Feb 10, 2015

A SPOOL OF BLUE THREAD - Anne Tyler

On ‘Anne Tyler Day’, we thought we’d show how we transformed an original 1950s black and white photograph into the luscious, evocatively coloured jacket image on her new book. The original photograph from Getty Images was by Carl Iwasaki.

Feb 10, 2015
myjetpack:
“My book of cartoons ‘You’re All Just Jealous of my Jetpack’ is available now:US: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1770461043
UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1770461043
Other stockists, info and prints for sale at www.tomgauld.com
”

myjetpack:

My book of cartoons ‘You’re All Just Jealous of my Jetpack’ is available now:US: http://www.amazon.com/dp/1770461043
UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1770461043
Other stockists, info and prints for sale at www.tomgauld.com

Feb 4, 2015

NEVERHOME- Laird Hunt

I was strong and he was not so it was me went to war to defend the Republic. I stepped across the border out of Indiana into Ohio. Twenty dollars, two salt-pork sandwiches, and I took jerky, biscuits, six old apples, fresh underthings and a blanket too.

Neverhome is set during the American Civil War. The main female character goes to war dressed as a man. We created a period photograph for the front and back cover of this jacket. The image was shot against a white sheet in a garden; a colleague was dressed in a soldier’s uniform and a dress, both hired from Angels the Costumiers.

The novel is published tomorrow by Chatto &Windus.

Jan 30, 2015

LOVE, SEX AND OTHER FOREIGN POLICY GOALS - Jesse Armstrong

It’s 1994 and a gang of good-hearted young people head for war-torn Bosnia with the aim of spreading peace armed only with several sacks of rice and a half-written play…

This simple typographic approach gives each of the protaganists a colour and a word each, and allows them to bicker between themselves as they head to the warzone

This is Jesse Armstrong’s first novel. He is the co-creator and writer of the BAFTA Award-winning Peep Show, as well as Fresh Meat, Bad Sugar, Babylon and, with Chris Morris, Four Lions. He was also co-writer of The Thick of It and the Oscar-nominated In the Loop, and wrote The Entire History of You for Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror

It is published by Jonathan Cape in April.

Jan 29, 2015

THE NARROW ROAD SHOOT - Richard Flanagan

The paperback edition of the 2014 Man Booker prize winning The Narrow Road to the Deep North features a new, photographic approach. The brief offered a chance to create a design with a cinematic feel, while still retaining the essence of the bold hardback cover.

It was decided a shoot for the main protagonists Dorrigo and Amy was essential, as finding the right couple in existing photography proved impossible. There were enormous challenges to achieving this as the images had to evoke the feeling of Australia whilst in reality being set in a south London studio in early January. The chosen studio, The Worx, offered plenty of natural light to create the authentic impression of daylight needed to capture the characters in various poses. 

The male model wore an Australian Army uniform and the female a 1940s inspired floral tea dress. Angels the Costumier, widely recognized as the world’s largest source of authentically reproduced costumes for use in productions, supplied both.

The cover worked best in black and white as we wanted a convincing period feel as the story is set during the Second World War.

The paperback version is published in March.  

Jan 28, 2015

HERLAND - Charlotte Perkins Gilman

‘A Utopian novel by a feminist set in the Amazon rainforest - and it is funny' Guardian

First published in 1915, three men stumble upon a community of women, living in perfect isolation in the Amazon. How could these women survive without man’s knowledge, experience and strength, not to mention reproductive power? In fact what they have created is a feminist utopia that dares to threaten the very concept of male superiority.

For this centenary edition, we commissioned Petra Börner to create a bold yet feminine paper-cut pattern that explored the homogeny of this strong female society. Beneath are some of her earlier ideas and sketches.

Published by Vintage Classics in April 2015

Jan 21, 2015
Jan 15, 2015
Jan 8, 2015
#JE SUIS CHARLIE
www.lucilleclerc.com

#JE SUIS CHARLIE

www.lucilleclerc.com

Dec 23, 2014
Dec 22, 2014
MAKING NICE - Matt Sumell
Matt Sumell’s brilliant debut is about Alby, a strangely loveable guy turning thirty, who’s desperately trying and often failing, to come to terms with his mother’s death, accompanied by his loveable French bulldog Jason.
By...

