To dress a book is a meticulous craft, the art of a well-defined field of graphic designers. Chip Kidd, one of today’s best-known book cover designers, has worked for almost 30 years at Random House, the American world-renowned publisher, which combining forces since 2013 with Penguin, the historic English brand, have together formed the world’s largest publisher, Penguin Random House, a galaxy of over 200 imprints.
Book covers are more customary graphic objects than many other applications of design. Acting within the cultural and visual communication of its time, book cover design’s quality contributes to the definition of our present-day society, besides being a practical instrument of commerce. This exhibit is a curated selection of the best among thousands of book covers designed, commissioned, and produced every year by Penguin Random House worldwide through its publishing houses. Many among them maintain a healthy tradition of care towards elegance and innovative design for they published covers and jackets.