Kimi Weart

Art direction and design of full book jacket and interiors, Photoshop work.

I sourced a photo that managed to combine a sense of Chinese culture and voracious reading, which is what this book is about. I also plowed through my own mother's collection of vintage Asian embroidery to find this lovely piece of fabric that I used as a wraparound spine. This book became a winner of two global Notable Book awards.

The poems are about Yeung Ying, a young girl growing up in Hong Kong in the 1960's. She becomes tired of hearing how important boys are. After all, she can write letters and recite poems as well as—even better than—her boy cousins.

Art direction and design of full book jacket and interiors, cover image creation. 

It was fun finding a vintage map of the border of Texas and Mexico, as well as making the interiors moody yet serene, to match the text. Lupita, the main character, tells a tale in verse of living on both sides of the border and experiencing her mother's cancer and eventual passing.  

The most challenging part of this design was to use a stock photo of a girl looking up, but make it look like the author as a young girl—this meant making her heavier, with long wavy hair, hands in jean pockets, and bigger (ahem) endowment. The author was thrilled at how it came out, and in fact when her husband saw the cover he asked, "How did they get a picture of you as a teen?". 

Art direction, design of book jacket and interiors

This book was a true collaboration with the author, the mother of a teenage girl who tragically was killed in a car crash in 2004. I used a personal photo of her daughter for a moody, almost romantic cover, with fading typography in a classic typeface.

Throughout the book, I took sketches from Alicia's own sketchbooks and journals, as well as collaged photos of her friends into new forms to grace the chapters where they speak.

This book is a true paean to a woman's mourning but also to other teenagers' responses to the passing of a friend.

Art direction, design of book jacket and interiors, custom typography

For this rollicking fun story set around the moon landing in 1969, I used photography from NASA which is all, astoundingly, copyright free for anyone to use for any purpose. It was great fun trolling through their massive archive.

Bold yet silly type reflects the bold yet silly heroine and her tale of forming a friendship with a new foster kid in the neighborhood. She slowly learns both skepticism (he says he's training for the 1972 Olympics) and compassion. 

Art direction, design of book jacket and interiors

The kidnapping and murder of Emmett Till is famous as a catalyst for the Civil Rights Movement. Giving this book a proper gravitas, intrigue, and harshness, without overwhelming the reader, was an important charge. It has 40 photos from the time, including one of Emmett's corpse, all of which were treated with utmost respect.

Emmett Till, a fourteen-year-old Black teenager from Chicago, was visiting family in a small town in Mississippi during the summer of 1955. Likely showing off to friends, Emmett allegedly whistled at a white woman. The perpetrators were acquitted and later bragged about the crime.

Art direction and design of full book jacket and interiors, Photoshop work.

For this trilogy I created a custom font for the title, inspired by old Barnum & Bailey posters. With a stock photo from Getty Images I isolated a grand lion and designed the jacket to have embossed lettering and a gold shimmer. 

The story is about a boy who speaks the cat language, mysteriously missing parents, and an extraordinary floating circus, and a handsome hoodlum villain. What more could one ask for?

Art direction, design of jacket and interiors

I worked closely with the digital artist both in image research and Photoshop details to create an evocative image in a nigh-monochromatic palette that still had brightness. Even though it is a novel about a girl with a rare allergy to sunlight, who longs to feel the sun's touch. I loved reading it before designing it and wanted a cover that reflected her ability to find magic in her own condition.

But one of my favorite details was discovering that the book the perfect number of chapters to show the phases of the moon. I created isolated images of the moon, going from full to dark to full again, for each chapter heading. I love finding the perfect way to engage readers in the chapter headings. 

Art direction, design of jacket and interiors

I worked closely with a digital artist to create a compelling image that reflected the tone of the story and nature of the main character, a half-Japanese half-Jewish girl who can't stand her own reflection.

It won the Edgar Allen Poe Award, and received a starred review from Booklist. It is a mystery novel as well as a journey of finding one's own power and self-acceptance.

Art direction, design for book jacket and interiors

I created headlines in vintage newspaper typography for the artist to use in his collaged painting. Throughout the novel the chapter headings incorporate the look of a torn newspaper and headlines.

This novelization of a fictional friendship between a Mississippi boy and Emmett Till, the victim of racial violence, is a way to introduce young people to a crime that helped galvanize citizens and push the Civil Rights Movement.