Wisdom of a 20 Year Old Korean Girl
Fall 2023
︎ Book Design
December 14, 2023
Wisdom of a 20 Year Old Korean Girl is a book full of my random thoughts, the ones I deem a little wise. I have gotten into the habit of sharing my takes with my friends and Instagram followers, and have found that my honesty often leads me to interesting and unexpected conversations. It’s always a little scary to put your thoughts out there, but ultimately sharing human experience is, in my opinion, the best way to learn. Wisdom of a 20 Year Old Korean Girl is a book of my thoughts, but more importantly it’s an encouragement, especially to young people and designers, to find value in their fleeting ideas. No one thinks or designs like you do!
The process of designing this book was largely spontaneous, a divergence from my usual workflow of setting up a logical system and planning intentions behind each element. For this book, I challenged myself to explore what it looks like to design intuitively. I created some constraints, limiting myself to my own images, four distinct typefaces, hot pink, and the recurrence of dotted lines, but each spread took its own path. With an awareness of the endless possibilities, I found myself struggling to follow my gut and just start designing. I had to take my own advice, “slumps are caused by fear,” and trust that whatever the outcome was, it would be true to me and the content. The end result is a hodgepodge of imagined images, a window into my mind, and a time capsule of who I am as a person and designer at age 20. I’m excited to see who I become at age 21.
December 14, 2023
Wisdom of a 20 Year Old Korean Girl is a book full of my random thoughts, the ones I deem a little wise. I have gotten into the habit of sharing my takes with my friends and Instagram followers, and have found that my honesty often leads me to interesting and unexpected conversations. It’s always a little scary to put your thoughts out there, but ultimately sharing human experience is, in my opinion, the best way to learn. Wisdom of a 20 Year Old Korean Girl is a book of my thoughts, but more importantly it’s an encouragement, especially to young people and designers, to find value in their fleeting ideas. No one thinks or designs like you do!
The process of designing this book was largely spontaneous, a divergence from my usual workflow of setting up a logical system and planning intentions behind each element. For this book, I challenged myself to explore what it looks like to design intuitively. I created some constraints, limiting myself to my own images, four distinct typefaces, hot pink, and the recurrence of dotted lines, but each spread took its own path. With an awareness of the endless possibilities, I found myself struggling to follow my gut and just start designing. I had to take my own advice, “slumps are caused by fear,” and trust that whatever the outcome was, it would be true to me and the content. The end result is a hodgepodge of imagined images, a window into my mind, and a time capsule of who I am as a person and designer at age 20. I’m excited to see who I become at age 21.
March 16, 2024
I feel differently about this book every time I think about it. Sometimes I think it’s so cool and sometimes I find it so embarrassing. But I’ve learned to accept it for what it is and be proud of it. It’s my honest view of the world at the time that I had these thoughts filled with a critical eye and childlike wonder. It’s interesting to look back at this book and see how I have changed over the course of a few months, just as I had predicted. I’m happy to be sharing it and I hope you enjoy.
I feel differently about this book every time I think about it. Sometimes I think it’s so cool and sometimes I find it so embarrassing. But I’ve learned to accept it for what it is and be proud of it. It’s my honest view of the world at the time that I had these thoughts filled with a critical eye and childlike wonder. It’s interesting to look back at this book and see how I have changed over the course of a few months, just as I had predicted. I’m happy to be sharing it and I hope you enjoy.
✷ Anyone can be wise (＊๑˘◡˘)