Minimalism: Album Covers Recreated
Designer Ty Lettau has recreated some of the most famous and iconic classic album covers and made them his own by using a minimalist style and focusing on the iconography.
You can see his full set on Flickr.
Penguin Book Cover Designs (Special)
I love books and I love design, which is why I think book covers are extremely important to me. Luckily there is a fabulous book publisher out there who agrees with me (you may have heard of them), they have a quirky little penguin stamped onto all of their books as a seal of quality.
The saying “never judge a book by its cover” is a logical saying, but the point is that we as humans judge everyone and everything on first appearances, whether we want to or not. A good book should have a good cover and whilst I can’t buy a book without at least reading the blurb, I will decide not to buy a book if the cover design is especially poor.
It may be pedantic but when I look at a book, I think it should be a piece of art (the design and the literature combined), presented to you in book form.
When it comes to Penguin books, they could only be better if it were presented on a silver dish by a smartly dressed English fellow named Giles.
Above, for example, are the lovely book covers for Patrick Süskind’s upcoming novels. I recommend you click the Creative Review article (below) and read more into how it was designed.
I’m also currently writing an article on how design is becoming increasingly more important in our consumer-driven lives and it isn’t a bad thing either; I would even go far as to say that it is a great thing, even improving our experience of life, but I shall write more about that another time.
Penguin aren’t oblivious to the fact that they have set a gold standard for quality in books, they sell postcards with book cover designs on, because they recognise that a book cover is a statement and a form of beauty. I dare say that Penguin are the Apple of the book publishing world.
Penguin have also introduced a series focusing on their books over the decades and how they represent the decade (‘Penguin Decades’, see the link below). I recommend you take a look at both the cover art and the books themselves. In particular, John Wyndham is one of my favourite authors (what can I say? I’m a science fiction buff).