China

December 2018

2nd Place (Black & White), WLIA 2019


This map of China appears in a book by Frank Langfitt, The Shanghai Free Taxi. The client requested something with a casual, hand-made style. The linework is Moriarty Hand, from projectlinework.org. I applied a brush to it in Illustrator that caused the width to vary a little bit, helping further the hand-done look.

The typeface is Comicrazy. I had thought, too, about hand-lettering the map, but time ran short. In any case, though, I think that comic lettering has a nice advantage: it's more legible than a lot of other handwriting, while still maintaining some informality. I paired the type with some blobby city dots, not quite circular.

The odd, off-center placement of a couple of labels (like Mongolia) is due to the fact that this is a two-page spread, and I had to make room for the gutter.