Designing magazines and reports that show where the NUS puts its money

The NUS has a well established calling to represent the best interests of students. The support for their core activities are at least partly enabled through the savvy business management of student resources across universities in the UK. Each year they produce a Commercial Intelligence Review that highlights financial performance in key areas supported by data analysis and graphs. My task was to produce a serious commercial report. I wanted it to be easy to navigate, with clear graphic information that strengthened the NUS brand, while also looking inviting enough to be picked up and read willingly. I believe graphic data that’s well designed and beautiful to look at, can also be much easier to read and understand. Take a look at the example spreads below to see how pretty graphs can help communicate data clearly.

By way of a contrast, I also designed many editions of the Spotlight magazine. I liked to give these a looser feel while working within a strict grid structure. This helped spreads to look very different across many separate articles, while maintaining the magazine’s overall consistent look.