By its Cover: Thinking With Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students
randomly:
Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students by Ellen Lupton
I love a good style guide.
No really I do.
Especially one that concentrates on type and type design. (Why the disbelieving stare?)
Perhaps not surprisingly, it is just such style guides as these that I judge most harshly on design. And I'm looking at Thinking with Type and wondering why I should care. Amazon keeps shoving it at me, knowing how much I love a good style guide (especially one that concentrates on type and type design). But I've rarely clicked on it. I don't feel drawn to the book. And perhaps it is because (in part) the type on the cover is presented in a rather pedestrian way. Also, you can't really appreciate the border (of black-on-white typeset pages) without looking closely. (You also don't see the curves and lines explanetary notes on the type's edges... but since they're not especially necessary, they're hardly worth mentioning... though I did manage to mention them, didn't I.)
This makes me wonder how many people might actually be designing for those little Amazon boxes. How important is it that we be able to see the aspects of design in a glace at a browser screen?
In a book like this, I'd wager that the most important thing is that the type be legible there, on the browser page, and also legible in the bookstore (should it happen to be set face out--however unlikely that is). The type should be clean and unhindered. So, though I don't exactly take back what I said about this book not drawing my attention (the contrast between text and field is awfully thin), I would say that at least I knew exactly what it was the moment I saw it. And there's something to be said for that.
Though I didn't have to look inside the book based on its cover, if I was in the market for a book like this one, I would at least wander through it and see if it was worth the purchase price. And that's maybe good enough. For now.
Blessings.
// posted by terry@bainbooks.com //
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