Christian M. Allison

The World Showcase in Walt Disney World's EPCOT park is home to eleven pavilions each themed to represent a country in the world. This provided the perfect opportunity to begin an architectural study on buildings from around the world without needing to source images from the Internet. One beneficial side effect of the intense Florida sun are the crisp shadows that are created, so rather than soft gradients along the faces of buildings, there are solid shapes that make up the form, which can then be translated to graphic orthometric illustrations.

The way we usually navigate the Showcase is clockwise, so I decided to complete them in that order starting with Mexico and followed by Norway, China, Germany, Italy, the United States, Japan, Morocco, France, the United Kingdom, and Canada.

This project is the first in a series of parallel projection illustrations based on famous architectural landmarks. I began with the City Hall from Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom theme park because the details on the façade of the building are indicative of an earlier time in America's history. This exercise began as a way for me to both strengthen my ability to simplify the complexities of architecture by removing perspective, but also to solve the problem of presenting a three-deminsional object in two-deminsions as I seek to create a visual database of beautiful architecture from around the world.

YEAR
2015

Andaz is a local Indian restaurant in Gainesville, Florida that seeks to provide quality food and drinks at an affordable cost. Based on the décor that they have already established, I felt the aesthetic that would be most successful was the full merging of two design styles that they have already begun to implement: American Art Deco and traditional Indian hand lettering and sign painting. For this to be successful, the identity needed to be distilled into what makes the two styles unique.

Rather than utilize a preexisting typeface, I used this opportunity to create my own. Inspried by the bold geometry of the American Art Deco perio merged with the distict letterforms characteristic of traditional Indian signs, I began with a consistent grid and built each letter from the ground up.

CLIENT
Andaz Indian Restaurant & Bar

YEAR
2015

This project began as an experiment with creating a children's board book. I created several illustrations depicting common fears or "phobias" using a restricted color palette. The final book contained no words other than the name and syllabic breakdown of each phobia, which led the reader to create their own inferences based upon the illustrations.

I then decided to push the project further. I thought about how a child would interact with this piece and I came up with the idea of incorporating a mobile device since the younger generations have never been without them. I created concepts of animations that would appear using an augmented reality software when the user held a camera-equipped device with the proper application installed. The illustrations were meant to be lighthearted and playful to contrast with the content of the book. Although there is no formal storyline, I wanted the user to imagine the adventures of the mouse heroine, Phoebe (inspired by the Greek root "phobos" meaning fear), overcoming her various fears as she 'magically' appeared on the screen of the device.

LÜXE is a fictional company founded in Clanwilliam, South Africa by the Vos family. They specialise in cultivating the rooibos plant for steeping as well as scented geraniums which they then use to scent their various other home products. The brand redesign project required a brand name and visual identity system in addition to an application to a tea box, bottle label, and candle packaging

CLIENT
LÜXE: Clanwilliam, ZA

YEAR
2013

The University of Florida was looking to expand their presence on social media, so they asked me to design a series of geofilters for Snapchat that could be used around campus and Gainesville. I began by looking into what areas would most likely be the most heavily utilized by Snapchat users and then created simple flat illustrations for these locations that would be placed as filters over the users image. I avoided text in order to allow the user to add their own.

CLIENT
University of Florida

YEAR
2015

Heritage by Twinings is a fictional branch of the British tea company based in London. The idea was to create a line of upscale hand-made and hand-packaged tea and tea products that catered to their local clientele because it would be distributed only within the original Twinings shop on The Strand. For the brand's "We/You" Campaign, two print magazine spreads were created to push the handcrafted nature of the products, but gearing them toward the experience of consumer and how they would benefit from the extra time the blenders spend with the tea leaves.

The final component was a store groundplan created to show how the new line could be integrated into the existing space.

CLIENT
Twinings of London,
Associated British Foods plc

YEAR
2013

For the set of David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross, I chose to create the space as if it was an abandoned warehouse. After reading through the play, I realised that the office space would likely not be one that the salesmen would be brining clients to and I wanted to push the shadiness of the entire operation by placing it in an unconventional location. For the first act, I created the Chinese restaurant through lighting techniques and the inclusion of dining tables rather than transforming the set itself or doing dramatic scene changes. For the transition into the office, the windows needed to be boarded up after the break-in and the lighting becomes more industrial. The second level would be the offices of Mitch and Murray which would be always present and overlooking the space, but it would be inaccessible to the other characters because of lack of a staircase, further separating the salesmen from the management.

In 2013, Kate Spade & Co saw a dramatic increase in global appeal and the company expanded into multiple new countries. For the annual report, I wanted to explore the overlap between a tangible, printed report and a digitally-published version. I decided to divide the report into a fully-illustrated look-book that would accompany the more standard financial data. The iPad app uses many of the same illustrations but was optimized to include interactive videos and hyperlinks in order to best take advantage of the platform.

CLIENT
Kate Spade & Co.

YEAR
2015

next to normal is a rock musical with a book and lyrics by Brian Yorkey and music by Tom Kitt. It opened at the Booth Theatre on Broadway in 2009 and ran for 21 previews and 733 regular productions. The musical explores the controversial topic of mental disability and medication as its cure. The relationships in the show are fractured and distorted and the façade that the family puts on is only a front for what has become a barren and cold home.

For the design, I wanted to emphasize both the ideas of distortion as well as façades by creating an abstracted townhome that would serve as a multi-level structure for the actors. The upper-most level is mostly obstructed by the semi-transparent windows, but serves as the sanctuary for Gabe, the deceased brother of Natalie who is a figment of the Dilusional mother, Diana's imagination.

YEAR
2014

I have taken vocal lessons for nearly twelve years, and one of the most important facets is the timbre of one’s voice. This differs from the magnitude and can also be called the “color” of the pitch. A strong baritone voice will have a much different sound than a light, airy soprano. In the same way, a tenor who is able to belt upper notes and keep them just as strong would sound very different from one that achieves pitch by figuratively placing his voice in his head, giving him a lighter, and breathier tone.

The idea behind "Dolcissimo" is to create a synaesthetic product that could be used to demonstrate the correlation between the many colors of sound and the flavors of chocolates.

CLIENT
Dolcissimo Confections

YEAR
2015

Born in 1921, Ottavio Missoni competed in the 1948 Summer Olympics as a hurdler for Italy. He went on to be a part of the team that revolutionized Italian fashion in the 1950s. As a celebration of the company’s diamond anniversary, we have created a line of packaging based on the famed patterns.

CLIENTS
McDonald's Co. & Missoni

YEAR
2012

This poster was created for a campaign involving the University of Florida's Department of Recreational Sports. Crew rowing is one of the most team-oriented sports available, yet I found it to be under-represented around the campus. Through further research on the subject, I noticed the juxtaposition of the serenity that comes from the lithe boat gliding across the water with the strength and effort put forth by the rowers. I decided to create this visually through the use of calming colour and long, flowing shapes. I took my inspiration from vintage travel posters and created a simple and bold print that verges on abstraction in order to create a visually-striking poster that presented the idea of ‘team’ and ‘teamwork’ in a less obvious way and from a view that could be interpreted as from above or below.