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Tag: dan mogford

Today in Micro-Trends: Neon Signs

bright-shiny-morning

Inspired by the recent Blur album cover designed by Tony Hung (read more about it here) amongst other things, here are a selection of (relatively) recent books cover designs using lettering inspired by neon signs (pictured above: Bright Shiny Morning by James Frey, designed by the one and only Gray318 in 2008):

9780375424991-brothers
Brothers by Yu Hua; design by Jonathan Sainsbury (Random House / January 2009)

ham on rye design by Steve Attardo


Bukowski series; design by Steve Attardo (Ecco / July 2014)

event-design-cb-king
Event by Slavoj Žižek; design by Christopher King (Melville House / August 2014)

extreme-centre-tariq-ali-design-dan-mogford
The Extreme Centre by Tariq Ali; design by Dan Mogford (Verso / March 2015)

the-girl-who-was-saturday-night-design-leo-nickolls
The Girl Who Was Saturday Night by Heather O’Neill; design by Leo Nickolls (Quercus / March 2015)

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Glow by Ned Beauman; design by Oliver Munday (Knopf / January 2015)

hotel life design by simon pates
The Hotel Life by Javier Montes; design by Simon Pates (Hispabooks / October 2013)

inherent-vice-design-haggar-goretsky
Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon; design by Darren Haggar and Tal Goretsky; illustration by Darshan Zenith / Cruiser Art (Penguin / August 2009)

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Kissing in America by Margo Rabb; design by Erin Fitzsimmons; art by Thomas Burden (HarperCollins / May 2015 )

last-days-of-shanghai-design-jason-snyder
Last Days in Shanghai by Casey Walker; design by Jason Snyder (Counterpoint / December 2014)

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Love Me Back by Merritt Tierce; design by Emily Mahon; illustration by Rizon Parein (Doubleday / September 2014)

make-something-up-design-james-paul-jones
Make Something Up by Chuck Palahniuk; design by James Paul Jones (Jonathan Cape / May 2015)

mammons-kingdom
Mammon’s Kingdom by David Marquand; cover art by Mr Whaite (Allen Lane / May 2014)

milk-bar-life-tosi
Milk Bar Life by Christina Tosi; design by Walter Green (Clarkson Potter / April 2015)

musical-brain
The Musical Brain by César Aira; design by Rodrigo Corral (New Directions / March 2015)

no-regrets-design-jennifer-heuer
No Regrets Coyote; design by John Dufresne; design by Jennifer Heuer (W. W. Norton / July 2014)

pluto-design-jonathan-pelham
Pluto by Glyn Maxwell; design by Jonathan Pelham (Picador / April 2013)

yes-please-design-tbd
Yes Please by Amy Poehler; design by Mary Schuck (Dey Street Books / October 2014)

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Book Covers of Note February 2015

Here is this month’s selection of new book covers that have caught my eye…

angry-youth-comix
Angry Youth Comix by Johnny Ryan; design by Keeli McCarthy (Fantagraphics / February 2015)

Dom Casmurro hi-res
Dom Casmurro by Machado de Assis; design by Nathan Burton (Daunt Books / February 2015)

etta-otto-russell-james
Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper; design by Gray318 (Penguin / January 2015)

fishermen-gray318
The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma; design by Gray318 (Pushkin Press / February 2015)

Girl In The Dark
Girl in the Dark by Anna Lyndsey; design by Greg Heinimann (Bloomsbury / February 2015)

i-am-radar
I Am Radar by Reif Larsen; design by Will Staehle (Penguin Press / February 2015)

ismael-and-his-sisters
Ismael and His Sisters by Louise Stern; design by Dan Mogford (Granta / February 2015)

italians
The Italians by John Hooper; design by Nicholas Misani (Viking / January 2015)

karate-chop-pearson
Karate Chop by Dorthe Nors; design by David Pearson (Pushkin Press / February 2015)

munich-airport
Munich Airport by Greg Baxter; design by Anne Twomey (Twelve Books / January 2015)

room
The Room by Jonas Karlsson; design by Christopher Brand; photograph by George Baier IV (Hogarth / February 2015)

shooting-stars-burton
Shooting Stars by Stefan Zweig; design by David Pearson (Pushkin Press / February 2015)


