Rupert Brown is a graphic designer who, for the last ten years, has specialised in the design and production of large-format illustrated books. Born in 1938 in Woodford Green, Essex, he went to grammar school from 1946 until 1957. After initially studying hydraulic engineering, which was intended to take him into the family business, he switched to graphic design and illustration before going into advertising as a graphic designer in 1961. In 1962 he was appointed creative head of a London agency. He turned freelance in 1965, working mostly from his house in London but also on the Continent.

Brown in 1972 bought an eighteenth-century watermill on the Essex/Suffolk border and spent the next two years converting into a home and the stable block into a studio. In 1978 he formed a film animation company that ran alongside his graphics studio.

His work has engaged a wide diversity of disciplines, from promotional graphics and illustration to corporate programmes and identities. From exhibition stands and interiors to trophies, posters and packaging. He has designed and produced books for, amongst other publishers, Collins, Mitchell Beazley, Weidenfeld, Flammarion in France and Alfred Knopf in the USA, and has managed printing in Europe and the United States. Companies for whom he has undertaken major projects include British Telecom, Ford Motors, Alcan Aluminium, Kodak UK, Observer Newspapers, Conoco Petroleum, The European Conservation Foundation and The Jim Henson Organisation.

Rupert Brown is married with a son, who now manages the studio, and a daughter, who is a magazine editor.