It's my birthday next week, and with that, I'll be celebrating 9(!) years of OneCuriousChip! So here's a little advert I designed for myself and what I do: graphic design and illustration, or dearadh grafach agus léaráid, as Gaeilge. Click through to see the design process behind this one. :)

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; a digital painting to accompany the little biography section in my Study in Scarlet project.

Sometimes I draw tiny things. This was one of them. Another illustrated element fro my Study in Scarlet project!

The Victoria Hotel was Cork’s oldest functioning hotel until its closure in 2014. Built in 1810, it had been patroned by the likes of Michael Collins, survived the burning of Cork in 1920, and hosted the second ever meeting of the GAA. After the hotel closed its doors, the building was repurposed for retail and if you’re familiar with Cork City nowadays, you might recognise it as a Monsoon/Accessorize on Patrick’s St, just opposite Opera Lane. In the past week or so though, construction has begun on referbishing the building; which apparently involves exposing the old hotel ballrooms and spaces, and it looks like its going to be pretty sympathetic to the original design, with a modern twist. I love these little histories, so I’m happy to see them celebrated again! :)

Anyway, when I found myself needing to draw a fictitious hotel set the early 1900s for my Study in Scarlet project, the Victoria hotel is what came to mind and that’s what I based my fake advert on. I even borrowed the Victoria Hotel’s original phone number! To reflect the story though, it became Halliday’s Private Hotel of Little George Street, London. :)

One of the most interesting - and most time-consuming! - parts of my Study in Scarlet project was the typography in all the adverts. Everything is based very heavily on historical advertising references from the early 1900s (I had a lot of fun with that research!) and I ended up drawing pretty much every letter by hand. There are so many delightful quirks in that vintage lettering, and I really wanted to capture as many of those characterful details as possible! Click through to take a look!

I didn’t know much about the SS Sirius until recently, despite seeing its legacy all over Cork. If you visit Cobh today, you might pass the Sirius Arts Centre; if you wander around Passage West you might see a paddle shaft from the ship on display; it's even the reason Ballycotton has a lighthouse now!

I'll share its story below if you're curious, but the reason I researched and drew it in the first place was as part of an advert in my Scarlet project. I've used artistic license obviously, but it's a self-indulgent project anyway, so I drew my favourite instead of a more accurate ship 🤷 It felt like a good time to share the story too, as Sirius made its most famous journey in April. I’ve also been playing AC Black Flag lately, humming sea shanties while sailing around in my virtual ship. So, here's the (shortened!) story of a historic Cork ship!

Another storefront, this time inspired by my other brother! He tends to lean towards modern design, he's pretty fond of coffee, and he's not a half bad baker. I really love designing and drawing these little façades. Particularly happy with the lettering, lighting, and textures in this one. More to come!

One of the main reasons I’ve been so fascinated with the Illustrated Police News lately is because of the old-school illustrations in them. I like the idea that entire front covers of newspapers around the turn of the 20th century may have been filled, essentially, with comics telling the latest news and gossip stories. Some of them are fascinating little slices of life: in my research, I’ve seen illustrations of stilt-walkers racing the trams in Dublin, and hot air balloons going rogue, and police tracking convicts who’ve escaped by hiding in coffins. I’d be unlikely to have noticed any of those stories if they hadn’t had curious little illustrations alongside them!

With that in mind, for the front cover of my Study in Scarlet project I decided to fill the page with a sort of comic summary of Part I of story itself. From the initial discovery of a dead body at Lauriston Gardens, to Sherlock Holmes’ clever capture; it’s all based very heavily on illustrations and layouts and typography I found in actual issues of the Illustrated Police News, and also some very early artwork of Sherlock Holmes and Watson. Lots and lots of crosshatching later, and I’m pretty happy with how it turned out!

I've been using the same profile picture - for everything - for years, and it felt like time for a change. Also, I'm starting to worry my friends will forget what I look like by the time I can actually see them again, so... here's my face. Several times, in fact, because I couldn't decide which photo I liked.