Behind the Scenes: Horizons 3 Cover

Hello, Horizoneers! Hannah here to take you behind the scenes of the wizard's study in our latest Horizons cover.

The full wrap-around cover of Horizons 3! Download the issue here.

Clara and I discussed an idea for a magical door/portal opening into a desert landscape (the novels The Starless Sea and The Ten Thousand Doors of January are both favorites of mine). Our concept involved Middle Eastern and/or Mesoamerican-inspired architecture, so we turned to our longtime colleague Adrián Ibarra Lugo, whose illustrations are featured across the tabletop scene from Dimension 20 actual plays to Critical Role's Exquisite Exandria cookbook to D&D books including Planescape: Adventures in the Multiverse.

Adrián, in turn, drew inspiration from photos, sketches, and plein air studies he did during his time in Andalucía, Spain, as well as pictures he took while visiting the Museo Nacional de Antropología at home in Mexico City.

Plein air study of the Alhambra by Adrián, painted during his exchange program in Granada, Spain.

Architecture at the Museo Nacional de Antropología (National Museum of Anthropology) in Mexico City.

Adrián told us that he was also inspired by the work of other nineteenth and twentieth century artists Mariano Fortuny, Julio Romero de Torres, and Saturnino Herrán, as well as others he followed in the footsteps of during his time in Andilucía, such as Joaquín Sorolla, John Singer Sargent, Giovanni Boldini, and Anders Zorn.

Initial concept sketch.

Adrián says, "I imagined the interior as the house/studio of a powerful mage, with all sorts of furniture, magical items, fancy robes, fantasy plants and other trinkets. I wanted to depict a sort of 'costumbrista' scene of a powerful wizard's home alongside an epic landscape ready to be explored."

Door and window shape options. We ended up with a combination of #1 and #5.

Options for the desert through the portal. We wanted a landscape with a fantastical destination still some distance away, suggesting a journey through the desert to reach it. Option D ended up being our pick!

Adrián says, "The outer landscape was based on the arid sedimentary surroundings nearby my abuelito's house in Tenjay, State of Mexico."

A truly amazing amount of graphic design expertise, painting, and references went into this beautiful cover! The combination of elements from different parts of the real world was a challenge that Adrián pulled off with aplomb, and there are so many beautiful details hidden in the scene:

Close-up details.

Finally, a fun easter egg: the cats snoozing on the floor, surrounded by scattered papers, are based on Adrián's own calico cat, Kiki, as well as my two feline familiars Mei (calico) and Marzipan (black)!

Thank you all for supporting Horizons so we can hire incredible artists like Adrián to create illustrations with this level of care, research, and detail! It's truly an honor, and your support makes it all possible.

—Hannah, Editor-in-Chief

P.S. Adrián has prints of this cover available here, and you can find more behind-the-scenes process of his work on his own Patreon page!

Questions? Check out the FAQ.

Want to chat about Horizons? Join the party on Discord!

Gift a Horizons subscription to a friend!