Surreal scenes in Hedof's vibrant print illustrations

With its bright colours, bold lines and burger analogies, it seems bizarre that we’ve never featured the work of brilliant Breda-based design studio Hedof on the site before. The studio is really just one man, Rick Berkelmans, whose single-minded design aesthetic is deliciously versatile, working as well on editorial pieces as large-scale murals, clothing brands and posters.

We were drawn in by the simple yet surreal style: not unlike the work of Malarky
or David Shillinglaw – there’s more depth to the work than first meets the eye, with smart allusions and multiple ideas married together in the sweet little scenes and characters.

On the Hedof site, Rick compares screen printing to barbecuing. “A hamburger tastes just fine when you make it in a pan in the kitchen,” he notes sagely. “But on a barbecue it tastes ten times better, even if its a little burnt.” What he’s saying is that even in work as crisp as his, it’s the little textures and imperfections that make the final work as lovely as it is. To achieve this he explains, he often resorts to such bizarre experiments as scanning in things like bricks, his sandwiches, and his underpants.