RICS reference books

The client

Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS)

The brief

We were briefed by RICS to design a light-hearted set of three covers for their reference books which were to be made available on consumer bookshelves as well as through the usual on line and mail order channels.

The approach

The books' content covered subjects including 'Boundary Disputes', "Rights to Light" and 'Party Walls', which were aimed at "consumers as well as professionals".

In order to appeal to the wider consumer audience we recommended that the imagery should be fun but relevant and that it would follow the reference theme.

To identify each book as part of a set, each book was styled in a similar manner and allocated a different colour and image, which was coloured with spot colour to differentiate each title.

The cover images were all black and white photographs taken between 1930 and 1950. All pictures related to the subject matter but provided a visual comic twist.

The outcome

The books have proven to be a great success and are still being used by and ordered from RICS.