Pudd’nhead Wilson and The Prince and the Pauper by Mark Twain; design by Isabel Urbina Peña (Vintage / February 2015)

utopia-of-rules
The Utopia of Rules by David Graeber; design by Christopher Brian King (Melville House / February 2015)

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Series Book Covers 2014

In the past, I’ve often included a few series designs in with my favourite covers of the year. This year, I saw so many great covers that were part of a series, I thought a they deserved a post of their own…

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Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes; design by Nathan Burton (Alma / 2014)


Alma Classics; design by Nathan Burton (Alma / 2014)

A Winter's Tale
A Winter’s Tale by William Shakespeare; design by Michel Vrana (Broadview / 2014)


Broadview Shakespeare; design by Michel Vrana (Broadview / 2014)

9780141396064
Nova Express by William Burroughs; cover art by Julian House (Penguin Classics 2014)


The Cut-Up Trilogy by William Burroughs; cover art by Julian House (Penguin Classics 2014)

LaSolutionEsquimauAW
Snapshots–Nouvelles voix du Caine Prize; design by David Pearson (Éditions Zulma / 2014)


Éditions Zulma; design by David Pearson (Éditions Zulma / 2014)


Wolf Haas; design by Christopher Brian King (Melville House / 2014)

My Fellow Skin
My Fellow Skin by Erwin Mortier; design by David Pearson (Pushkin Press / 2014)

Erwin Mortier; design by David Pearson (Pushkin Press / 2014)

9780241970317
After You with the Pistol by Kyril Bonfiglioli; design by Richard Green; illustration by Luke Pearson (Penguin / 2014)


Charlie Mortdecai by Kyril Bonfiglioli; design by Richard Bravery illustration by Luke Pearson (Penguin / 2014)

Tim O’Brien; design by Cardon Webb (Broadway / 2014)

9780143569725
Cloudstreet by Tim Winton; design by Adam Laszczuk; illustration by Josh Durham (Penguin Australia / 2014)


Penguin Australian Classics; design by Adam Laszczuk; illustration by Josh Durham (Penguin Australia / 2014)

9780141976150
Greek and Roman Political Ideas by Melissa Lane; cover design by Matthew Young; logo design by Richard Green (Pelican 2014)


Pelican relaunch; cover design by Matthew Young; logo design by Richard Green (Pelican 2014)

Regeneration by Pat Barker; design by Mr Foxx
Regeneration by Pat Barker; design by Mr Foxx (Penguin / 2014)

Penguin Essentials; design various (Penguin / 2014)

9780141395852
Letters from a Stoic by Seneca; design by Coralie Bickford-Smith (Penguin Classics 2014)


Penguin Pocket Hardbacks; design by Coralie Bickford-Smith (Penguin Classics 2014)

Les fantômes fument en cachette by Miléna Babin; design by David Drummond
Les fantômes fument en cachette by Miléna Babin; design by David Drummond (Les Éditions XYZ / 2014)


Quai No. 5; design by David Drummond (Les Éditions XYZ / 2014)

Sicilian Uncles
Sicilian Uncles by Leonardo Sciascia; design by Dan Mogford (Granta / 2014)


Leonardo Sciascia; design by Dan Mogford (Granta / 2014)1

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August 1914 by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn; design by Oliver Munday (FSG / 2014)


Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn; design by Oliver Munday (FSG / 2014)

authority
Authority by Jeff VanderMeer (US); design by Charlotte Strick; Illustration by Eric Nyquist (FSG / 2014)


The Southern Reach Trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer (US); design by Charlotte Strick; Illustration by Eric Nyquist (FSG /  2014)

Annihilation
Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer (UK); design by Jo Walker; illustration by Kai and Sunny (Fourth Estate / 2014)


