My background is in visual art and so the range of designs tends to reflect experimentation and variety, rather than commercially-oriented repetition.

Many of the patterns are reconfigurations of monetary ornament that was originally machined for securing banknotes and share certificates. This was my area of doctoral research, for which I collected a large repository of detailed scans and photos of prints made by 19th century engravers who were attempting to create ‘inimitable’ designs for paper currency.

My interest in monetary ornament extends beyond its use on paper currency. I’m actually more interested in the idea of a graphic vocabulary that constitutes the language of certification — with paper money being one of its exemplary ‘statements’. Since the 19th century the printed reproduction of these ornamental conventions have given credibility to documents such as diplomas, passports and share certificates, and in abbreviated and debased forms, conferred value on advertising tokens, lottery tickets and patent medicine labels.

The genealogy of this particular form of abstraction and language has yet to be properly researched and written.