The design for Roya’s album Breath & Being follows an organic theme inspired by references to flowers and nature within the album's songs, as well as the energy and flow of Roya’s music. The organic theme of the design explores ideas of growth, flourishing, and connections through conceptual analogies between flowers and personal growth.
The inspiration for this design came from the song Shy, thinking about the ideas of wanting to hide, feeling like we are nothing special, as well as fearing what others may think of us. Meanwhile, also reflected upon lyrics from the song Step by Step that talk about how everyone has something to give; therefore, also reflect upon the beautiful and special things we often don’t see about ourselves. The design revolves around these ideas of shyness through the use of dark background colour, in which the darkness of the background amplifies the vibrancy of the other colours, and is accompanied by imagery of flourishing flowers blooming out from Roya and her surrounding. The idea behind the blooming flowers and the vibrant colours functions to reflect ideas about inner beauty and how each person has unique qualities and value. Furthermore, the theme of the flowers also relates to the potential of beauty and growth in a person by comparing it to flowers — a plant may be flowerless for all its life but the potential to have flowers is there. However, it takes time, energy, space, and the right conditions for a plant to be able to give flowers; likewise, over time, people go through things like overcoming hardships, learning from experiences, and forming bonds with family/ friends and lovers that help people to bloom.
The illustrations for Roya’s album design consist of vine-like shapes and several strokes of colour in order to create a sense of the connections that tie us together — such as being humans on one planet, relationships, heritage, the language we speak, and more. The front cover illustration portrays how those aspects come together and form our identity and therefore creating a portrait of Roya. Furthermore, the stroke continues off the page to reference how these same aspects that form who we are also connect us to each other. Lastly, the typefaces for this album are expressive and playful in order to emphasize the organic theme, the imagery of the cover, and the mood of Roya’s music.