The Southern Reach Trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer (UK); design by Jo Walker; illustration by Kai and Sunny (Fourth Estate / 2014)

ukojenie_RBG2
Ukojenie by Jeff VanderMeer (Poland); cover art by Patryk Mogilnicki (Otwarte / 2014)

The Southern Reach Trilogy by Jeff VanderMeer (Poland); cover art by Patryk Mogilnicki (Otwarte / 2014)

city-of-saints
City of Saints & Madmen by Jeff VanderMeer backlist; design by Crush Creative (Tor / 2014)

Jeff VanderMeer backlist; design by Crush Creative (Tor / 2014)

Verso Radical Thinkers; design by Rumors (Verso / 2014)

battle-of-ap-bac
The Battle of AP Bac by Neil Sheehan; design by Joan Wong (Vintage / 2014)


Vintage Shorts; design by Joan Wong (Vintage / 2014)

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Fleur de Cerisier by Aline Apostolska; design by David Drummond (VLB éditeur / 2014)


Vol 459; design by David Drummond (VLB éditeur / 2014)


M. D. Waters; design by Jaya Miceli (Plume / 2014)

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Art and Lies by Jeanette Winterson; design by James Paul Jones (Vintage / 2014)


Vintage Winterson; design by James Paul Jones (Vintage / 2014)

3 Comments

Q & A with Dan Mogford

Filthy English
If you’ve followed this blog for a while, you will surely have a come across the work of London-based freelance designer Dan Mogford before. His work — including covers for 419 by Will Ferguson, All Over the Map by Michael Sorkin, and Filthy English by Peter Silverton (pictured above, and now available as a poster should need the swears on your wall) — has been featured here on numerous occasions over the years. A longer feature on Dan’s work has felt overdue for some time now, and so I’m very pleased to finally have Q & A with the designer himself on the blog today. Dan and I corresponded by email…

MotherTongue

Do you remember when you first became interested in design?
Although I was exposed to design from a young age. I was always sure I would end up in a scientific career – I was all set on becoming an oceanographer or marine biologist, then around the age of 16 I was given a black and white darkroom kit by a friend of the family and was hooked on the whole process immediately. Within a year I’d applied and been accepted onto a foundation art course despite the fact I was doing science and maths A-levels. This was also around the time that Pixies came screaming onto the indie music scene and Vaughan Oliver and Simon Larbalestier’s bonkers, twisted, dark and sexy artwork for the albums struck a chord with my tortured 18-year-old psyche…

Was anyone else in your family creative?
My father was an engraver for The Royal Mint, first in London then later in Wales where we relocated when I was 4. He designed and engraved coins and commemorative medals for a variety of countries and organisations around the world so I spent a lot of time watching him hand-lettering then intricately carving type and images into these large plaster discs, which would later be somehow magically turned into little metal stamps for coin minting.

Did you study design at school?
When I finished secondary (high) school I went off to do a one year art foundation course with a fantastic array of tutors and access to screen printing, etching and some very clunky early Macs (1991!) which eventually lured me away from the darkrooms. From there I went to Central Saint Martins to study Graphic Design after I realised that type didn’t just belong on a label underneath photographs.

Intimesfadinglight_PB

Are your kids interested in design?
My wife is a textile designer so their exposure to art & design has been a constant, whether it’s books at home or trips to galleries and visits to friends who work in similar fields. I’m secretly hoping one or all of them will rebel and go into law or marine biology though.

Where did you start your career?
During the second year of my degree course I wrote to the art departments of virtually every major publishing house in London asking for a summer holiday work placement/internship – only one of them replied! I did 3 seperate placements with the Pan Macmillan design crew thanks to the lovely Art Director Fiona Carpenter. When I left college Fiona put me in touch with a design studio called The Senate where I ended up working for 4 years on predominantly book related projects for the likes of Penguin, Random House and Macmillan – among many others.

419

Why did you decide to go freelance?
I went freelance in January 2000, bitten by millenium fever and the realisation that I’d gone about as far as I could in the small design studio I was at. I think being freelance was for me inevitable as I’ve never been very good at being told what to do by other people! I’m lucky it worked out for me, I’ve had certain clients since I went freelance fourteen (!) years ago and have worked with a huge variety of brilliant people in that time. Also some idiots.

