Project Description

Following the success of the plush Yeti I designed for Saks Fifth Avenue last year, creative director Terron Schaefer and his team asked me back for another round in 2012. Not only did I get to design a new teenage Yeti—turned into plush once again with the expert help of Kate Clark and Peter Doodeheefver at Yottoy&mdashlI got to write and illustrate the origin story of the Yeti, too.

For years, Saks has projected snowflakes on the façade of their flagship store in New York as part of their holiday decoration. In 2011 their design partners at Pentagram created the book "Who Makes The Snow?" which introduced the idea that a family of Yetis is living on the roof of Saks, and that they are the ones making the snow that falls down the side of the building. Michael Bierut was kind enough to recommend me for the job of developing the main Yeti character. Which is pretty much the best recommendation for the best job with the best client I could imagine.

This year we find out how the first Yeti came to live up on the roof of Saks. It's a classic immigrant's tale that starts in a snow factory in 1950s Siberia, and leads a frustrated young snow artist around the world to seek his fortune in New York. Along the way the Yeti has nerdy adventures, finds himself in grand locations, and masters a few major obstacles, too.

The book — available exclusively at Saks and on Saks.com — is bound in imitation Yeti fur that pops out of die-cut silver slipcase. The obsessive details start right on that box, where each flap is decorated with little bonus illustrations. The book itself is so full of little inside jokes that Saks asked me to add an insert to call them out. Where "The Lord of the Rings" had the Silmarillion, we have the Yetigorium. And that doesn't even deal with the visual references that only designers will truly appreciate — particularly if they enjoy the finer points of philately, two color printing or references to the number 344.

All that, and the whole thing rhymes!