Sean’s book was very special. She reached out to me to design a book for her partner as a birthday gift. Asaf, her partner, is a writer, and he had been working on his book for a while. Sean wanted to surprise him by publishing it-not as a full production, but as a single, meaningful copy. A gesture. A gentle push towards one day maybe publishing it properly. I was so touched by the idea and jumped on it straight away.

As with every project, I first wanted to understand the story-but this time, it wasn’t just the story of the book. Sean isn’t the writer, so it became about something else. I wanted to understand their story. The story of Sean and Asaf. Because we weren’t just designing a book-we were creating something that holds both the writing and their relationship. Sean also chose to add her own story at the beginning of the book-written as a letter to their future kids, reflecting on how they met.

This was the first birthday Sean was celebrating with Asaf in their relationship, so there were a lot of emotions involved. I was very intentional with how I held the space for her throughout the process, and she later shared that she felt really safe. She told me it was scary for her to take his writing and share it with someone else, not knowing how he would feel about it. It was important to me that she felt seen, and that she knew we were creating something really special for him.

Sean told me their story, and it was very romantic. They met on a dating app, where Asaf sent her a rose. When she first told me that, I had no idea what it meant-I’ve never used those apps-so we both laughed about it. But the rose stayed. It felt symbolic. At one point, Sean suggested adding childhood photos of them, but I felt it would be stronger to stay within a more romantic, nostalgic tone. She also suggested the name The Never Ending Album (free translation), which came from the name of their shared photo album-a kind of quiet promise that they would be together forever.

As she was telling me all of this, ideas were already forming. I created a mood board of old, romantic books. I knew I wanted it to feel vintage-something that could exist outside of time. Soft textures, classic typography, and a sense of intimacy. I also wanted the rose to feel like it was part of the paper itself-like a stamp, or something inked into the page.

I was actually working on this book while I was on remote islands in Indonesia. As the deadline was very short, I decided to fully focus on it while I was there. I read the book in a few hours, lying in a hammock, and both Sean and I went through a couple of editing rounds for the text-mostly fixing small mistakes, even though that’s not usually part of my process. At one point, I was lying on a small boat between surfs, half meditating, half inviting creative ideas-and the whole concept just clicked. I remember rushing back to our accommodation, opening my laptop, and starting the cover straight away.

The final direction carried that romantic, nostalgic feeling throughout. Inside the book, I added small details-like a delicate floral symbol next to the page numbers, and carefully chosen typography that felt soft and timeless. The background has a natural, almost recycled paper texture-like an old photo album. The rose and the text feel as if they are inked into the paper in red. It all comes together into something that feels intimate, emotional, and slightly nostalgic.

Sean loved it so much that we added a strip of photo-booth images of them into one of the pages, just after her story. When Asaf received the book, he was overwhelmed-in the best way. And more than that, it created something deeper between them. He later shared that it gave him the push to finally consider publishing his work.