About
The (new) Melbourne Map was a ‘thought bubble’ back in 2016.
Acknowldeging the incredible changes to Melbourne's skyline since our first Melbourne Map published in 1990 I thought I might have a crack at producing a new illustration.
The team was assembled, funds raised and away we went. It turned out to be a mammoth project, costing four times the budget, and taking much longer than expected.
Thousands of hours, photographs, illustration and persistence and The Melbourne Map was finally completed – first in black & white and then in colour.
We hope the fun we had creating this hand-drawn, visual documentation of Melbourne, has passed on to the image for you and your family to enjoy.
Meet the Makers
We are a small team of artists, passionate about what we do and particularly enamoured with creating detailed illustrated maps.
The maps take a ton of time and money to bring to fruition, and we’ve had the most extraordinary support from admirers of our work.
In 2017, with The Melbourne Map well on its way, we gave crowdfunding a try, to help bring the project to completion. The response was amazing and heartwarming.
Out of the confines of a tiny studio, we discovered that so many other people love maps – and love Melbourne. If you'd like to have a squiz at our crowdfunding campaign click on the link.
There's a lot to learn about running a business, building websites, print production, making jigsaw puzzles, marketing and much more. Actually we're still learning.
The magnificent limited editions, art prints, jigsaws and calendars are now making their way into homes, offices and schools here and abroad, and we couldn't be prouder.
Bitten by the mapping bug, we continue to work on new projects and look forward to sharing these with you.
2021 saw the launch of The Bellarine Map.
The next map off the press in 2023 is The Portarlington Map.
Melinda Clarke – Founder | Producer
Mel is the driving force behind each map project. She conquers technological learning curves, brings artists together, talks about the project to everyone who will listen and is the founder, project manager, researcher, funder, promoter and publisher of the maps. The original Melbourne Map was her brainchild after backpacking around Europe and America and seeing the value of illustrated city drawings. Since publishing the first Melbourne Map in 1990 she moved to the country in 1997 and ventured into fish farming for 12 years then back into the arts, working for Back to Back Theatre.
Seeing the enormous changes in her favourite city in the 28 years since the first project, she went on a quest to bring the enormously popular Melbourne Map image back to life, including all the new infrastructure, buildings, sporting arenas, parks and adding a few more suburbs to the drawing. Mel is delighted to be sharing this illustrated gift with Melbournians and her visitors, and is currently working away on new products and map projects as well as packing your orders!
Deborah Young – Character Illustrator
Artist and garden designer (total green thumb!), Deborah first joined the team in 1987. She illustrated the original character line drawing first published in 1990 – The Magic Melbourne Map. This historic view of Melbourne is held in the State and National Library archives, Historical Society records and adorns the walls of many a home and business around Melbourne and indeed the globe. Happy to be re-living the joy of working on the project once again, Deborah added her talents by illustrating many of the vehicles, people and events incorporated into the new Melbourne Map.
Deborah and Melinda have gone on to create a detailed illustration of one of our favourite places - The Bellarine - and continue to work on various map commissions.
Lewis Brownlie – Chief Illustrator
Mel met Lewis in 2016 after she'd seen the colouring book of Melbourne he'd illustrated. After an invitation to be involved in creating The Melbourne Map illustration, Lewis was excited to take on the challenge. Whilst his original estimation for completion of the drawing was 4-6 months, he ended up by committing two and a half years to what turned into a mammoth task. Mel and Lewis worked from a small studio in Geelong, researching and drawing every day whilst sharing the process with visitors to their tiny space.
He studied Fine Art at Liverpool John Moores University, and has always had a keen interest in objective drawing particularly in line work, shapes and spaces created within architecture. More of his work can be viewed on his website.
Sean Rodwell – Digital Colourist
The task of colouring The Melbourne Map cannot be underestimated. We met Sean in late 2018 and he agreed to take on the challenge of this final stage of the artwork.
Sean brought his vast experience and computer wizardry to the project and spent many months accurately digitally colouring the amazing line drawing created by Lewis.
When not working within the strict strategic disciplines of the advertising industry Sean loves to paint and draw and is an accomplished artist with a large body of work shared here on his website.