"The 1"
is the song that got me into Taylor Swift's music. I deeply resonate
with everything about it. I feel like the song perfectly captures the
feelings of longing and regret over a past love that you consider the
best you've ever experienced. It encapsulates the bittersweet nature of
"what-ifs" and the slow progress of moving on, while still clinging to
the idea of being the one they’d choose in the end. This song will
always be my favorite of hers.
But we were something, don't you think so? Roaring twenties, tossing pennies in the pool And if my wishes came true It would've been you In my defense, I have none For never leaving well enough alone But it would've been fun If you would've been the one
The Process
I actually did some lettering for these lyrics four years ago when the
song first came out, although I wasn't trying to make it deliberately
beautiful at that time. It was just something I whipped up for fun.
This time, I wanted to be more intentional with the design. I
added some details to convey the concept of desperately wishing for a
second chance. This includes the imagery of wishing on stars along with
the water filled with floating pennies. Learning about compositions and
various letter styles also helped me immensely, along with using new
brushes and textures. You can see a vast difference between the two
pieces.
