As is with most college performing arts departments, every summer comes the time to design and promote the upcoming concert season. For the Butler School of Music, this includes refreshing the season’s graphic identity, promoting the event through various social channels, and mailing around 60,000 brochures around the city of Austin. This 2018–2019 brochure would mark the third season of season subscription package offerings, so one of the goals was to continue ticket sales by attracting new audiences and to build on past success.

The Season Brochure brings the challenge that many performing art organizations struggle with. First, it is often the case that institutions will want to promote its individual concerts but doing so, again, brings the issue of promoting individual concerts rather than the institution hosting the events. Secondly, imagery can be tough to find, especially in academia, so the design must find creative ways to bring cohesiveness and consistency from some sort of design methodology. Finally, there is much information to digest from spread to spread, so another challenge becomes ensuring a clear visual hierarchy, while also ensuring a dynamic layout that engages readers.

In order to bring a design that was cohesive, the solution was to create a structure where each performance could shine within the brochure’s spreads through consistent treatments. A simple circle was used at the heart of the brochure that abstractly suggests a spotlight. Using this circle would bring consistency to each spread and would serve as a placeholder and “spotlight” for performers and imagery. This graphic device would be accompanied by a flexible grid system and strong typography set in the compact sans serif Tungsten, paired with Gotham Narrow: a perfect typeface for legibility at smaller sizes.