even knowing how to drive a car.
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The job was 5 classes of art for 7th and 8th and 9th graders of long shore men families. The first year I shared a garage apartment with the High School homemaking teacher. We gave lots of parties and she brought all the teachers at the high school over at one time or another. Eldon Jensen was a drafting teacher and before I knew it I was talking to him all the time. We married the following summer. Our honeymoon was an entire summer spent mostly in Yellowstone on my Uncle’s boat and trailer. Eldon loved the country around Montana as much as I did. After a couple of years we decided we needed to change something because we couldn’t live on just one teacher’s salary. Eldon applied with the Bureau of Prisons as an instructor. The salary was three times what public schools paid (even in the Houston oil area). We got a job in Lompoc, California one year later.
YVONNE & ELDON JENSEN
WENDY & VINCE MOONEY
layout | headings
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refine
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FINAL OUTCOME
final spreads
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4
Carrie arrived at the junction with two
I’m getting ahead of the story.
trunks and two crocks of butter in the fall
The severe winter of 1886-87 was
in Virginia city and then by wagon in Mus-
of 1882. She was the first white woman in
selshell. My dad found it in a chicken coop
baby Mina. They had to feed their milk
and restored it. It had gone out of style
cow with the sod roof to keep her alive.
because it was filled with horse hair. I had
to shoot an Indian. She missed but
Mina, my grandmother, was 20 when she
it redone by people that restored
met Theodore Finley Archer, 31. He came
furniture for the White House while I was
scared him away.
“
Montana Roots
I feel fortunate I have some memories of ranch life. Our generations today don’t have as many opportunities to see grandparents.
Five children were born to Carrie and
to Montana to teach school. He was paid
in Virginia. The furniture needs to be in
John. Mina, their first born and my grand-
$40 a month with room and board $15 a
the Roundup, Montana museum one day.
mother arrived in 1885. Kittie 1887, Edna
month. He lasted one year and then began
1890, Earl 1894, and Bent 1898. Bent died
to ranch. “TF” as the family called him
newborn kittens in haystacks and a goat
at the age of 11 from a snake bite. When
married Mina in 1905. Their ranch was
that would pull a wagon if you had a carrot on a stick.
next to the Cooley source on the Musselshell River. Ted, my dad, was born
I feel fortunate I have some memories
Vallie, a mail order bride from Wisconsin.
in 1907 and Laura followed in 1909. Ted
of ranch life. Our generations today don’t have as many opportunities to see grand-
I always thought Vallie was a beautiful
and Laura rode a mule to school and they
name. In my lifetime, Vallie was the lady I
have many stories of the mule getting loose
parents in that setting. I was only 11 in
knew. She looked wonderful in jeans into
and going home without them.
1946 when they sold the ranch. Mina and
her 90’s. She just died a few years ago at
Ted drove a tractor from the age of 5.
97. John, her son, died a few years later.
He tells the story of taking eggs to town to
He was born the same year as I was.
have money for the dances. Ted’s picture is
We had a family reunion for Vallie’s
”
95th birthday. John was recovering from a
I’m going to begin my story years before
heart attack at the time. He was dressed in
John Cooley, b. 1850
Carrie Cartwright , b. 1858
Mina, b. 1885 Kittie, b. 1887 Edna, b. 1890 Earl, b. 1894 Bent, b. 1898
Vallie
Theodore “TF” Archer, b. 1874 Laura Ted, b. 1907 Thelma, b. 1909 Yvonne, b. 1935 Donald, b. 1940
John
TF retired to running a nursery in Lovell, Wyoming and their graves are there.
hanging in the Musselshell school, The Cooleys
graduating class of 1928. All my cousins and I have never liked
I was born with my first relative in
a nice western outfit but had street shoes
TF. He was mean to our grandmother.
