Style combination · Pairs well

Arab Children's Comic Magazines × Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book

The same Cairo and Beirut artists (Ellabbad, Hegazi) drew for both: add its hand-drawn Kufic-derived titles, folk borders and spot colour to a magazine cover.

From the research on Arab Children's Comic Magazines (Samir to Majid)

Mix them and make something Arab Children's Comic Magazines Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book

A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book, their arrangement from Arab Children's Comic Magazines, the finish from Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Arab Children's Comic Magazines (Samir to Majid) Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book & Periodical Design

Type from Arab Children's Comic Magazines: Hand-lettering
Ornamented display
Colour from Arab Children's Comic Magazines: Full polychrome
Flat fields
Form from Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book: Stylised figuration
Folk & sacred symbols
Composition from Arab Children's Comic Magazines: Framed panels
Sequential narrative
Surface from Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book: Painterly brushwork
Flat

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Arab Children's Comic Magazines

Yay!

Rakkas, standing in for Hand-lettered Arabic balloon text, read right to left (in colloquial Egyptian Arabic in most of Samir's stories, in literary Arabic in Bisat al-Rih)

Text · Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book

The illustrated book, magazine and children's-book culture that ran from Cairo's post-1952 publishing houses to the Arab nationalist and leftist presses of Beirut. Hand-drawn Arabic titles reworked from Kufic and everyday scripts, rough, expressive pen-and-brush drawing and flat offset colour gave mass readers and children a modern, decolonised Arabic page. Helmi el-Touni and Mohieddin Ellabbad also brought folk ornament and borders back to it.

Reem Kufi; Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book used Hand-drawn Kufic-derived Arabic display lettering and Hand-lettered titles based on Ruqʿa and Naskh

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Arab Children's Comic Magazines, with a counter-accent from Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Arab Children's Comic Magazines (Samir to Majid) Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book & Periodical Design

#f6f0dc ground · 36%
#1d1a17 ink · 14%
#f6c928 accent · 18%
#e23b2e accent · 14%
#2f8fd0 accent · 10%
#3f9b4a accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #f6f0dc;
  --ink: #1d1a17;
  --accent-1: #f6c928;
  --accent-2: #e23b2e;
  --accent-3: #2f8fd0;
  --accent-4: #3f9b4a;
  --font-display: "Rakkas", cursive;
  --font-text: "Reem Kufi", cursive;
}

Use it with care

Arab Children's Comic Magazines (Samir to Majid): Samir, Majid, Kaslan Jiddan, Fudooli, Ammouna and the magazines' mastheads belong to their publishers (Dar al-Hilal, Abu Dhabi Media) and artists, and the Arabic Disney and Tintin pages to Disney and Hergé's estate: draw your own mascot, characters and masthead, never ask an image model for these characters or a named artist's hand, and never present a generated page as a vintage issue. The tradition's artists also drew caricature, such as 'Ib Goha and Sambo' by Samir co-founder Haroon, about an Arab boy and his Black Nubian sidekick Sambo: give every character, Black, Nubian, foreign or villain, the same drawing care, and never make skin colour or features the joke. Draw everyday Egyptian, Levantine and Gulf children in the dress they actually wear (gallabiya, kandura and ghutra, shayla, school uniforms), not Orientalist shorthand (camels, harem veils, oil-sheikh caricatures, pseudo-Arabic squiggles), and do not copy Hergé's stereotyped Arabs of the invented Khemed, who are 'always the punchline' (Nadim Damluji). Leave religious pages to writers and readers of the faith, and have all Arabic lettering written or checked by a fluent reader, joined and running right to left.

The two styles

A colourful Arabic comic poster shows children discovering litter on a beach, collecting it with gloves and bags, sorting waste into coloured bins, and celebrating together. In the bottom panel, four children sit facing the sea and a sunset, with sailboats and a coastal town in the distance.

1956–present · Middle East & North Africa Arab Children's Comic Magazines (Samir to Majid) Arabic children's comics weeklies, from Dar al-Hilal's Samir in Cairo (1956) to Abu Dhabi's Majid (1979), mixing translated Western strips with house characters by Egyptian, Lebanese, Armenian and European artists. Pages read right to left: flat bright full-colour panels, rounded cartoon children in local dress, hand-lettered Arabic balloons and drawn sound effects, shared with quizzes, puzzles, contests, letters and lessons, under a boy mascot who names the magazine. The look is that of the colour weeklies of the 1950s to 1990s; Majid went monthly in 2020, redesigned by Studio Safar.

A vintage-style illustration shows a woman in a patterned headscarf and red embroidered dress holding a large key, with olive branches in the foreground. Behind her are sailboats, a waterfront town with a dome and minaret, birds, and a large golden sun; red Arabic lettering spans the top.

1952–1990 · Middle East & North Africa Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book & Periodical Design The illustrated book, magazine and children's-book culture that ran from Cairo's post-1952 publishing houses to the Arab nationalist and leftist presses of Beirut. Hand-drawn Arabic titles reworked from Kufic and everyday scripts, rough, expressive pen-and-brush drawing and flat offset colour gave mass readers and children a modern, decolonised Arabic page. Helmi el-Touni and Mohieddin Ellabbad also brought folk ornament and borders back to it.

More combinations

With Arab Children's Comic Magazines

With Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book

Every style combination