Padraig Croke x VOITED

About Padraig Croke

I’m an Irish graphic designer living in beautiful Finland as of 2021.

The Nordic Series

For hundreds of years Scandinavia and the Nordic countries have had a huge tradition of folk inspired textiles, patterns and handcraft. From the snow capped peaks of the Arctic, to the green fields of wildflowers in Southern Sweden, the landscape, the weather, and even, in the case of the Vikings, the gods, have shaped the patterns and textures of the Nordic identity.

But what would a modern style look like? For VOITED I wanted to design a series of patterns inspired by Nordic culture, drawing inspiration from not just the landscape and the seasons, but also from culture, architecture, design and way of life.

I knew that I wanted my pattern to fit on a grid, drawing inspiration from the textiles often found in the homes of Scandinavia. I began by creating a series of shapes and objects from nature, architecture, textiles and the seasons. The result is The Nordic Series, one design in two color schemes inspired by the Nordics.

The inspiration behind this pattern is based on the way in which we apply our own systems to the natural environments in order to draw understanding from them.

From topographic lines on a map, to charts documenting the migratory patterns of birds, to looking at how layers of soil and rock can give us a glimpse into the past.

Nature is forever providing us with a wealth of complex information, which can be used for better understanding our planet, as well as a limitless source of inspiration for art and design. These are some of the things I looked at when exploring patterns for VOITED, eventually landing on an organic set of shapes that attempt to reflect those patterns in nature.