Montana, John Cooley. He was born in
on. I asked him why he didn’t wear cow-
When they went to town he left her thread
Wisconsin in 1858 and came to
boy boots and he said “Only truck drivers
and things on the counter of the store and
wear those f***** boots!” He died a couple
only paid for his tobacco etc. He is the one
of years ago from his heart trouble. The
that “rushed” cattle from his father-in-law
1882. Carrie was from New York and her
Cooley ranch is in the hands of
John Cooley. I have Carrie’s “parlor” set
father had been a stonemason and farmer.
his sons today.
of oak furniture in my front room. Carrie
Carrie Cartwright married John in
Family Tree
I have a couple of memories of
Mina was born she was the first white baby born in Musselshell Valley. Earl married
By Yvonne Jensen
Musselshell valley in 1881.
had ordered east and it arrived by train
recorded as a very bad time with a new
the Musselshell valley. The story goes that she used a shotgun from her front door
1
Built in 1912, the Cooley house in Mussellshell, Montana had cabin lights and was fur nished with leather fur niture and dark wood pieces.
2
One of the only pictures I have of Great Grandma Car rie Cooley. It was a visit sometime before I was three with Ted’s Grandmother. Car rie was barely five feet.
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Forward By Morgan Jones
I cannot remember a time in my life without her letters. They appear everywhere throughout the full stretch of my memory— from my present life to my distant childhood memories. Between those early recollections and today lie years of life— visits to and from Montana and Atlanta, getting older, maturing, celebrating, mourning, sharing, teaching and learning. These all comprise the development of a special friendship with my Grandma, Yvonne Jensen, that I have been blessed with the opportunity to cherish through the years.
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Ted Archer
“
I called a boot store in Billings and asked if they could tell the gentleman I was bringing in that all boots were on sale for $39.99.
”
By Yvonne Jensen
Ted never became the rancher he wanted to be. He was always very good with horses and animals. TF sold the ranch in 1946. Ted resembled the Cooley men that were known for their red hair, slender builds and small feet. He
In the spring of 2014, I looked back at letters I’ve kept from her, spanning a 14 year range. This time I evaluated them through a designer’s lense. What information about people, time and place do they lend? How? I discovered that collectively, the letters tell a greater story, visually documenting the timeline of our lives and relationship. The following summer, my Grandmother entrusted to me a binder of loose-leaf papers— pages and pages of her hand-written memoirs on her life and family, along with original documentation of family history and photographs. I saw the same creative potential that I saw in her letters to illustrate the development of a relationship through time in a personal, tactile, and visual way, while also preserving family history and my Grandmother’s words for generations to come. This book is the result of a 21 year-old cross-generational friendship, a collaboration of grandmother and granddaughter.
2
Ted and Thelma
1
1
Ted and T helma on their 50 year wedding anniversar y
2
Ted and T helma at their Palace Café in Laurel, MT. right after they were married.
3
Ted and T helma in Roundup, Just before T helma started having heart surgeries.
4
Ted and T helma in St. John’s hospital just before Ted died.
did raise cattle part time later and always wore cowboy boots. 125 was his top weight. I have a story about boots and Ted in St. John’s just before he died. Ted’s ankles were beginning to swell and he needed softer cowboy boots. He already had about a dozen pairs around. I called a boot store in Billings and
3
asked if they could tell the gentleman I was bringing in
4
that all boots were on sale for $39.99. Ted found a pair he liked and bragged to all his friends in St. Johns that he really got a good deal on his new boots. They were actually $300.
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Seagoville, Texas
“
High school was awful because no one ever moved into the school. It was especially bad for me since I didn’t have a southern accent.
By Yvonne Jensen
In the 8th grade they moved to Seagoville, Texas 20 miles from Dallas. Worn out cotton land and pecan farms were everywhere. Also lots of gravel pits because the town was on the Trinity River. Seagoville prison was bigger and Ted was always at work. Food preparation took place at odd hours. Early morning baking for example. The prison reservation and housing for employees was three miles from town and all of us kids rode the bus. We were called the reservation kids. One fun thing in those days happened when us kids watched the latest movies with the inmates. I’m sure the inmates enjoyed having all of us there.
High school was awful because no one ever moved into the school and it was especially bad for me since I didn’t have a southern accent. The boys in school all wanted to be gravel truck drivers or run their folks’ pecan ranches. My roommate and I were the only kids in our graduating class that went to college. Several kids married in the eighth grade and one boy had three kids when he graduated. The one bright spot in those years was being Editor of the annual. Basketball was also fun. We were Texas state champions one year! My brother found all kinds of things to get into. Drinking, cars, and not paying much attention to school.
