The Fairest of Them All

During my final year of BA Design at Goldsmiths, I wrote my dissertation about skin whitening culture and its socio-political influences. In my dissertation, I explore skin whitening culture from a Malaysian context and the harmful influence this culture has had on the population. In addition to producing this detailed body of research, I also typeset and bound the final publication.  

 

The final outcome was an off-size A5 book that was roughly face size. 80gsm off-white paper was used for the body of the essay while the appendix was printed on light blue 70gsm paper. There is also a mini booklet attached at the end with images of ephemera I collected from the Wellcome Collection Museum as part of primary research.  

 

The choice of using a flexible mirror for the cover was to force readers to be confronted with their own body image when first picking up the book. Secondly, it’s also a play on the dissertation title – The Fairest of Them All – which ties into notions of fairytales and narratives that I explore in a graphic novel project following the dissertation.