Edinburgh: The resurrection trade
Typography, Branding, Editorial & Layout
Design, Illustration
Typography, Branding, Editorial & Layout
Design, Illustration
Edinburgh: The Resurrection Trade is a four-panel accordion pocket guide to the grave robbing and body snatching that supplied Edinburgh’s medical schools in the early 1800s. I designed it as the first title from Sexton & Rae, a fictional small press. The guide follows six sites across the Old Town, from Greyfriars Kirkyard to Surgeons’ Hall Museum, and treats each one as a case file: what lies beneath, how people defended against disturbance, the best hour to visit, and a recommended tour for anyone who wants to dig deeper.
One side of the sheet carries a single illustrated map with a lamppost compass and legend, running unbroken across every panel. The other side holds the covers, an introduction, and six illustrated cards. Each card pairs hand-drawn line art with short, tightly edited copy, and the one entry built on online folklore rather than documented history is labelled as such. The charcoal, bone and blood-red palette keeps the subject eerie without tipping into costume.
Sketches and Brainstorming ────⋆༺·
The style I was going for was a more grungy, medieval map style. I wanted it to be symbolic, with the cover choosing a crow (omen of death) and a star (an ode to necromancy). I wanted the cover to also have hand-done type to weigh out the hand-drawn map on the back.
The guidebook layout ────⋆༺·
Mockup ────⋆༺·
