Judge Me
St. Thomas Aquinas once said (not that we go around quoting him often), “beware of the person of one book.” To him, this statement was almost certainly intended as an inditement of the closed-minded followers of one rigid doctrine. We could also take it to mean that a wise person takes knowledge from many sources. For graphic designers who create covers for books and magazines, the lesson is clear: insistence on a singular visual and metaphorical style serves neither the content nor the reader.
Inculte Publishing, France
Inculte is a French independent publisher created by a group of up-and-coming young writers. Since 2004, the company has published a quarterly review, a collection of monographs, and many hardcover novels and essays. Our latest work for Inculte includes book covers within the series “Afterpop” and “Temps Réel.”
Cover for “Big Fan,” a tragic fiction about the life of an obsessed fan of the band Radiohead.
Book cover for “Les Soniques,” by Niccolo Ricardo & Caïus Locus
Cover designs for “Lost Album” by Stéphan Legrand and Sebastian Le Pajolec, and “The Cannibal Keys,” by Claro
Covers from the Inculte series of philosophy books, “Reédition Arc.” Each cover is an embossed letterform construction, which represents the initial of the author (e.g. Lyotard, Joyce, Freud, etc.).
Observatoire du Samu Social de Paris
Founded in 2003 by Dr. Xavier Emmanuelli, with the support of the Mayor of Paris, Jacques Chirac, Samusocial was created to help address the immediate and urgent needs of citizens on the streets of Paris. The Samusocial report, “Mental health & the addictions of the homeless” (2010), has a cover designed by Yann Legendre.
The New York Times
The last December issue of 2008 for The New York Times featured this cover design for the Arts & Leisure section, entitled “The Year in Culture.” This illustration assignment represents a core capability of Legendre+Rutter not found with many traditional graphic design studios—the ability to merge art and meaning as a strategy for great communication.
Amnesty International
This book, published by Amnesty International in Paris, features posters that express a theme of free expression.
The New Yorker
The original “Eustace Tilley” cover of The New Yorker from 1925 appears to the left. At right, Yann Legendre’s “Deconstructed Tilley” was one of 12 winning covers from the annual competition, curated by The New Yorker’s art editor, Françoise Mouley.
International Interior Design Association
IIDA worked with us to create not only a new cover for their design journal, Perspective, but also to launch a fresh approach to the journal’s visual attitude. This first issue expressed the seductive magnetism that designed artifacts wield.
While the adage that one cannot judge a book by its cover is certainly true, we want to believe that a well-designed cover gives the reader a vision of the journey within. It is not a reflection of the narrative but a window into it.