What advice would you give a designer thinking about going out own on their own?
If you’re considering it then you’re halfway there. Don’t overthink it, don’t fret, go for it. What’s the worse that could happen?

Sicilian Uncles

What are your favourite kinds of projects?
I seem to have worked on quite a few series designs in the last couple of years and have realised that I really enjoy the challenge and constraints that entails. I like solving the problem of branding a set of books that hang together while still letting each have their own distinct, individual voice – and it really appeals to the collector in me.

Sciascias

What kind of books present the greatest creative challenges?
Again a series design can be challenging but very rewarding if you crack it. I’m really not a fan of the hastily written brief with a scattering of Amazon thumbnails ‘for reference’ and a ‘do whatever’ undertone. You’d think that carte blanche was a gift to a designer but those jobs always end up rumbling on and becoming headaches as there’s been no thought about a clear direction or postioning for the book. Some constraints are a good thing to rub against and work with.

Can you describe your process for designing a book cover?
Sketching and doodling and hot shower meditation. I always draw lots of scrappy little thumbnails of ideas as they occur to me along with word lists and diagrams with arrows linking things. Lots of arrows for some reason… When I have a good feeling about an idea I’ll refine it to a more polished visual on the Mac to a point where it can go into a cover meeting by itself and face the scrutinity of the meeting without me there to defend or excuse it. Then of course comes the email requesting a few tweaks and so it goes on. Occasionally a great idea will survive the sales department waterboarding unscathed – that makes it all worthwhile.

Morcheeba

Do you approach music packaging differently from book covers?
I think they’re actually very similar disciplines in that you’re trying to distill the essence of the thing into a visual that will connect with people in some way while respecting the content that another person has poured a good chunk of their life into creating. I think as with great book designs the conent and the package can become inextricably linked but record design can only do so much – music can be quite resistant to visual interpretation, more so than the written word I think.

A Human Being Died

You were suddenly taken ill at the end of 2012. Have you fully recovered?
For anyone who hasn’t yet been bored to tears by my health history, I had a heart infection which came out of the blue and very nearly killed me. I had open-heart surgery followed by several months of hospitalisation and recovery but can safely say I’m 99% back to the stubborn, easily distracted muppet I was before my illness. Thanks for asking.

Did your illness change your approach to work? Do have a different perspective on it than before?
Absolutely. I’m a lot less tolerant of bad clients! I sacked a few within a couple of months of getting back to work properly and am much more picky about who I work with and what on. Life actually is too short. I’ve also started a little sideline business producing art prints from my collection of printed ephemera and packaging because it makes me happy and the marketing department consists of ME.

Who are some of your design heroes?
Vaughan Oliver is the main reason I got into this graphic design lark. He let me shadow him at 4AD for a day while I was doing my design degree which only confirmed his likeability and genius.

Also: Lustig, Sagmeister, Conran, Kidd.

6HATS

Who do you think is doing interesting work right now?
In terms of book design, I’m not going to stroke/stoke the egos of the UK book design Mafia anymore, they know who they are and they’re all bloody fabulous people and constanly inspiring. Same goes for that lot over the pond. Bastards. Also more generally: Dan Cassaro, Elana Schlenker, Rob Lowe, Marcus Walters, Steven Wilson, Dan Matutina

What‘s in your ‘to read’ pile?
I’m gradually working my way through a list of classics I feel I should really have read by this point in my life – I’ve just finished Jamaica Inn and made a start on Love in the Time of Cholera. I also have a few classic ghost stories lined up for the darkening autumn evenings…

Tony-Susan

Do you have system for organizing your books?
None whatsoever. I love having slippery piles of books all around my studio. They give off a barely discernible warmth and are good company now I work alone.

Do you have a favourite book?
Enid Blyton’s Faraway Tree series were the first books I remember my mum reading to me as a child. She carefully kept them in pristine condition and I’ve just finished reading them to my son Milo who adored them too.

