If interested in purchasing any of these original customizable covers, please send a message via the contact form on the left.
If interested in purchasing any of these original customizable covers, please send a message via the contact form on the left.
Hi, I’m Nahal Sheikh. Welcome to my creative practice, NAHAL کأ STUDIO. A small space for mindful collaborations that value visual design to narrate stories. On this page, you’ll see my portfolio full of editorial illustrations, book covers, posters, music album cover art and more.
A bit about my background – I’m a graphic designer and researcher with Pakistani roots, based in Amsterdam. Curious about connecting historical and contemporary aesthetics, my work constantly merges cross-cultural design languages. I’m currently obsessed with Bauhaus minimalism and Urdu typography.
Alongside, I’m a Lecturer in Media and Culture at the University of Amsterdam. I teach themes of racialised and
gendered identity in media representation from a post- and de-colonial perspective. My current research focuses on South Asian graphic design history and visual culture, looking
at design as inherently political.
nahalrsheikh@gmail.com
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Contact
at design as inherently political.
nahalrsheikh@gmail.com
Contact
Conferences
& Talks
“Soft Scripts: Urdu Typography and the “new ideal” of Postcolonial Femininity in 20th century Pakistani Advertising,” in Typography Theory Pracitce at School of Arts, Leeds Beckett University, 2025.
Academic Publications
“The Sociogeny of Religious Discrimination in India’s Surveillance State,”
Soapbox Journal of Cultural Analysis, 2022.
“Reminiscences of Morals: A socio-psychological analysis of bystander unconsciousness in Waltz with Bashir,” Maastricht Journal of Liberal Arts, 2017.
“Recognize your history: Re-narrating the ‘glorified’ Indian Partition 1947,” jfa human rights journal, 2021.
“Midnight Doorways: Usman T. Malik on Pakistani folklore, fables and horror tales,”
Youlin Magazine, 2021.
“Archiving Fashion: In conversation with the author and photographer of ‘Pakistan: A Fashionable History’,”
Youlin Magazine, 2020.
“Pakistani popular music: towards an apolitical and original culture,”
The Nation, 2019.
“Let’s go digital, let’s get active!” Express Impress Virtual Exhibition, 2021.
Last Updated 24.10.31
Penguin Book Cover Reimaginations: In 1961, Romek Marber designed the Penguin Grid – a structured layout that brought consistency to Penguin book covers while still allowing for creativity. Over 60 years later, it still holds up. Why? It’s structured but not rigid, text and image actually work together, it avoids trends and rather focuses on simplicity. Using this iconic 1960s Penguin Marber Grid, I reimagined some of my favourite books.
Posters
‘Every Breath is a Translation’ series, Writing Women: Between Sept-Nov 2025, every week Writing Women releases personal essays on the meaning of translation written by a diverse set of writers across South Asia and its diaspora. I’m part of this live process, drawing illustrations for six selected pieces.
Academic publishing reimagined with creativity and curiosity: Working in academia, I usually find academic books published with covers that can definitely push the boundaries more. As a small exercise I love doing, sometimes I find some academic titles that resonate with me from all kinds of genre – history, scientific, culture, religion – and design a new book cover for it. See more here.
More selected artwork from editoiral illustrations, posters to podcast cover art and personal sketches
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