Inside the mind of the creator of DAP merch

DAP has a physical store, and now you can purchase DAP Books in person and grab some swag to go along with them! DAP sat down with march designer Ash Crantas…here’s what she said!

Hey, I'm Ashley, and I'm a full-time editor at DAP (aka Di Angelo Publications). I've always really enjoyed art in all forms, so I've helped out withsome visual designs and other creative aspects in the company. We've had some big changes lately: we're starting to rebrand to our shorter, snappier "DAPBooks", and we recently opened our first physical bookshop in Twin Falls, Idaho. With that, we decided that we definitely (dare I say, finally?) needed some merch.

First up were the t-shirts and totes, followed by the stickers. In line with the sage novel-drafting advice of "write what you want to read," I designed what I'd be willing to buy. The loose, minimal design of "Sorry, my weekend is booked" and "Life's best distractions" reflected our main logo (an outline of three books in a stack), and after playing around with the color scheme, I realized the illustrations paired really well with our trio of brand colors. The "Certified Book Hoarder" concept and pun was a suggestion from a fellow DAP employee, Willy. And, since we have some truly amazing and unique book covers, those have transferred to merch as well; now people can rep their favorite books, or hopefully be inspired to read them after seeing how cool their designs are. Below is a sneak peek of what will be next on the merch lineup; the art is by Cassie Podish, who did all of the glorious designs for Mike Damante's Hey Suburbia: A Guide to the Emo/Pop Punk Rise.

My goal is that they appeal to book nerds and creatives--people who admire storytelling in all mediums and likely have a soft spot for the written word.

Happy reading!