The University Times
The University Times is a student newspaper in Trinity College, Dublin. Following a period in the doldrums the incoming Editor Robert Donoghue felt the newspaper needed a fresh start and a new design was at the top of his list.
I had worked for a number of years years for their direct competitor, but Robert approached me with the offer of a “blank page” redesign. He had a few ideas of what he wanted, but was willing to give me pretty wide creative reign. The challenge would be striking a balance of elegant design and something that an inexperienced team could pull off every issue.
For this project I took the roll of Art Director, so these pages were produced by the paper’s own designers, but to my specifications and templates and under my supervision for the first issue.
Gratifyingly, the newspaper won it’s first ever national award that year – Newspaper of the Year – with the judges making direct reference to it’s design.
Gearoid understood our vision for the newspaper and during the design he continued to include us in the process and incorporate our input with his professional eye. This made the final product perfectly inline what we had imagined at the start. Working with Gearoid is a treat; he always worked hard and gave us what we wanted.
— Robert Donoghue