Style combination · Contrasts
Book Blob × Corporate Memphis
Its contemporary in flat, polychrome blobs and inclusive warmth, but Corporate Memphis draws whole faceless figures as small vignettes on white. The blob dissolves the figure into a full-bleed field and leaves only a profile or an eye. Choose the blob when a single person's inner life matters more than a scene.
01
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.
Book Blob (Abstract Colour-Blob Literary Fiction Cover) Corporate Memphis
- Type from Book Blob
- Colour from Corporate Memphis
- Form from Corporate Memphis
- Composition from Book Blob
- Surface from Book Blob
02
The type
Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.
Display · Book Blob
Home
Bricolage Grotesque; Book Blob used Large spaced capitals in a sturdy sans, white or cream, one or two words to a line across the width and Spaced sans capitals with round, slightly hand-drawn shapes, staggered left and right down the cover
Text · Corporate Memphis
The flat vector illustration style that became the default visual voice of big tech in the late 2010s: faceless, ethnically non-specific figures with elongated limbs and tiny heads, drawn in bright flat colour among blobs, leaves and confetti. Codified in Buck's Alegria system for Facebook (2017) and spread by open libraries such as unDraw and Humaaans, it was later named, half-mockingly, after the Memphis Group.
Hanken Grotesk; Corporate Memphis used Circular and Airbnb Cereal
03
The colours
The ground and leading colours come from Corporate Memphis, with a counter-accent from Book Blob. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.
Book Blob (Abstract Colour-Blob Literary Fiction Cover) Corporate Memphis
-
#ffffffground · 36% -
#2f2e41ink · 14% -
#ffc857accent · 18% -
#ff4a03accent · 14% -
#6c63ffaccent · 10% -
#dba729accent · 8%
As CSS
:root {
--ground: #ffffff;
--ink: #2f2e41;
--accent-1: #ffc857;
--accent-2: #ff4a03;
--accent-3: #6c63ff;
--accent-4: #dba729;
--font-display: "Bricolage Grotesque", sans-serif;
--font-text: "Hanken Grotesk", sans-serif;
}Use it with care
Book Blob (Abstract Colour-Blob Literary Fiction Cover): These jackets are the in-copyright work of named, living designers and illustrators: borrow the method, not a particular cover. Print (2021) read the look as a 'safe' route taken disproportionately for women of colour and debut authors, who deserve covers 'that wouldn't have been created for anyone else'. If you use the blob for such a book, draw the shapes from that book's own story so the cover does not become a mere demographic signal.
04
The two styles
05
More combinations
With Book Blob
- Finnish Bold Print (Marimekko Modernism) Pairs well · Marimekko's big organic shapes in flat, saturated colour, printed edge to edge, are a crisp, hard-edged cousin of the blob's soft fields. Borrow their scale and confident cut edges when blurred blobs feel too vague.
- Penguin Paperback Design (Three Bands to the Marber Grid) Contrasts · Penguin's bands and grid made every book look like its publisher on purpose. The blob made books from rival houses look like one another, so the cover signals comparable titles rather than an imprint. Borrow a house grid when a series identity should outlast the season's trend.
- DTC 'Blanding' / Millennial Minimalism Contrasts · Both are phone-era formulas that critics mocked for making everything look alike, but blanding sells a product: one muted colour, lowercase sans, an isolated object on white space. The blob sells a story: clashing colour runs edge to edge and a figure is only hinted at. Use blanding when the thing itself should be seen, and the blob when the reader should project onto the cover.
- Risograph & Indie Print Culture Pairs well · Detransition, Baby already uses grain to warm its digital colour. Print the blobs as two or three overprinted riso inks to get real overlaps and speckle, and to take the formula away from the glossy bestseller table.
- Modern Calligraphy and Brush Lettering Pairs well · The handwritten 'a novel' under the big capitals is a brush-script accent. Take it from a real modern calligrapher rather than a stock script font so the one personal line actually feels personal.
With Corporate Memphis
- Polish Poster School Contrasts · Polish poster metaphor and painterly ambiguity show how much illustration can say once it stops being generic.
- Risograph & Indie Print Culture Pairs well · Add riso grain and two spot inks to the figures to escape the over-familiar SaaS sheen and give them printed warmth.
- DTC 'Blanding' / Millennial Minimalism Pairs well · Its photo-led start-up sibling: pair Corporate Memphis figures with blanding's pastel ground and geometric sans when a brand needs both people and product.
- Brutalist Web Design Contrasts · Brutalism's raw honesty is the opposite of this friendly gloss; reach for it when a brand needs credibility over cheer.
- Memphis Design Contrasts · The original's real colour clash, irony and Sottsass or Du Pasquier patterns are the foil to generic confetti blobs; borrow one genuine Memphis pattern to give the illustration an edge.
- Rubber-Hose Revival (Cartoon Mascot Graphics) Contrasts · Both draw stretched figures in flat colour, but the revival gives each brand its own outlined, nostalgic mascot where Corporate Memphis uses interchangeable faceless people.
- CalArts Style (Rounded Cartoon Character Design) Pairs well · Both use flat fills and simplified figures; borrow its pastel UI-illustration palette, but keep faces and expressions, which Corporate Memphis drops.
- Data Humanism Contrasts · Both aim to feel warm and human, but Corporate Memphis draws generic faceless figures for mood, while data humanism draws the specific data of specific people. Replace stock warmth with a drawing of real data when a brand needs sincerity.