Illustration and cover design

My Role: Illustrator

Project overview

Objective:

To design the cover and illustrations for my best friends’s debut poetry book in a way that visually captured her voice, emotion and personality.

Why? :

This project meant a lot to me—both personally and creatively. I offered my design and illustration skillls to help bring her poems to life, making sure the visuals felt just as intentional and expressive as her writing. It was a chance to support someone I care about while pushing myself to create work that felt honest, emotional and aligned with her vision.

From vision to sketch

We kicked off the project by talking through her vision for the cover. She shared a rough sketch and gave me the freedom to bring her concepts to life while keeping the tone personal and diary-like.

She already had a strong idea of what she wanted the cover to feel like—raw, emotional, and personal—so our first step was going over her concept together. She even shared a quick sketch and a text description, which gave us a visual starting point.

After that, we reviewed all of the poems in her book. She pointed out which ones she wanted illustrations for, but gave me full creative freedom on how to interpret them. Her only request was that everything—from the cover to the internal art—felt like it belonged in her personal sketchbook or diary.

To fully understand the tone, I read the book front to back several times. That helped me create illustrations that didn’t just match the poems, but supported the overall mood and voice of the book.

designing with intent

Each design choice on the cover was intentional—from color to imagery—to reflect the author’s personality, life experiences, and the emotional tone of her poems.

After reading through the book several times, I began illustrating the cover with the author’s original concept in mind, adding personal touches that gave the final design deeper meaning.

I chose to depict the author on the cover because the book is deeply personal—it reads almost like a diary. It felt right to place her at the center, especially since this was her debut.

For the color palette, I landed on blue. As someone who knows her personally, I’ve always associated blue with her personality—and it also happens to be her favorite color.

One detail she specifically requested was smoke on the cover. I suggested using a cigarette to add more emotional weight, symbolizing the harder periods of her life that shaped many of the poems.

She also wanted butterflies, so I illustrated monarchs—her favorite, and a tribute to her father. They represented hope and serve as a reminder that the book contains light moments too, not just pain.

Visual storytelling

Each sketch was designed to match the tone of its poem—subtle, emotional, and cohesive with the overall aesthetic of the book.

For the interior illustrations, I used Procreate on my iPad to create a series of hand—drawn sketches based on a few selected poems the author chose.

The goal was to visually reflect the mood and message of each poem without distracting from the words. I kept the art style simple and cohesive—delicate pencil-like linework that matched the tone of the cover and felt like pages from a diary.

Throughout the process, the author gave feedback, but only a couple minor revisions were needed. All final illustrations were approved and integrated seamlessly into the book layout

Final Product

Reflection

Learning the importance of proper file setup, scalable formats, and organized client handoffs.

What I learned :

• I learned how important it is to export files in the correct size from the start. When my friend began placing the illustrations into the book layout, she had to manually resize some of them, which risked distorting the images.

• Next time, I’ll export files in exact dimensions and use scalable formats (SVGs) whenever possible to protect image quality during any resizing.

• I also realized how valuable better file organization is. For future projects, I’ll create a shareable, organized folder with all assets clearly labeled and ready for the client.

• Lastly, I want to capture more high-quality photos of both the final product and the process itself, using better lighting and documenting more behind-the-scenes stages for my portfolio.