Exploration Life in Kowloon Walled City
Stepping back into time and space, I designed three various types of media to convey the time and place of the Kowloon Walled city at the end of its era; the year of its announced demolition. On January 14 1988, the massive and unparalleled Walled City in Kowloon, Hong Kong was given ticket to destruction. The City, home to more than 300,000 people within less an 7 acres, has been inhabited for almost a thousand years and survived through wars, invasions, and colonization.
The first piece of media is a redesign of the iconic book City of Darkness: Life in Kowloon Walled City by Greg Girard and Ian Lambot from 1998. The second piece is a month-by-month year long calendar of the year 1988. The final piece is a poster created from an image-based grid of the Walled City.
Book + Cover Redesign
Using content from the book City of Darkness: Life in Kowloon Walled City, I designed a more compact and updated print copy of the book and dust jacket cover. In addition to the print materials, I created a mobile book made for the iPhone 7+.
The Calendar
Putting myself into the state of chaos and confusion the erupted during the months and years before the evictions and demolition began, I designed this year-long calendar for the year of 1988. I traced the north facing side of the walled city, noting each window and ‘cage window’ on every mismatched building.
The Poster
The final installment of my three part exploration of the Walled City is a large scale poster. I started with an image of a corner of the city, from which I adding over 150 lines to created my image-based grid guides. From there, I began to manipulate and transform my added text and shapes based on the underlying grid system. Using type and color, I expanded upon existing shapes and forms to connect the various letter forms across the canvas, but like how electrical wires and pipes were overly abundant across every inch of the Walled City.
