Guinness Nonscience (1963)
Year: 1963
Format: Booklet
Illustrator: Maureen Roffey (b.1936) and Bernard Lodge (b.1933)
Client: Guinness
Details: This 1963 Guinness 'Nonscience' booklet was illustrated by Maureen Roffey and Bernard Lodge, a married couple who sometimes collaborated on projects. The text was written by Stanley Penn and was designed by S. H. Benson Ltd.
Guinness 'Doctor's Books' were an annual promotional exercise. Guinness began sending them to doctors at Christmas in 1933, breaking off during the Second World War and restarting again in 1950. Twenty four were made altogether, with different illustrators and a variety of themes. The booklets were sent to GPs’ surgeries to encourage the drinking of Guinness for medical purposes.
Maureen Roffey was born in 1936. She studied at Hornsey College of Art and afterwards at the Royal College of Art. Roffey worked as a graphic designer for a production company called Associated-Rediffusion in the 1960s and designed cardboard toys for a number of years. She also created illustrations for Mary Quant’s Ginger Group, which were used on labels, merchandise and shop displays.
After 1970 Maureen Roffey concentrated on illustrating magazines and children's books. She is a successful children's book illustrator and has been working for the past 50 years with publishers such as Walker, Bloomsbury and Macmillan.
Bernard Lodge was born in 1933. He is a printmaker but prior to this he designed television graphics. He was at the BBC for fourteen years and his work included five title sequences for Doctor Who. He later formed the company Lodge/Cheesman with a BBC colleague and produced graphics mainly for advertising, effects for the feature films Alien and Bladerunner, and diagrams for BMW in Munich.
Lodge began to design children’s books, which introduced him to the art of printmaking. He prints on a large Victorian press and his prints are available to buy from www.bernardlodge.co.uk.