What does the future hold for book cover design?
I think we’re at an interesting point in the story of books and their covers. I’m certainly being asked to consider the whole book package more frequently than I once was – things like cloth colours and foils on hardbacks as well as endpaper designs, varnishes and other little flourishes that make the physical book the covetable item an ebook can never be. Some design briefs demand that the cover works strongly as an Amazon thumbnail which is an interesting constraint akin to designing stamps or matchbox labels – a reductive process and simplification that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I don’t think books as objects are going to vanish any time soon and whatever happens down the line – products physical or digital – will always be packaged.

Thanks Dan!

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Triangles, Quadrangles, Shards, and Fragments

This is my last post on book covers and triangles — for the time being at least. I hope you’ve enjoyed this three-sided, three-post design diversion (you can see the previous posts here and here):

Adjacent
The Adjacent by Christopher Priest; design by Martin Stiff, Amazing15 (Titan Books April 2014) 1

book-of-heaven
The Book of Heaven by Patricia Storace; design by Linda Huang (Pantheon February 2014)

book-of-my-lives
The Books of My Lives by Aleksandar Hemon; design by Jonathan Pelham (Picador February 2014)

box-of-birds
A Box of Birds by Charles Fernyhough; design by Dan Mogford (Unbound May 2013)

close-to-the-machine
Close to the Machine by Ellen Ullman; design by Clare Skeats (Pushkin Press March 2013)

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Connectome by Sebastian Seung; design by Matthew Young (Penguin June 2013)

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Contradance by John Peck; design by Natalie F. Smith (University of Chicago Press October 2011)

Dostoevsky_Demons
Demons by Fyodor Dostoevsky; design by Peter Mendelsund (Vintage August 2004)

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Gun Dealers’ Daughter by Gina Apostol; design by Jaya Miceli (W. W. Norton August 2012)

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November 1916 by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (Farrar, Straus & Giroux August 2014)

August 1914 by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (Farrar, Straus & Giroux August 2014)

Stories and Prose Poems by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (Farrar, Straus & Giroux November 2014)

Design by Oliver Munday

9780141393346
The Scandal of Father Brown by G. K. Chesterton; design by Matthew Young (Penguin

snowdrops
Snowdrops by A. D. Miller; design by Emily Mahon (Doubleday February 2011)

time-machine
The Time Machine by H. G. Wells; design by Coralie Bickford-Smith (Penguin May 2012)

we-the-animals-800
We Are Animals by Justin Torres; design by Gray318 (Granta March 2012)

your-face-mine
Your Face in Mine by Jess Row; design by Oliver Munday (Riverhead August 2014)

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More Recent Book Covers of Note

Seeing as it’s a long weekend in Canada, and The Independent, The New York Times, The Atlantic, and countless other fly-by-night operations are jumping on the book design blog train (and doing it far better than me, damn it), here’s another round of recent covers that have caught my eye (just so you know who’s boss):

 419 by Will Ferguson; Design by Dan Mogford

The Antidote by Oliver Burkeman; Design by Scriberia

Coin Locker Babies by Ryu Murakami; Design by David Pearson

The Enchanted Wanderer by Nikolai Leskov; Design by Peter Mendelsund

Gun Guys: A Road Trip by Dan Baum; Design by Jason Booher

The Private Life: Why We Remain in the Dark by Josh Cohen; Design by FUEL

Watergate by Thomas Mallon; Design by Evan Gaffney

What the Family Needed by Steven Amsterdam; Design by Jen Heuer

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Midweek Miscellany

Work / Life — An interview with the brilliant Louise Fili, designer and former art director of Pantheon Books, at The Great Discontent:

Everybody wanted to use standard fonts, but I just wasn’t satisfied doing that. I didn’t realize this until years later, but what I was really doing was developing type treatments for the title of the book and approaching it more like a logo. I wanted each book to have its own personality and that couldn’t be achieved with standard fonts. Again, I was lucky because it was appropriate to do that for the types of books I was working on. The other thing to note is that I was collaborating with a lot of really talented illustrators and made a concerted effort to combine the type and image together. I also tried to encourage illustrators to create their own type. I would sketch it out for them and then ask them to actually draw it so it would become part of the illustration, which makes for a stronger design, whether it’s a book cover or logo.

