Map for 'Three Hours In Paris'

Client: Soho Press | July-August 2019 | Adobe Illustrator
I was commissioned by the publishers Soho Press to create this illustrated period-style map of Paris for the endpapers of the novel Three Hours In Paris by Cara Black (published in April 2020), a thriller set in the French capital during the Nazi occupation in World War II. The map displays eighteen locations around the city that are key to the plot, each illustrated by simple pen sketches, as well as famous landmarks. The brief required the design to resemble tourist guide maps of the 1930s-1940s. To achieve this, I used a limited colour palette and period-style typefaces for the text labels (Brandon Grotesque and Clarendon); I was also careful to ensure that the detail was correct for the period, researching plans of Paris from the 1930s and omitting any modern-day details or landmarks that didn't exist until later, such as the Périphérique orbital motorway. As a further illustrative touch and to relate to the theme of the story, I had the idea of creating the illusion of pins and string connecting to the illustration bubbles, in the manner of maps created by detectives in their investigations.