September 7th, 2011 Comments Off
If you ask any graphic design student at San Francisco’s Academy of Art University to name his/her most-faved teachers, Typography 2 instructor Carolina de Bartolo will no doubt pop up in the mix. In fact, it was with her students’ encouragement (and their resulting wow-worthy portfolios) that finally convinced de Bartolo to bring her ten-years-in-the-making book idea to fruition. Two more years and a steep learning curve later, de Bartolo can now add author/entrepreneur to her title.“Explorations in Typography: Mastering the Art of Fine Typesetting” is de Bartolo’s first venture into the world of self-publishing – and a beautiful, instructive piece to boot.
Read my full article on Print Magazine’s awesome design blog IMPRINT.
"Explorations in Typography" by Carolina de Bartolo
May 26th, 2011 Comments Off
I recently spoke with an extremely talented graphic designer who was struggling with a book cover design. She confided, “I’m starting to feel like I suck as a designer because I can’t figure out a solution to this problem.”
“Oh, thank god!” I exclaimed.
She was a bit baffled (and slightly ticked off) at my response until I explained that I literally thought I was the only graphic designer who felt this way. Hours after hours of trying this idea and that idea and still not coming up with a feasible solution feels…well – pretty darn crappy. But now that the, “yeah, I’m not alone!” party is over, the question remains: how exactly do we get rid of this negative self-talk? For help on this matter, I went to the top – the very top: Chip Kidd, Paula Scher, Stefan Sagmeister, and Robynne Raye – to be precise.
Read my full article below or buy the awesome May 2011 HOW MAGAZINE.
March 31st, 2011 Comments Off
From delightfully mismatched buttons to colorful spools of thread to vintage typewriter ribbon, a variety of small, unexpected collections can be found in charming little tins. Thanks to artist/illustrator Lisa Congdon’s A Collection A Day blog project, we can now find her brand spankin’ new book of the same title oh-so-appropriately packaged in a tactile and highly covetable collector’s tin too. Designed and published in collaboration with UPPERCASE’s Janine Vangool, the book is chock full of “voracious collector” Congdon’s nostalgic finds—organized into 365 artful collections.
Read my full article on DWELL.
Image courtesy Lisa Congdon / UPPERCASE
December 14th, 2010 Comments Off
Creative Madness is one of my all-time favorite typography projects. It was an exploration into the minds of some of the most noted creatives of our day: Zelda Fitzgerald, Woody Allen, Diane Arbus, Werner Herzog, etc. The book reinterprets their various texts through typographically driven designs. But Woody Allen was especially fun to make. I created his face entirely through typography – his eyes, hair, glasses – everything was created from letterforms. And yes, he looks a little worried. He’s Woody Allen – he always worries!
For a close-up, click on the image:
by Stephanie Orma
To see more of this project, check out my website.
January 13th, 2010 Comments Off
No one understands the statement, “design is everywhere” better than us designers. But comprehension and integration are two totally separate acts. From food packaging, to billboards, to book covers, catalogs, websites, and everything in between, we spend the majority of our waking hours on our computers designing and/or looking at these designs through the portals of our monitors.But when the computer is shut down, does your “design radar” go off-line, as well?
For instance, when it’s time to grocery shop, are you in the get-in/get-out as fast as possible mindset? Or do you treat the experience as a journey through Design Mecca – with sources of inspiration lining the shelves from wall to wall? When you’re waiting on the unbearably slow line at the post office do you temper your impatience by burying your nose in your iPhone? Or do you make note of the ugly signage covering the walls and kill the time by redesigning it better in your head? “Cranking up your design radar” is about never turning off the designer in ourselves. READ FULL ARTICLE: Smashing Magazine
January 13th, 2010 Comments Off
Book design is an art. And it is one of the mostchallenging of the design disciplines. When executed well, it’s a beautiful marriage of words and images dancing together in perfect harmony, each supporting and enhancing the other.
"The Little Red Book of Fun" cover design by Stephanie Orma for Gibbs Smith Publisher. Photo Courtesy Stephanie Orma / Orma Design.
Yet, when I tell people that I design books for a living their response usually goes something like this: “That’s cool….so what exactly do you do?” When most people think of book design, they picture some sort of Danielle Steel paperback with generic type, text dropped into book format, page numbers stuck in the corners, all printed on cheap newspaper stock. But there are thousands upon thousands of books that have been designed. And by designed, I mean the essence of the printed words have been translated to the visual.
Book design is an art. And it is one of the mostchallenging of the design disciplines. When executed well, it’s a beautiful marriage of words and images dancing together in perfect harmony, each supporting and enhancing the other.
Yet, when I tell people that I design books for a living their response usually goes something like this: “That’s cool….so what exactly do you do?” When most people think of book design, they picture some sort of Danielle Steel paperback with generic type, text dropped into book format, page numbers stuck in the corners, all printed on cheap newspaper stock. But there are thousands upon thousands of books that have been designed. And by designed, I mean the essence of the printed words have been translated to the visual.
According to Ayako Akazawa, an incredibly talented senior designer at San Francisco-based Chronicle Books, “Book design is not a mere task of typesetting. The size of the book, its weight, its choice of paper, its fonts and their size, amount of space around it…all these minute details are carefully designed to evoke readers’ senses, let him/her be able to see, touch and feel the spirit of the content.”
An example of great book design is “The Little Red Book of Fun: Lessons Learned from Playing the Harmonica,” which I created for Gibbs Smith Publisher (slated for September 2009 release). In designing this playful, inspiring, music book, every element was thoughtfully considered. One hundred and forty four pages plus cover were hand-designed from the selection and arrangement of the whimsical typography, to the chapter openers shaped as enlarged half notes, to the history of the harmonica timeline represented via a musical staff bar. Thus, reading the “The Little Red Book of Fun” becomes a joyful experience for all the senses to delight.
Many speculate that in the very near future tangible, touchable books will be a thing of the past. With the arrival of Kindle and other electronic book readers, it certainly looks like this is the direction we’re headed. No one knows for sure what will happen. In the meanwhile, as long as great designers and publishers produce books that make the already enjoyable task of reading that much more entertaining, I will continue shamelessly indulging my senses, as well.
(originally appeared in SF Examiner 4/03/09)
