Rosie Convey- MA Graphic Design and Art Direction
Adopt your local - Designing nostalgic communal loss
My practice is about experimenting, pushing ideas and seeing how far I can take them. I like design with personality, humour and a bit of weirdness. I don’t want everything I make to feel polished for the sake of it. I want it to feel like it has something behind it.
My synthesis project started with nostalgia. I designed a book exploring how memories are formed through objects, places and personal experiences. I then created a second book looking at a pub owner’s religious upbringing, family history and familial theory, exploring how these things can shape the way we remember.
From there, the project became Adopt Your Local, a local non-profit based in Chorlton, Manchester. I wanted to take what I had been researching about memory and loss and apply it to something that was happening around me. Independent pubs are disappearing, taking with them places where people meet, celebrate, argue, make friends and create memories.
I built Adopt Your Local as a campaign to give something back to these spaces. The identity developed across posters, stickers, coasters, social media and a website, alongside community events and fundraising for local pubs.
The project became much more than a university brief. It gave me the chance to use design to do something I actually cared about, while still having fun with the visual side of it. That balance is important to my practice. I want to make work that has a purpose, but I also want to enjoy making it, push the idea further and leave people with something they remember.
