About

Book Designer is a small set of working notes about making books — kept public because the questions come up again and again.

Shelves of books — The reference shelf that most of these notes argue with.

The pages here are not a course and not a style guide. They are the things we find ourselves explaining to a new collaborator on every project: why the measure matters more than the typeface, why the gutter is not wasted, why a printed proof is not optional.

Nothing here is sponsored and no product is recommended. Where a specific tool or stock is mentioned, it is because it illustrates a point, not because anyone is paying for the mention.

Corrections are welcome. A good deal of what is written here was wrong the first time and improved by somebody saying so.

If something here contradicts what a printer or a binder tells you about your specific job, believe them. These notes describe how the materials usually behave; the person running the machine knows how they behave this week, on this stock, at this humidity.