1 2
”
He was always a great artist since he was 2 or 3 but trouble was always with him. He found every pitfall there was for humans to get in trouble. He had a massive stroke at 40 from drinking and died in a Missoula hospital thirteen years later. Summer jobs during high school and college were interesting. I worked in Girl Scout camps, private girls camps like Fern in Marshal Texas as a craft counselor. Department stores like Sanger and A. Harris were my next jobs. Then a couple of summers I worked for my uncle in his motel in Billings. I waited tables and helped make beds!
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Donald and Yvonne 1
Together riding horses in Seagoville, Texas
2
Yvonne (6) and Donald (2) in Idaho.
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North Texas State
“
Eldon Jensen was a drafting teacher and before I knew it I was talking to him all the time.
By Yvonne Jensen
Four years of college, I enjoyed every minute. I loved to dance and skipped a lot of classes on Wednesday because that was the afternoon the Union Building had sock hops. Linda Gibson McCaully was a fun roommate. She was always trying to steal the cute boys I found on the dance floor. Denton was only 30 miles from Dallas so I could go home on weekends often. My major was art but in those days everyone suggested strongly that you get a teaching degree “just in case.” I tried hard to do department store windows ($25 a month) or stage scenery (free) but in the end it was teaching. I looked down the list of teaching jobs
”
1
after I graduated and found a job that paid well teaching art. I left for Galena Park, Texas without even knowing how to drive a car. The job was 5 classes of art for 7th and 8th and 9th graders. The first year I shared a garage apartment with the high school homemaking teacher. We gave lots of parties and she brought all the teachers at the high school over at one time or another. Eldon Jensen was a drafting teacher and before I knew it I was talking to him all the time. We married the following summer. Our honeymoon was an entire summer spent mostly in Yellowstone on my Uncle’s boat and trailer. Eldon loved the country around Montana as much as I did. After a couple of years we decided we needed to change something because we couldn’t live on just one teacher’s salary. Eldon applied with the Bureau of Prisons as an instructor. The salary was three times what public schools paid (even in the Houston oil area). We got a job in Lompoc, California one year later.
2
Eldon and Yvonne Jensen 1
Together on their wedding day
2
Eldon and Yvonne around 2000
3
Donald, Eldon,Thelma and I in Oklahoma City, 1960
3
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A Timeline of Dresses By Morgan Jones
As I investigated and worked to preserve my grandma Yvonne’s memoirs through the fall of 2014, I also happened to be planning my own wedding. The two themes ran parallel to each other for a while, before beautifully intertwining when I discovered that my mother had posession of her own wedding dress and her mother’s (Yvonne’s), Grandma had her grandmother Carrie Cooley’s, and of course I had mine! Upon gathering the four dresses together, my family history came to
life. The defining styles of each era— the early 1900’s, 50’s, 80’s, and a contemporary style of the millenium are distinct when juxtaposed alongside one another. The dresses became a more unique, visual timeline of our family history. They also serve as a family tree, documenting the evolution of family names from Hamre, to Archer, to Jensen, to Mooney, to Jones.
October 3,
1987
Vince and Wendy Mooney Yvonne’s Daughter
June 7,
November 1,
1958
2014
Eldon and Yvonne Jensen
Caleb and Morgan Jones Yvonne’s Granddaughter
May 6,
1906
Nels and Bertha Hamre Yvonne’s Grandma
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2
3
Lompoc, California
“
We arrived in California in a red Carmen Geha with a little dog Phobee and all our stuff on a roof sack.
”
Marc & Wendy Jensen 1
Marc, Wendy and Yvonne. Both kids were born in Lompoc, CA. in 1962 and 1965, respectively. Here Marc is about 4 and Wendy is 1 year old.