MAKING NICE - Matt Sumell

Matt Sumell’s brilliant debut is about Alby, a strangely loveable guy turning thirty, who’s desperately trying and often failing, to come to terms with his mother’s death, accompanied by his loveable French bulldog Jason.

By turns hirarious, offensive, reckless, endearing and direct – it has an infectious energy propelling you through the grief, failure and fights.

We wanted a bold cover to convey its vigorous raw spirit and David Foldvari delivered on all fronts.

Published by Harvill Secker in February 2015.

Dec 18, 2014

THE GRACEKEEPERS - Kirsty Logan

The Gracekeepers is an extraordinary magical first novel about a world that is almost entirely sea. North lives on a circus boat with her bear, floating between the scattered islands that remain. Callanish, the Gracekeeper, lives alone in her house in the middle of the ocean, with only the birds and the fish for company. When a storm creates a chance meeting between the two girls, their worlds change.

The cover for The Gracekeepers started out as a sketch on the manuscript (see above). The first idea was to have a mirroring of the two main characters, above and below the waterline. Illustrator Felicita Sala was commissioned to develop this theme, based on the work seen in her sketchbooks. Her characters are exceptional, they have a sophisticated line and a broad commercial appeal. As the cover evolved, the layout changed and simplified. The characters were now mirrored on the front and back cover. Felicita also illustrated the map on the endpapers and the boards – where, once the cover is removed, you discover what is under the sea.

Felicita Sala was born in Rome but grew up in Perth, Australia. She graduated in philosophy from the university of WA and now lives and works in Rome as a painter and illustrator.

Published in April 2015 by Harvill Secker

Dec 12, 2014
MOD - Richard Weight
Publishing in January, the paperback of Richard Weight’s MOD takes on an altogether new approach to it’s cover design.
The hardback design featured here was one for the purists, whereas the paperback is concerned with the...

MOD - Richard Weight

Publishing in January, the paperback of Richard Weight’s MOD takes on an altogether new approach to it’s cover design.

The hardback design featured here was one for the purists, whereas the paperback is concerned with the far-reaching appeal of MOD - revealing it to be the DNA of British youth culture, leaving it’s mark on glam and Northern Soul, punk and Two-Tone, Britpop and even rave.

Dec 9, 2014
INVISIBLE - Philip Ball
Published next July in paperback, Invisible is a cultural history of invisibility, looking at how humans have attempted to develop and use invisibility and the motivations behind this urge to be unseen.
The inspiration for...

INVISIBLE - Philip Ball

Published next July in paperback, Invisible is a cultural history of invisibility, looking at how humans have attempted to develop and use invisibility and the motivations behind this urge to be unseen.

The inspiration for this cover came from two ideas: the dazzle camouflage used on ships, and the way the stripes of a zebra make their form harder to distinguish by a predator.

‘One popular theory of the zebra’s stripes is that they obscure not by concealment but by confusion. A division of the body into seemingly random patches of highly contrasting colours breaks up the outlines on the creature itself: a predator sees something but is unable to interpret it.’

Dec 3, 2014

SATIN ISLAND - Tom McCarthy

The challenge with this cover was to create a contrast against the monochrome cover of Tom’s last novel, C. The cover for Satin Island features a brightly coloured buffer which sits centrally against a white background. The spinning buffer was a perfect graphic symbol of the novel on which to spill, another recurring theme, thick black oil. To ensure that the oil oozing and dripping into puddles looked authentic, black treacle was poured over a large wooden letter O. The best bits were then transferred to the final visual.

Below Tom McCarthy talks about how this cover represents his book:

“Suzanne Dean has made a wonderful cover for this book. It captures two of its central strands: the goopy, flowing, shape-shifting materiality of oil, which stains snowy coastlines like ink polluting paper; and what I see as the ultimate symbol of contemporary existence: the buffering-sign. That circle that spins on your laptop, and the temporality that it imposes - a time of delay, of waiting, of anxiety, of incompleteness - sums up what it is to be alive today. It’s not even a question of digital technology, although it might manifest itself that way. It’s ultimately a theological situation: we assume that, behind the circle, there are endless streams of data being sent our way, pumped out by servers in Nevada or Uzbekistan or somewhere, like so many angels dancing on the pin-head of our wi-fi connection. And that re-assurance, in turn, gives us a mental place inside the universe, make us feel gathered up and saved. But what if it were just a spinning circle?”

Published in March 2015 by Jonathan Cape

 

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