As Within, So Without

The manuscript brought together decades of records, letters, photographs and artworks. It had to read as a serious book rather than a case file, and each image needed to sit close to the passage that explained its significance.

Many of the source images were old scans of uneven quality. The book also had to meet Amazon’s print specifications for paperback and hardcover, while several rounds of text edits kept changing the layout.

I read the manuscript and Steve’s earlier books, then studied printed material from the art world of the 1930s and 1940s: catalogues, magazines, typefaces and the way pages were built around images.

I chose Adobe Caslon for its period character and its readability across a long book. It matched the editorial feel of the books and magazines that handled this work back then, and still felt modern next to the book’s layout. A consistent grid and generous margins gave the material room without making each page feel like a separate exhibit.

The images were part of the evidence, not decoration. I placed each one alongside the passage it supported, with consistent framing and captions, so readers could follow the argument without searching through the book.

I coordinated the restoration of weaker scans and carried the layout through several rounds of structural edits. As the sole designer, I handled the typography, layout, image placement, captions and print-ready files, keeping Steve involved throughout and explaining decisions in terms of the reader’s experience.