Jamila Alemi
Jamila Alemi is a Dutch-Afghan graphic designer based in Arnhem, The Netherlands.
Currently, she’s a fourth-year graphic design student at ArtEZ Arnhem.
Within her studies, she focuses on book design and video art.
Her projects mostly focus on topics such as social media and online behavior.
Me Talk Pretty One Day
2025
In
collaboration with Fay Buurman & Jara Hermanns
Me Talk Pretty One Day is a redesign of the book by David Sedaris, developed around the themes of travel, language, and dislocation. In the original, Sedaris reflects on his move from the United States to France, navigating a new culture and the awkwardness of learning a new language, experiences that shape much of the book’s tone and structure.
The design draws from the visual language of public transit and travel documents. Long and narrow in format, the proportions reference folded metro maps, while the book opens and closes with alternating layers of grey and yellow paper. Perforated lines of holes appear across these early and final pages, resembling the tear-off markings of transport tickets.
Throughout the book, references to transit systems are woven into the structure. The title pages display a vertical line with 27 black dots, each representing a chapter. The current chapter is indicated by a punched-out hole in place of its dot, marking it like a stop on a route. This visual system continues in the running header, where the same transit line reappears horizontally across each spread. A larger black dot marks the reader’s current chapter, and the line gently shifts in height, beginning high on the left page and dropping slightly lower
on the right, to subtly indicate the transition from part one to part two.
Typography was chosen to echo the tone of the writing.
Katari is used for quoted speech, capturing the bold, outspoken character of Sedaris’s voice, while EB Garamond carries the rest of the text with a more grounded, narrative rhythm.
Tight margins and long text frames reflect the density and pacing of Sedaris’s storytelling.
Rather than simply framing the text, the redesign mirrors its rhythm, quietly shaped by movement, structure, and shifts in language. Me Talk Pretty One Day becomes not just a book to read, but one to navigate, punched, paced, and mapped like a journey of its own.
Me Talk Pretty One Day is a redesign of the book by David Sedaris, developed around the themes of travel, language, and dislocation. In the original, Sedaris reflects on his move from the United States to France, navigating a new culture and the awkwardness of learning a new language, experiences that shape much of the book’s tone and structure.
The design draws from the visual language of public transit and travel documents. Long and narrow in format, the proportions reference folded metro maps, while the book opens and closes with alternating layers of grey and yellow paper. Perforated lines of holes appear across these early and final pages, resembling the tear-off markings of transport tickets.
Throughout the book, references to transit systems are woven into the structure. The title pages display a vertical line with 27 black dots, each representing a chapter. The current chapter is indicated by a punched-out hole in place of its dot, marking it like a stop on a route. This visual system continues in the running header, where the same transit line reappears horizontally across each spread. A larger black dot marks the reader’s current chapter, and the line gently shifts in height, beginning high on the left page and dropping slightly lower
on the right, to subtly indicate the transition from part one to part two.
Typography was chosen to echo the tone of the writing.
Katari is used for quoted speech, capturing the bold, outspoken character of Sedaris’s voice, while EB Garamond carries the rest of the text with a more grounded, narrative rhythm.
Tight margins and long text frames reflect the density and pacing of Sedaris’s storytelling.
Rather than simply framing the text, the redesign mirrors its rhythm, quietly shaped by movement, structure, and shifts in language. Me Talk Pretty One Day becomes not just a book to read, but one to navigate, punched, paced, and mapped like a journey of its own.
God, I Hope She Would Talk Slower
2025
Collective Friction publication
ArtEZ Graphic Design Arnhem
Designed as part of the publication Collective Friction, this work includes a custom cover and a series of three typographic spreads responding to Go Carolina, the opening chapter of David Sedaris’s Me Talk Pretty One Day. The chapter reflects on Sedaris’s experience with speech therapy, a moment that resonated with the designer’s own memories of being told to slow down, speak clearer, or articulate better.
The spreads feature a personal text layered with collected comments from teachers, family, and friends about the designer’s speech. These external remarks are set in DejaVu Sans, a clean and neutral typeface that conveys the tone of correction and authority. In contrast, the inner voice is expressed through Fungal, a typeface that gradually grows less legible across the spreads, demanding more effort to read and reflecting the experience of being misunderstood or asked to repeat oneself.
In the final spread, the personal voice scales up, becoming more visible and assertive. Rather than trying to fix or silence the way of speaking, the design embraces its quick, expressive, and imperfect qualities, inviting the reader to listen
closely anyway.
The cover consists of two dust jackets, presenting two distinct voices layered over one another. The outer jacket reflects the designer’s internal voice, with additional thoughts and doubts set in a custom typeface made by applying dotted strokes and varied spacing. Beneath it lies the second jacket: God, I Hope She Would Talk Slower. Together, they form a physical expression of how external critique and inner
experience intertwine.
ArtEZ Graphic Design Arnhem
Designed as part of the publication Collective Friction, this work includes a custom cover and a series of three typographic spreads responding to Go Carolina, the opening chapter of David Sedaris’s Me Talk Pretty One Day. The chapter reflects on Sedaris’s experience with speech therapy, a moment that resonated with the designer’s own memories of being told to slow down, speak clearer, or articulate better.
The spreads feature a personal text layered with collected comments from teachers, family, and friends about the designer’s speech. These external remarks are set in DejaVu Sans, a clean and neutral typeface that conveys the tone of correction and authority. In contrast, the inner voice is expressed through Fungal, a typeface that gradually grows less legible across the spreads, demanding more effort to read and reflecting the experience of being misunderstood or asked to repeat oneself.
