Made by Sandwich reveals how contradictions drove this album design

Yeoian Huang’s PARADOX solo album explores the philosophical tension between contradiction and unity that defines urban existence. The Chinese singer-songwriter, composer and producer, whose work spans R&B, jazz, hardcore and punk, invited Shanghai-based creative collective Made by Sandwich to translate these complex emotional landscapes into visual form. The album’s central design gesture lies in a typographic reversal that crystallises the project’s conceptual foundation. Made by Sandwich flipped the word PARADOX to create XODARAP, then combined both iterations in the title design. “The title symbol, composed of both forward and reverse lettering, became our response to the interplay between contradiction and unity,” explains Co-founder & Design Director Zhengzhong Pan. “It is not intended to provide a definitive answer, but rather to open a vista of possibilities.” This linguistic manipulation serves as more than visual play – it embodies the emotional contradictions woven throughout Huang’s compositions. Where the music explores noise and tranquillity, busyness and loneliness, hope and loss, the typography creates a visual representation of these irreconcilable opposites existing simultaneously. The custom title typeface draws inspiration from highway lettering, a reference that extends the album’s urban metaphors into functional design territory. “In the urban landscape, roads are often the only guides leading us to our destinations,” Pan notes. “Much like the conflicting emotions expressed in the album, the path toward a final goal is rarely singular – it branches into different choices, and those choices ultimately shape the person we are in this very moment.” This highway aesthetic finds its most literal expression on the CD itself, where parallel intersecting lines resembling city traffic patterns create a tactile connection to urban navigation. The overlapping letterforms mirror these road networks, suggesting multiple pathways without prescribing any particular direction.