picture of book spread from the museum catalog displaying both text and image of the peacock room found in the Smithsonian icon of packaging box used for the peacock room gift box project

The Peacock Room

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The Packaging

Cardboard Book Box
9 in x 6 in x 3 in

Concept

I visited the Peacock Room in Washington DC and I've wanted to make a project on it every since! I've decided on designing a gift box based off of the Peacock Room that would be sold inside the museum's gift store. Inside the box will contain a catalog of information about the exhibit, a timeline booklet comparing history to the present alongside a handful of mini-gallery donation cards!

Sketches

Once I had the box figured out I kinda went overboard on the rest. I wanted to capture the “bookish” feeling and designed the box after those ornate storage books found in art stores. Focusing on layering and texturing to achieve an authentic feel.

scanned image of sketches for the packaging

Completed Package

photograph of the final product (the hallow book box) on a white background. The box itself is deep brown letter spine adored with golden straps, the cover is framed by gold, accented with gold ribbon of leaves, the top and bottom are separate into frames of green, and the center of the cover is dark blue with a gold painting of a peacock photograph of the final product (the hallow book box) on a white background with the cover opened, so the viewer can see the objects contained inside. The box itself is deep brown letter spine adored with golden straps, the cover is framed by gold, accented with gold ribbon of leaves, the top and bottom are separate into frames of green, and the center of the cover is dark blue with a gold painting of a peacock
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The Museum Catalog

Paper 11 in x 17 in

Style Tile

With so much happening I decided on making a “Style Tile” of my catalog. To test print color, text, and layout. Combined it all looks like one messy mood broad

Sketches

scanned sketches for the museum catalog scanned sketches for the museum catalog scanned sketches for the museum catalog

Demos

The catalog required a lot of demos! Most to spot layout errors or to test for printing errors.

scanned image of taped and stapled dummy prints or demo prints of four black and white trial booklets of the catalog within this scan includes a yellow sticky note identifying what these demo books are for

Completed Catalog

cover of the museum catalog which is an image of the southern wall of the peacock rom overlaid with white text a spread taken from the first chapter of the museum catalog including citation style, and image layout
back cover of the museum catalog which is an image of the northern wall of the peacock rom overlaid with white text a spread taken from the second chapter of the museum catalog providing an example of a short story page layout
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A Comparative Timeline

Cardstock Paper 11 in x 17 in

Sketches & Demos

This accordion fold booklet caused a lot of issues due to limitations in the printing interface I had at the time. Without duplex printing I had to manually alter and align these pages so they would display correctly. The booklet itself also needed to be made delicately as using double sided tape created a seamless.

scanned sketches for the comparative timeline accordion fold
the first two iterations of dummy printing. Their intended purpose was to trial and error what page numbers went where for the template production file to be used for final printing.
scanned image of three other dummy catalog prints, including black and white photographs of the final product. These dummy's were used to spot layout and type mistakes as indicated by the red writing and yellow sticky note

Completed Timeline

photograph of the timeline accordion fold spread out on a white background photograph of the accordion spread out to display four pages on a wood background photograph of the accordion book standing on a wooden flooring displaying off layout, format and use of imagery
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Donor Cards

Cardstock Paper
4.5 in x 5.3 in

Brief

These Donor cards were inspired by collectable cards. Using the photographs provided by the Smithsonian the backing of these cards were various imagery in relation to The Peacock Room. With the idea that the consumer can purchase a set, held together in a blank belly band, could have a miniature picture gallery in their pocket. The frontal side is adored with a logo, short summary of the room's history, and donation information for those inclined to contribute.

Completed Cards

a composed image of 7 donor cards some flipped to show front and back, with the center card displaying the belly band in use scanned image of the donor cards thrown upon each other with the belly band on top
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