S2 Ep 2: Book Cover Design w. Terry Miura & Darya Solomenko
Got Books? Conversations with BooksellersShow Notes
Do you judge a book by its cover? Well.. let's face it, most of us do. And that's probably alright. Today we will go behind the scenes of Book Cover Design. How does one capture the essence of a book in just one beautiful image? Where do you even start? And how does the entire process unfold? These are some of the questions I'll be asking my two guests.
As with most jobs in the book industry, there's a certain romance associated with book cover design. For many, this sounds like a designer's dream job.. although very few people do book cover design full time for a living. Wherever you stand on the future of the book – bound to become a digital object, or on the contrary, a forever physical, tactile part of our cultural life – we can safely say that we are now in a golden age of book design. Step into a bookshop and you'll soon find yourself surrounded by beautiful design, from the very abstract to sharp photography. Trends in book design have ebbed and flowed over the years, with simplistic design principles becoming more pronounced in recent years. That could be because many readers now discover books online, so the book covers are designed with this in mind. There is however still book cover art made the old school way, by painters.. with actual colours and canvases. Some digital magic is then sprinkled on top to bring us the final design.
Today my guests are two quite different artists. My first guests is Terry Miura. Terry began his career in the 90s in NYC as a freelance illustrator, creating imagery for such clients as Time, Newsweek, Rollingstone, and Sports Illustrated. In between illustration assignments he painted and exhibited cityscapes, and continued his transition to becoming a full time painter after returning to the West Coast in 1996. He has recently designed the book cover for The Paris Bookseller, by Kerri Maher, the story of Shakespeare and Company's founder and one of the most famous booksellers of all time, Sylvia Beach. This book cover is also a painting, now owned by the book's author. (Here's Terry's website https://www.terrymiura.com/)
My second guest today is Darya Solomenko, a Dublin based graphic designer & illustrator, who also happens to be an old friend and former colleague of mine. She recently designed two books - Dima Golik's "I just am.", a poetry collection, and Olga Polyakova's "What, Was It Possible?", a book about building a career from the perspective of an immigrant. Darya has kindly agreed to come on Got Books to tell us all about her creative process. (Here's Darya's Portfolio https://www.solomenko.com/)
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Welcome back to Got Books, the podcast where we talk to booksellers all around the world. My guest today is Alex, co-founder of the first and only bookshop selling new english books in Lisbon, Portugal, Salted Books. This conversation was yet another proof, in case you needed one, that women can indeed do it all, if they set their mind to it. Alex has started Salted Books with her partner Mark, and she has done so without giving up her work and while raising two children. She’s created a magical space that only opened its doors about 5 months ago but has already received raving reviews from readers and writers in Lisbon, and if you head over to their Instagram page you’ll see why. The book curation couldn’t be more relevant, the design of the space is bold and beautiful and it just feels fresh and exciting and like you want to be there. Alex is also hosting intimate and very safe writing spaces, where early on a Tuesday mornings writers come together to write in silence, by candlelight. She’s bringing new voices to Lisbon and encouraging those in Lisbon to write and get creative. This conversation felt encouraging and uplifting and it confirmed a suspicion I’ve had for a while now, interviewing bookshop owners all around the world: starting and running a bookshop is a bit of an art form and there’s a lot of artistic freedom in how it can be done. Here’s my conversation with Alex.
Many of you may know that the main reason Got Books started, years ago, was that I wanted to have my own bookshop and so I figured it would be good to chat to lots of booksellers before I start what seemed like ..a bit of a wild adventure. Then..years passed, many conversations with booksellers were had, but I kept putting this dream of opening a bookshop on hold, for all sorts of reasons. I’m sure you can relate..there’s never a perfect time. A couple of weeks ago though, a small, cozy, kind of perfect location became available in my village so I decided to just go for it..I’ve signed a lease and, together with a few other neighbors and friends who are also really into books, just like you and me, we’re slowly putting together what may be the world’s smallest bookshop. It will be a side project for now, as I do have a full time job that I very much love and a two year old daughter that keeps me entertained and busy, but it’s happening, I’ll open a bookshop. I see it as a community project, since so many people are already contributing with ideas, books, pieces of furniture, their time.. and with that in mind, I have a favour I’d like to ask. If Got Books is a podcast that you enjoy and you’ve been on this bookshop dreaming journey with me, I’d love to ask for you to become a small part of this bookshop too. One way to do that would be to send me one or a few books you’d like to donate to my bookshop, and I’ll post the mailing address in the show notes; if you could add a note inside each book about why you chose it, why you liked it..I’ll make sure that your notes go up on the shelves too, for all to see. It would mean so much to me to get books from around the world from Got Books listeners and have these be some of the very first books as we open our doors. Another way to support this brand new bookshop, especially if you live far from Spain and sending books my way doesn’t feel like the most climate friendly thing to do, is to send me suggestions for how to name the bookshop. It may seem strange that I don’t have a name yet, given how long I’ve been thinking about it, but..I do not, so if you feel inspired, send me ideas on how to name a bookshop that is small, cozy, in a Spanish village by the sea, selling books in both English and Spanish. Feel free to email me your ideas a [email protected]
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