Christmas Album Covers: A Personal Tribute to Vintage Gospel

For a family Christmas card one year, I wanted to create something truly unique and personal. Inspired by my love for the wonderfully cheesy and heartfelt album covers of independent gospel and folk records from the 1950s-80s, I designed a series of fictional album covers using photos from a family portrait session.

I envisioned a fictional gospel record label from the late 1960s/early 1970s, creating logos for both the label and imagined recording technology. These elements were then incorporated into the album cover designs, giving them an authentic vintage feel.

The project included a group album cover, which was sent as a Christmas card, and individual album covers for each family member. Each cover was designed with careful attention to the tropes and aesthetic of the era, from the typography and color palettes to the composition and imagery. I then created realistic vinyl mockups of each album, printed them as record sleeves, framed them, and gifted them to my family as Christmas presents.

This project allowed me to combine my passion for vintage design with my love for family, resulting in a memorable and personal Christmas gift. It was a fun exercise in world-building, and a loving tribute to a specific era of music and design.