DR.ME creates a handmade, 90s-inspired campaign for the 21/22 Man United away kit

DR.ME is a collaborative art and design practice founded by Ryan Doyle and Mark Edwards in 2010. Ever since launching, the studio has worked heavily in the field of music, making sleeve art, visual identities and video for labels and artists. And now, in a commission from creative agency U Dox, Adidas and Manchester United, the studio has created 20 original handmade collages for the 21/22 Manchester United Away Kit campaign.

The campaign pulls references from a few key elements, including the early 90s, as well as “old school away days in both a football and open-air rave-sense, with a focus on zine culture and a hand-made aesthetic,” says Edwards. The studio founders are both big football fans and live in Manchester, so it’s safe to say that they were excited about this commission. “Ryan has in fact been a Manchester United fan since he was a wee with posters of Cantona on his bedroom wall,” continues Edwards. “Every year, we write a dream list of work we’d like to do. Back in 2019, Ryan wrote ‘make work for Manchester United’, so how this came true is a perfect full-circle moment for us as a studio.”

In terms of the design itself, DR.ME paired imagery from the Manchester United archive, friends’ season tickets and Risograph printing. The process involved continuously running copies through the Risograph to give the work a grainy, archival aesthetic: “a feeling of authenticity like the old fanzines sold outside Old Trafford would have had,” adds Edwards, noting how they avoided digital processes. “Even though it would have meant much more work, making everything by hand was essential. The hand-cut elements coupled with the grain and texture from the old imagery, having been run through the Risograph, gave everything a tactility and unpredictable element that we and, to a greater extent, the club, really loved!”

DR.ME is widely experienced in the field of art and design, and its client list includes labels such as Sony, R&S, Parlophone, Universal, Domino, Young Turks, and artists such as Mick Jagger, Ela Minus, WU LYF and more. The studio also self-publishes its own printed material, including Cut That Out: Contemporary Collage within Graphic Design, which launched in 2016 with Thames & Hudson and Monacelli Press. Its collage work, too, has been exhibited globally in solo and group exhibitions across Berlin, London, New York and Dublin among other locations.