Brochure Design Ideas & Inspiration for 2021

Most designers, at some stage in their career have been called upon to design a brochure for a client. Regardless of whether it’s for your own company, or to promote the products & services of a client’s company, it takes a certain skill. 

 Gone are the days when once you’re done with the brochure design, you export for print and away you go. These days brochures are shared online, passed around socially and downloaded, so you need to be familiar with not just the set up for print but also preparing your brochures for online use. Not to worry. We’ve compiled a list of tips you can use to create a top quality brochure design that looks the part, and keeps your customers coming back year after year. 

Typically brochure formats Step one in creating your brochure design is determining what the layout is going to be. What size does the client need, will they be posted, what is the client’s print budget etc etc. This will all contribute to the final (or starting) layout.

Tri-fold Brochure Design

Square Tri-Fold Brochure

 Here are a few of the usual suspects : 

•  A4 Tri-fold - 6 panels A4’s typically with 3 panels on the front, 3 on the back. These fold up to 1/3 A4 size, which can slot nicely in an envelope. The type of format you might pick up at the dentist, chiro, that type of thing. 
•  Half-fold: This refers to half a page, which can be A4, A3 etc, just folded down the centre. Additional pages can be added to make it into a booklet. 
•  Die-cut: These are cut to your specific shape. As you are creating a ‘knife’ to cut the pages to a specific dimension or shape, this style is way more expensive than your typical A4 or A4 layout. • standard size (8.5 by 11 or A4) and include some binding. 
• Square: These are more and more popular and usually look fairly snazzy. You can do them in booklet form, or as foldable versions

So, once you've decided on your format, step back and have a second think about it. Where will you be displaying these brochures. If it's print only then you should be fine, but if you want to email them to people or allow them to be downloaded, there are extra things to think about. How will a tri-fold brochure look online for example. It certainly won't look as good as in print, so you might be better off going for a standard A4 or square booklet, that type of thing. Perhaps think of each fold as a new page, that way you get to keep your content and just have to create new pages, instead of new copy. 

Brochure Design Ideas & Styles

If budget allows, there are some really cool effects you can add to your brochure design. 

• Foil: More commonly seen on business card print, but can look great on a brochure cover too
• Spot Varnish: A clear ink or varnish applied to your brochure cover (usually) in certain places
• Letterpress: Basically ink stamped into very thick paper. Looks awesome, but is very pricey. Has seen a resurgence of late in wedding stationery. 
• Fancy Folds: your usual folds are no longer your only options. Companies like Z-Card offer some really cool folding options. 
• Paper: A myriad of different stocks and types. Ask your printers for a sample pack. 
• Die Cuts: These can look great, they will cost you an arm and a leg, but if you have a decent print budget, they can really make your brochure design stand out. 

Z-Card, super cool styles