Colour and Intention — Claire Cameron interviews Sam Garrett about his translation of The Dinner by Herman Koch, for the LA Review of Books:

The words a writer uses not only have a dictionary definition, but also a color and an intention. To pin those down, the translator has to sniff around. From the first to the final word of a translation, you’re leading the reader along a path to a destination. The color is what keeps the reader hopping; the intention is the scent that keeps the translator on the right path.


Negotiations — Jim Tierney explains his design process for the cover of Ruth Ozeki’s A Tale for the Time Being:

I decided to run with the first concept that popped into my head: a very simple and tactile facsimile of the red Proust notebook, embossed with an illustration of Nao, floating spectrally above the rocky coast of British Columbia. I think this design is all about questions: How did this book get here? Was it lost intentionally, or by accident? Is Nao alive or dead? Is she even real?

Minimal designs like this is always a hard sell in cover meetings, and it was immediately rejected as too quiet and precious-looking. Loud, colorful, and commercial are popular adjectives in modern book marketing, but it’s always fun to start off negotiations with something a little more obscure.

And finally…

Welcome back from near-death Dan Mogford. Please don’t do that again.

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Something for the Weekend

A lovely new cover design by Dan Mogford for All Over the Map by Michael Sorkin (Verso Books).

In an epic two part interview for Bomb Magazine, George Saunders, author of Pastoralia, talks about writing with Patrick Dacey.

From part one:

[O]ne of the challenges of the writing life is to find new things to say and/or new ways to say them. And this is a paradox, because when you write your first book, you actually carve out a great deal of what you’ll end up working with for the rest of your life… [T]hat’s genuinely exciting. But then there’s the next 60 years to get through (!).

From part two:

Sometimes when I read new fiction, I feel that the writers of it, myself included, have a somewhat dysfunctional relationship with our own culture. I don’t mean we disapprove of it. I mean that we have absorbed so much habitual disapproval of it that we are no longer able to see it, and therefore are unable to disapprove of it properly. How can you disapprove (or approve) of something you no longer see? If your palette of possible modes of representation has been habitually narrowed and restricted (to the edgy, the snarky, the hip, etc., etc.), if that palette has been shorn of, say, the spiritual, the ineffable, the earnest, the mysterious—of awe, wonder, humility, the truly unanswerable questions—then there isn’t much hope of any real newness there.

Just as an aside, I love this cover for Pastoralia (I’m not sure who the designer is though. Anyone?):

Mom — A short interview with Gene Hackman in GQ. I’ve always been a fan of Hackman’s acting, what I didn’t realise is that he is also a novelist:

Yeah, they tell you not to write about your mom in books, but I don’t know how you keep from doing that.

Fantastic. Hackman’s most recent novel is Payback at Morning Creek.

And finally…

A gallery of vintage Irish book covers from the 1920’s to 1970’s curated by Niall McCormack, a graphic designer based in Dublin. Pictured above: Cuir Síos Air, Fallons. Cover design by Cor Klaasen. (Via The Donut Project).

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The Breaking of Eggs: One Book, Three Covers

Books published in both the US and UK will often have different covers in each country. The UK and the US are, after all, two nations divided by a common language. Even so, I was still quite surprised by just how different the cover of UK paperback edition The Breaking of Eggs by Jim Powell (forthcoming from Orion, above right) was from the cover US edition of the same book (published by Penguin, above left).

It was Dan Mogford the designer of the UK paperback who pointed me in the direction of the original US cover, designed by Gregg Kulick. I had, it turned out, seen Gregg’s cover before — it had caught my eye in Paul Buckley’s book Penguin 75 — I just hadn’t realized it was the same book that Dan had just designed the cover for!

