We are going to use the palmerpenguins dataset to create a multi-panel figure, containing:

SVG template

First, we need to create an SVG template in Inkscape.

Draw rectangles where the plots and image will go
Add text boxes for the figure title and caption, with {} where svgedit should insert text
Open the “Layers and Objects” panel (Ctrl+Shift+L) and name the layers according to the content they will hold, e.g. panel_A, panel_B, fig_caption, etc.

This is what our template looks like:

The four rectangles have labels panel_A, panel_B, panel_C, and panel_D, while the caption text box is labelled fig_caption.

Load data and create plots

library(palmerpenguins)
#> 
#> Attachement du package : 'palmerpenguins'
#> Les objets suivants sont masqués depuis 'package:datasets':
#> 
#>     penguins, penguins_raw
library(ggplot2)
data("penguins")

# Number of penguins per species/island
penguins_count <- ggplot(penguins, aes(x = island, fill = species)) +
  geom_bar(alpha = 0.8) +
  scale_fill_manual(values = c("darkorange", "purple", "cyan4"), 
                    guide = "none") +
  theme_minimal() +
  facet_wrap(~species, ncol = 1) +
  coord_flip()

# Flipper length distribution by species
flipper_length <- ggplot(data = penguins, aes(x = flipper_length_mm)) +
  geom_histogram(aes(fill = species), alpha = 0.5, position = "identity") +
  scale_fill_manual(values = c("darkorange", "darkorchid", "cyan4"))

# Body mass vs flipper length colored by species
body_mass_vs_flipper_length <- ggplot(
  data = penguins,
  aes(x = flipper_length_mm, y = body_mass_g)
) +
  geom_point(aes(color = species,
                 shape = species),
             size = 2) +
  scale_color_manual(values = c("darkorange", "darkorchid", "cyan4"))

Use svgedit to insert elements into the SVG template

library(svgedit)

svgedit::draw(
  input_svg = "../inst/examples/Template.svg",
  output_svg = "../inst/examples/penguins_figure.svg",
  plots = list(
    panel_A = penguins_count,
    panel_B = body_mass_vs_flipper_length,
    panel_C = flipper_length
  ),
  text = list(
    fig_caption = c(
      "1",
      "Number of penguins of each species per island",
      "Body mass vs flipper length colored by species",
      "Flipper length distribution by species",
      "Photo of an Adelie Penguin (Diego Tirira, CC BY-SA 2.0)"
    )
  ),
  images = list(
    panel_D = "../inst/examples/adelie_penguin.jpeg"
  )
)
#> `stat_bin()` using `bins = 30`. Pick better value `binwidth`.

This will produce the completed figure:

Multi-panel figure

SVG template

Load data and create plots

Use svgedit to insert elements into the SVG template