Judges — PANZ Book Design Awards 2025

The judges for the 2025 PANZ Book Design Awards are; Chloe Blades, artist and manager at Unity Books in Auckland; Eva Charlton, Graphic Designer for design studio Extended Whānau and Jo Bailey, designer and educator and researcher at Toi Rauwhārangi College of Creative Arts, Massey University, where she co-leads the Visual Communication Design programme.

Convening Judge Chloe Blades

Chloe Blades is a manager at Unity Books in Auckland, where she’s been bookselling since 2017, and is also a Director on the Board of Booksellers New Zealand. Last year Chloe was on the PANZ Book Design Awards judging panel and recently organised and chaired a panel at Unity on AI and the future of creativity and design, alongside a BBC journalist, Data Analyst, and the Founder of Crane Brothers. She’s an artist based in West Auckland, too, featuring in August’s Your Home and Garden magazine with exhibitions coming up at Art in the Park and Titirangi’s Upstairs Gallery. 

Eva Charlton is a graphic designer based in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland who specialises in design for the arts and culture sector. She currently works as Graphic Designer for design studio Extended Whānau and on independent projects, collaborating with artists, curators, and writers. Recent projects include the publications Rewi: Ata Haere, Kia Tere and Ana Iti: What is that Salty Voice? and the rebrand of Te Whare o Rehua Sarjeant Gallery in Whanganui. Eva previously worked as Graphic Designer for The Dowse Art Museum in Te Awakairangi Lower Hutt and holds a Bachelor of Design from Auckland University of Technology.

Dr Jo Bailey is a designer based in Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington. Her roots before emigrating to Aotearoa are in the UK. As a designer she is interested in ‘good design’ in all ways: functional, beautiful, equitable and inclusive. Her practice focuses on making complex information more accessible and engaging. That’s frequently through graphic and book design (she has designed titles for many publishers in Aotearoa and beyond), and also science communication, which was the focus of her PhD research. She is an educator and researcher at Toi Rauwhārangi College of Creative Arts, Massey University, where she co-leads the Visual Communication Design programme. This is Jo’s second time judging the PANZ Book Design Awards

 

 

PANZ employs a strict conflict of interest policy and no judge is permitted to have their book design work entered into the awards. Where a judge has a perceived conflict of interest with a book, publisher or designer they will recuse themselves from judging the relevant category. This process is closely monitored by PANZ.