As Dan and Gregg’s treatments were so different, I thought it might be informative to ask them both about their designs. In the process, I came across Nathan Burton’s design for the UK hardcover edition of The Breaking of Eggs (published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, above middle) — another, altogether different, interpretation of the same story. I thought it would be interesting to ask Nathan what he remembered from his design brief as well.

I’m grateful to all three designers for sharing their thoughts on their very different directions…

Gregg Kulick:

The Breaking of Eggs is the story of an old curmudgeon who learns to take down all of the walls he built around himself and really enjoy life. As a child, he flees Poland to escape the war and settles in France. As an adult he becomes a travel writer who focuses on the old communist block and is very much a communist himself. The rest of the world and its excesses annoy him and he shuts himself out. Slowly he breaks down the walls and visits his lost brother in America.

The title refers to a Joseph Stalin quote “You can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs” and could be used as a metaphor for his own life. Or he as a child, he could also have been one of the broken eggs. Regardless, it was his mind that needed to be broken in order to live a truly full life. Which, is why I chose that imagery. The giant exclamation point was a homage to Rodchenko, who was a huge influence on my design as a student and who often used them in his design.

The map in the background just represents some of the places he wrote about as a travel writer. This was more of a request from editorial to show “place” on the cover and I think it was a very nice suggestion.

Nathan Burton:

The publisher had tried a photographic route previously to commissioning me which hadn’t worked so they wanted an alternative approach. Buzz words they came up with were: cafe, espresso, napkin, beer, handwritten notes, cigarette smoke, a guide book on a table, a train. It was a case of combining this with a nod toward an Eastern European aesthetic to come up with the final design.

Dan Mogford:

The previous incarnations of the jacket – on both sides of the Atlantic – had all been fairly quirky and lighthearted and the publishers were keen to open this book up to a different audience. Orion were quite specific about the direction they wanted to go with this – the phrase ‘traditional, sophisticated literary fiction’ was mentioned a few times!

The focus for this version of the jacket was to be the protagonist’s early year’s in Lodz, Poland around 1939 when he was abandoned by his mother. The brief asked for ‘a lonely looking boy in an urban Polish setting ideally with a woman walking away from him’ – this highly specific request meant I was looking at a composite image from the start, it was really a case of finding the right elements within a variety of period photographs then assembling them to tell the story you see in the final composition.

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Something for the Weekend

Filthy English — a new cover design by Dan Mogford for Portobello Books.

Hip Flask — An interesting interview with the folks behind 48 Hour Magazine at Gizmodo. There’s some great stuff in the piece, and it’s worth reading from beginning to end, but I particularly liked this insight from Derek Powazek (founder of Fray, co-founder of JPG Magazine, and consultant at MagCloud*):

Print is, at some point, done. However imperfect. It has a rhythm of creation, editing, and publishing. And when it’s done, everyone involved can sit back, look at the thing we made, and feel accomplished.

The web is never done. It’s in a constant state of flux. That’s not good or bad, it just is.

Powazek is also the guy behind Strange Light a print-on-demand magazine that collected photographs of the Australian dust storm that covered New South Wales and Queensland in September last year. He has interesting post about the creation of the magazine on his blog.

No. — A Tumblr that’s apparently devoted to found-type numerals.

The latest Harvard Review cover by Alex Camlin. My interview with Alex is here.

*Does this make anyone else feel slightly inadequate? — I mean, what have you founded, co-founded or consulted on today?

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Dan Mogford’s de Bonos

Earlier this week, London-based graphic designer Dan Mogford kindly alerted me to a series of fresh Edward de Bono covers he designed for the Penguin UK:

At the BPPA book cover panel last night, David Gee was lamenting publishers’ current predilection for blandly neutral Malcolm Gladwell-esque covers for certain kinds of popular nonfiction, and so I’m really glad that Dan (and Penguin) decided to go in the completely opposite direction.  I really like the slab serif (the rather lovely Stag by Christian Schwartz, Dan tells me), bold colours, and light-bulb motif they went with here.

Is it just me or do they have a certain Milton Glaser-like quality?

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