Lincoln’s Inn Fields Posters
Done for School project: Facilitate
Grids & The City with Phil Baines 

A personal approach to a brief on a poster I designed on Lincoln’s Inn Fields showing its evolution from my research from the London Metropolitan archives. I’ve added in an edited version as well.

I have done something similar before, design-wise I like it as the layers represent the layout of the gardens and it showcases the progression of it throughout the centuries. I have done my research at the London Metropolitan archive, looking at several different maps, some of which were beautifully illustrated, starting from 1563. At first, I intended to have it screen-printed  to get the ‘raw, hands-on feel’ to it, but as I have not done the induction for it, I have resorted to using the computer to come up with the equivalent graphics, which was ok, just ok.

THE FULL REPORT

So I was given Lincoln’s Inn Fields as my area of interest, I was lucky because it was actually near school and I have been there more than once as I went there to visit the John Soane Museum (which was totally awesome, they have this intricate golden key which I wish I had in my collection and a skeleton that was 70% female and 30% male.). Anyways I had time, that day so I went round, armed with my digital camera and proceeded to shoot anything that caught my eye.

I came back on another day after having coffee with Duarte, Shiho and some other study abroad students and proceed to draw a layout of the fields with the buildings around it as I felt like doing some illustrations. People were looking at me funny as I was struggling with my A3 drawing pad going around sketching but I finally got the gist of it, the rest were done by referring to googlemaps.

We had a trip to the London Metropolitan Archive and it felt like a fun school trip outing. We went in and found an array of maps starting from the 1500’s up till now, which was really cool. I had only some photocopied so I have to come back sometime soon again.

Went to the library to get some books on Lincoln’s Inn Fields in the school library and ended up with two books and it turns out that the other one was for reference only and more about his works on architecture which were absolutely captivating as well. The book that I got was pretty helpful as I got some information about the fields and how life was for them. They were titled ‘The Soanes at Home: Domestic Life at Lincoln’s Inn Fields’ by Palmer, S. 

I went to the Archives on my own today and made more photocopies today. I found some books on Lincoln Inn Fields but weren’t really helpful. Turns out that loads of lawyers and dentists used to live there and then it evolved into a hangout for prostitutes and hobos, also there used to be some homosexual activities going on but that was nearer and more evident near the Strand.

With my maps I have proceeded to make a timeline of how it has changed, it use to be huge and made up of three sections, Purse-field, Ficketsfield and Cup-field. Used to be a huge playing area for kids but as time passed by it was turned into a housing area by William Newton. Then John Soane came into the picture when he purchased house No.12 from a Mrs Barnard. and then he bought house No.13 and now the houses stand as the John Soane museum today.

I stayed in today so I decided to fiddle with a bit of 3D artwork and design Lincoln’s Inn Fields in 3D. I did it but it took quite awhile. Also I found an archive online where it showed the records of previous occupants of the houses around Lincoln’s Inn Fields. Not so sure how it may help but at least I have some information. Also there was a poem about the Fields which covers on the thieves, prostitutes and beggars that lurk around the fields and how the built the rails because of it. Might use that for my personal poster.

With all that information I have decided to start execution. for the exhibition poster I wanted to literally use grids and without the cheesy portrayal of Lincoln’s Inn’s Fields as that will be expected. I saw the bee’s honeycomb and decided to use that as a grid as its not the conventional one and it is made as a home, like how Lincoln’s Inn Fields was a housing area. So I did the layouts, didn’t add colour as it didn’t seemed necessary and I liked it.
The feedback that I got was that it was generic, it’s alright but good as a template.

For the second poster, I had more fun with it. I wanted to use the poem but it was really challenging to layout and was a disaster for me. I ended up with another idea that was “The Evolution of Lincoln’s Inn Fields” from the timeline I did previously. So the idea was to layer the span which Lincoln’s Inn Fields covered during different periods and compare them with each other. Well, it area shrinked as time progressed but nevertheless it provides a good graphic for the poster.

I have redesigned the posters since then and did some minor tweaks.