Uzabase is a Japanese company that specialises in business information infrastructure. They offer curated business intelligence, data analytics, and media services for corporate clients.
Uzabase’s 2024 sustainability report offers a screen-first horizontal design and a variety of photographic treatments to tell its story.
While text occupies a neat grid that sprawls across the horizontal space, photography acts as a disruption. The first notable instance of this disruption is the cover image. The designers (uncredited) use a vertical image split across the first two full pages and along the top slice of the third page. The image cleverly features a strong vertical mid-line, echoed throughout the report by the text grid.
Another way images disrupt the page grid is when photographs are placed extending beyond the mid line. In some cases, images are cropped around blocks of text. In others, images within abstract shapes do a lovely job of including organic lines into a layout that is mostly composed of boxes.
The third and final way the designers use images is to alter the reader’s perception of space. Employees photographed from above are placed on the layout to suggest the page space forms a ‘floor’ on which they walk or stand. It’s a pleasant break from the reading experience.
Use of these minor disruptions to the page grid goes a long way to creating interest on each spread. It’s gently done, without feeling gimmicky.