In the final spread, the personal voice scales up, becoming more visible and assertive. Rather than trying to fix or silence the way of speaking, the design embraces its quick, expressive, and imperfect qualities, inviting the reader to listen
closely anyway.
The cover consists of two dust jackets, presenting two distinct voices layered over one another. The outer jacket reflects the designer’s internal voice, with additional thoughts and doubts set in a custom typeface made by applying dotted strokes and varied spacing. Beneath it lies the second jacket: God, I Hope She Would Talk Slower. Together, they form a physical expression of how external critique and inner
experience intertwine.
Modern Design in Jewellery and Fans
2024
Modern Design in Jewellery and Fans is a redesigned catalogue based on the book of the same name, originally edited by Charles Holme. The project focuses on a selected portion of the publication and reinterprets it into a visually focused, contemporary format.
Created as part of a design assignment with specific constraints, the project required selecting a title from the Project Gutenberg archive, limited to the art category, and redesigning it into a 48-page catalogue. Within these restrictions, this version highlights the jewellery and fans featured in the original, presenting them in a more curated and spacious layout.
The layout was kept minimal to allow the jewellery and fans to take center stage, highlighting their decorative qualities and refined detail. With the use of shimmering silver paper and fine silver thread for binding, these choices aim to echo the texture and delicacy of the works featured.
By isolating and recontextualizing elements from the original book, Modern Design in Jewellery and Fans presents historical imagery through a contemporary editorial lens, shifting the emphasis toward visual storytelling through layout, pacing, and material choices.
Created as part of a design assignment with specific constraints, the project required selecting a title from the Project Gutenberg archive, limited to the art category, and redesigning it into a 48-page catalogue. Within these restrictions, this version highlights the jewellery and fans featured in the original, presenting them in a more curated and spacious layout.
The layout was kept minimal to allow the jewellery and fans to take center stage, highlighting their decorative qualities and refined detail. With the use of shimmering silver paper and fine silver thread for binding, these choices aim to echo the texture and delicacy of the works featured.
By isolating and recontextualizing elements from the original book, Modern Design in Jewellery and Fans presents historical imagery through a contemporary editorial lens, shifting the emphasis toward visual storytelling through layout, pacing, and material choices.
The Language of Hands
2023
The Language of Hands is a photographic exploration of hands as captured in the artworks archived by the Rijksmuseum.
By isolating these artworks from their larger context,
this project delves into the delicate expressions of hands as they appear in historic artworks, focusing on how they hold, rest, and interact in ways that reveal intimacy and emotion.
In this project, hands become the storytellers, speaking across centuries through softness of touch, posture, and placement.
Each artwork captures a gesture that might otherwise go unnoticed, a hand lightly touching a sleeve, fingers wrapped around an object, or holding each other hands.
The Language of Hands invites the viewer to engage with the timeless, quiet language of hands as a window into the human experience, bridging generations through a shared,
silent touch.
By isolating these artworks from their larger context,
this project delves into the delicate expressions of hands as they appear in historic artworks, focusing on how they hold, rest, and interact in ways that reveal intimacy and emotion.
In this project, hands become the storytellers, speaking across centuries through softness of touch, posture, and placement.
Each artwork captures a gesture that might otherwise go unnoticed, a hand lightly touching a sleeve, fingers wrapped around an object, or holding each other hands.
The Language of Hands invites the viewer to engage with the timeless, quiet language of hands as a window into the human experience, bridging generations through a shared,
silent touch.
Printen moeten we vieren
2025
In collaboration with Fay Buurman
Created as part of a portfolio class assignment judged by NPN Printers, Printen moeten we vieren is a double-sided A2 poster that highlights the value of local print production. The design is built around a modular structure, folding systems, and the formal logic of paper itself.
The word print appears five times across the poster, constructed from A12-sized blocks, the second smallest defined format within the ISO 216 paper system. Some are readable, others are scrambled. The spacing between blocks follows the same ratio, set at one-quarter of the A12 size.
The poster folds into five equal parts, generating a grid of four vertical and four horizontal lines. This structure became the foundation for the poster’s composition.
The number four is used as a guiding system: four grid lines, four print colours (CMYK), four letters in the final row. The sentence Printen moeten we vieren reflects both a celebration of print and the underlying structure of the design. Hidden in the center vertical row, the letters NPN PR offer a quiet reference to the print house for whom the poster was created.
The building blocks that form each letter are divided across both sides of the poster. When held to the light, the layers align and the full forms emerge. Printed on IBO One paper, its transparency activates this interaction, merging front and back into a single system of reading.
Printen moeten we vieren turns the act of printing into both subject and method, folded, layered, and quietly coded
with care.
Created as part of a portfolio class assignment judged by NPN Printers, Printen moeten we vieren is a double-sided A2 poster that highlights the value of local print production. The design is built around a modular structure, folding systems, and the formal logic of paper itself.
The word print appears five times across the poster, constructed from A12-sized blocks, the second smallest defined format within the ISO 216 paper system. Some are readable, others are scrambled. The spacing between blocks follows the same ratio, set at one-quarter of the A12 size.
The poster folds into five equal parts, generating a grid of four vertical and four horizontal lines. This structure became the foundation for the poster’s composition.
The number four is used as a guiding system: four grid lines, four print colours (CMYK), four letters in the final row. The sentence Printen moeten we vieren reflects both a celebration of print and the underlying structure of the design. Hidden in the center vertical row, the letters NPN PR offer a quiet reference to the print house for whom the poster was created.
The building blocks that form each letter are divided across both sides of the poster. When held to the light, the layers align and the full forms emerge. Printed on IBO One paper, its transparency activates this interaction, merging front and back into a single system of reading.
Printen moeten we vieren turns the act of printing into both subject and method, folded, layered, and quietly coded
with care.