A publication of seven volumes depicting my personal family history; the story of my mother and her first child, a daughter, who were separated in 1981. Due to the strict societal regime present in Ireland at the time, women who became pregnant outside of marriage were branded ‘fallen women’, often incarcerated, in many cases for life, and separated from their children, who would be given up for adoption or sold to families of ‘higher moral standards’.

The collection sits on an archive table atop original documentation and baby clothes pertaining to different stages of the story, tracing the birth, separation, the adoption from the point of view of the adoptive mother, the reunion of mother and child 19 years later, the homecoming of the child and photographs of the two together in the present day.

The project was an exercise in writing, curating original documents and archiving them alongside publications, telling the story through old memorabilia and new publication material while trying to capture changes in voice, tone and emotion within the design.