Book Cover Archive

The Bauhaus Group

2009-11-05T07:30:51-08:00

Animal Sanctuary

2009-11-04T06:57:22-08:00

Five Quarts

2009-11-04T06:45:34-08:00

The Defenestration of Bob T. Hash III

2009-11-04T06:44:23-08:00

A Chance Meeting

2009-11-04T06:43:07-08:00

Gall & Co. put Nabokov on display

2009-11-10T15:13:27Z

…each box would be filled with paper, ephemera, and insect pins, selected to somehow evoke the book’s content. And to make it more interesting for readers — and less daunting for me — I thought it would be fun to ask a group of talented designers to help create the boxes.

Holy moly.

Congratulations to Ben Wiseman

2009-11-09T19:58:15Z

Mr Wiseman, one of the stupidly talented designers at Rodrigo Corral Design, has earned himself a spot in this year’s ADC Young Guns lineup.

Check out his [excellent] submitted book covers here.

9,233,188 glyphs later

2009-11-05T14:58:17Z

Fontshop turns 20 this year. As they are both amazing and the provider of all the font-related metadata on The Book Cover Archive, I think it’s more than appropriate that we all burst out into commemorative song.

(While youre priming the vocal chords, check out their fantastic celebratory website in honor of the occasion.)

A type treatment waiting for a book cover

2009-11-02T00:31:42Z

Abcity Typo by Borja Bonaque

Absolutely Brilliant

2009-10-26T16:20:22Z

Absolute Sellout is my favorite new website on the internets. From the business model, to the unapologetic design, to the items therein. It seems to be as simple as a retailer for “objects & literature” procured from their local Salvation Army. I have no idea who runs it but I’d give them each a gold medal in Awesome if I could.

One more for the 1984 pile.

2009-10-26T16:07:05Z

Nice cover for a student project from James Le Beau-Morley.

These are a few of my favorite things..

2009-10-21T04:43:42Z

Books & logos.
The combination thereof is almost enough to send me into a fit.

In order of appearance:
- Alber, Book store, Eugen & Max Lenz
- Textbooks.com, Werner Design Works
- Trees For Life, Gardner Design
- Explosive Technology, Saul Bass
- Gotham Books, Eric Baker
- Simon & Schuster, Prejean Creative
- Imperial Books, Designer unknown
- Asian Arts Publishing Group, Tnop™ Design
- Fleming H Revell Publishing, Wages Design
- Educational Development Corporation, Designer unknown.

(You have no idea how hard it was to not rip off Werner Design Werks and that last one for the BCA non-existent logo. No. Idea.)

Reading Nook — Barnes & Noble vs Kindle

2009-10-20T19:52:40Z

Introducing the Barnes & Noble “Nook”:

I’m guessing that this is a leak — the “overview” link goes to Brsnoble’s e-book page, and there’s no mention of the “Nook” on the front page. ~~Also the images refer to it as a “Hero”… development name perhaps?~~

They found a clever solution around the keyboard problem; e-ink displays are (apparently) incompatible with the surfaces that are used with touch-displays like the Apple iPhone, thus necessitating a chicklet keyboard (like the Kindle) or no keyboard at all (Sony). The “Nook” is instead putting an iPhone-style color display underneath the reading area. It doubles as a browser for full-color book covers. An LCD display is also like a tiny TV underneath the book (update: click to see in action), so I hope that it shuts off during formal reading time. (Of course it also cuts down the “reading space” to the top 3/4 of the device, but that’s no worse than the Kindle.)

I was dismissive of Barnes & Noble’s chances of entering the e-book market with a proprietary device this late in the game, but I think we’re looking at a surprise Christmas hit.

Also notable…

update: Video featuring a goofball co-ed.
It runs the Google Android OS (developed for cellphones). Awesome.
If Nook is successful, there will be two incompatible, competing, DRM-encoded e-book standards. That’s going to be a mess. (I don’t consider Sony’s efforts to be “successful” yet.)
Barnes & Noble also has iPhone/Blackberry/Mac/PC reading softwares coming out, so you’ll be able to read books on multiple platforms. Like Amazon, they’re more interested in selling books than devices.
Cross-compatibility between Nook and Sony readers — or even Nook and Kindle — is technically possible, but, as long as they’re “selling the razor blades,” unlikely.
If the PDF support is any good, you’ll see a lot of used Kindles on eBay overnight.
Engadget hints that you might get your filthy mitts on one at Best Buy this Thursday.
“hero implies hero shot… marketing term for that kind of image, as opposed to front/side/back” thanks CharlesV

And hey, great news for book cover designers… your craft will be preserved in the space of a postage stamp.

couple of notes regarding BCA

2009-10-17T19:53:02Z

• Comments on this blog have been offline for a little while. They are restored; let the smack resume.

• BCA proper has been quietly rewritten; same design, all of the underpinnings replaced. The transition has been smooth… almost too smooth… so if I overlooked anything please speak up.

• Here is a little video of one dog helping another dog across a swimming pool:

At times, ugly is unavoidable

2009-10-15T19:01:21Z

It’s no rare occasion that your book of choice has a horrible cover. In such cases, you could do worse than Book City Jackets. A charming solution straight out of middle school. 12$ for a set of three.