2
Marc in the 2nd grade
3
Wendy in the 4th grade
1
We arrived in California in a red Carmen Geha with a little dog Phobee and all our stuff on a roof sack. Eldon taught classes to the inmates and I did substitute teaching. A year later Marc arrived and three years later Wendy arrived. California is like a different country especially along the coastline. Lompoc was a small old Spanish town with Burpee flower fields all around. Beaches were wonderful and we camped out with other couples many weekends. Bridge, Mexican food, ball games and church were some of our activities. We spent ten years here. Several of our friends have visited us here in Red Lodge in recent years. We have also been back many times to visit there.
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2
Yellowstone and Other Adventures
“
Over the years we have had some wonderful adventures with National Parks, especially Yellowstone. The first time I was ever in Yellowstone I was 2 years old in 1938. The pictures from this trip looks like about 3 cars of relatives enjoying the park. Almost every year since then I have spent a short time in Montana and the park, visiting grandparents and relatives, and enjoying the beautiful country. After I met and married Eldon, we spent our honeymoon in Yellowstone, so Eldon fell in love with this area also. The first thing we did since we finally moved out to Red Lodge was set up a trip to the park in December with 10
Being a Grandmother is a pretty good job!
”
of our friends. Everyone is still talking about that trip. Since then, we go into the park several times a year by ourselves and with all our visitors. Having lived here in Red Lodge full time since 1995, we are pleased to still be in the charming town. After moving all over I felt I never really had a hometown and all the relatives
I have left in Montana made Red Lodge an ideal choice for retirement. These days Wendy and Vince live in Atlanta with their three kids Morgan, Kendall and Cole. Marc and Temple live in Crozet, Virginia with their two children Matthew and Sophie. Being a grandmother is a pretty good job!
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Vacations 1 2
Eldon, Yvonne and a friend on the historic Beartooth Pass, highway from Red Lodge to Yellowstone Eldon and Yvonne visiting granddaughter Morgan (2) in Beaufort, South Carolina.
vellum
VELLUM INSERTS To preserve Grandma’s integrity as the writer, and to maintain a personal, tactile feel among the memoirs, I printed copies of the original hand-written memoirs on a transparent vellum that accompanied its respective memoir in the designed book.
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book
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HANDMADE COVERS I wanted to futher preserve the handmade tactile qualitites of the memoirs by compiling them into a beautiful hand-bound book. Early in my research, I discovered Bella Forte books who specializes in creating hand crafted and bound books. Because I needed to print the book myself and insert the special vellum pages, I decided to just order handmade front and back covers for the book and print and bind it myself. To top it all off, Bella Forte made a custom die of my lettered logo and embossed it onto the front cover.
final iterations
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final iterations
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outcome
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FINAL ACCENT POSTERS To accent the displayed book spreads and to further drive the importance of the memoirs home, I went to the very beginning of my research and pulled some direct quotes by Grandma that I collected earlier in an interview. I chose to print them on vellum and display them framed and raised from the backdrop poster 3/4� to create a lightbox effect.
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EXHIBITION
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experience
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EXPERIENCE To make the memoirs come alive even more, I created an environment to emulate the act of Grandma actually writing that would ultimately draw the viewer into her world of writing. Through the semester I curated several different items from her Montana home, including a few pieces from her pin cushion collection, her high school hat with various pins, a photo album or original family photos, and of course a few original memoirs.
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exhibition
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exhibition
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REFLECTION
reflection
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IMPACT Looking back on the process of completing this project, I see a lot more potential that I did not capitalize on. I would like to revisit some of those missed opportunities in the future. I would also explore more layouts and writing styles for the quote posters, making a stronger connection between them and the memoir spreads. Finally, I would like to eventually complete the entirety of the memoirs as a long term project. I could expand the project’s scope beyond just print, incorporating audio recordings of her reading the memoirs aloud, or create an accompanying video or text animation. Some of the best design I have ever seen is that which makes a connection with the viewer on a deeper level. It reaches off the page and touches the human ethos or pathos in some way. Just by looking at it, you can tell the designer was personally, maybe even emotionally invested in its creation. That is the kind of design that drives me, and the kind of design I strive to create. My hope is that everyone walked away impacted by this piece, but I knew my mission was accompished when I saw tears in my Grandmother’s eyes when she saw it. It helped me see again the power design has to capture history, emotions, time, and so much more.
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