Making Ends Meet: Where to start

Considering inclusive formats after the main body of the work has been designed makes for more work and expense, so make sure to factor accessibility into the design or advertising brief. Make the primary piece as clear as possible and use it as the basis for any other formats. Experienced designers will be able to give you costs and a timeframe on how to meet your obligations. This will help with planning and scheduling press releases and launches well in advance. next >

CASE STUDY — The Beginner’s Guide to Ireland, created for the Reception & Integration Agency in 2005

Brief & requirements
The brief was to write, design and produce a handbook for refugees arriving in Ireland under the UNHCR resettlement programme. It had to be straight-forward to translate; cost-effective to update; and to be understood by people with limited English-language skills. Created for a group of refugees arriving to live in Roscommon, the brief also specified that it was to be adaptable to any part of Ireland.

Our solution
To make the content accessible and easy to read; the design easy to adapt; and the production easy to replicate!

Simply written, the handbook contains a huge amount of information, from ‘where is Ireland?’ and ‘how do people make a living?’ through to details such as accessing health services and registering documentation. For simplicity of navigation, the content is broken down into sections and bullet-points. Creating a series of small points also makes the text much easier to translate, in whole or in part.

The Guide uses illustrations as diverse as street signage, Garda uniforms and medical cards to give users visual cues about Irish life. It was designed as an A4 ring binder so that individual pages could be translated or updated quickly and easily without incurring excessive reprint costs. One unusual feature is that the handbook was created first in graphic design software and then replicated in Microsoft Word so that the client could update individual pages easily.