Francesca Iannaccone
27 // Francesca Iannaccone is a designer based in Crouch End, London. Francesca studied Image-Making and Design at West Herts College, part of Hertfordshire University, on a course that included a great mixture of graphics, illustration, film-making, photography and art history. It gave Francesca a good grounding in the arts, and she still draws on all these disciplines in her work. Francesca is inspired by mid-century colour palettes and vintage children’s toys. She loves the notion of collecting. As well as illustrating the collections in her house, Francesca collects everyday moments and illustrates them to keep as little souvenirs with her ‘Drawstagram’ project. Most of her designs are created to sell in her shop, but she plans to expand more into licensing, having recently worked with Papyrus. She would love to design wallpaper, and her dream brief would be to design for Heal’s, Habitat or Ikea.
Design Heroes: Lucienne Day, Rosalie Gascoigne, Ellsworth Kelly
Washi Tape
This fun stripe illustrates Washi tapes, the fashionable decorative masking tapes. Francesca even shows the tears in the tape ends to break up the pattern.
PlayBlocks
Francesca is drawn to colour and how overlaid colours react and create new depth and new shapes in the negative space. This design was inspired by Shapemaker, a colourful wooden building-block game.
Layered Squares
Another example of Francesca’s interest in opacity, this is a bold mix of squares overlaid with dot patterns. Most of the works featured here were created as prints for her shop, but Francesca also creates patterns for licensing.