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Giants of Jazz, The New Press

Contributed by Carrie Hamilton on Feb 3rd, 2014. Artwork published in .
Giants of Jazz, The New Press 1
Source: kismetdesign.com © The New Press, Illustrations by Robert Galster. License: All Rights Reserved.

I designed these covers for The New Press for Gary Tooth at Empire Design Studio. They’re a reprint in two different versions of Studs Terkel’s very first book, Giants of Jazz, first published in 1957.

Fortunately for us, The New Press’ then-publisher, Colin Robinson presented us with an original edition of the book, which featured the stunning black-and-white illustrations I later adapted for the covers, as well as title text set in Corvinus. As far as we understood at the time, Corvinus didn’t exist in a digital form, so I naively created one in Fontographer for use here, using Dover’s Classic Typefaces and How To Use Them as reference. In retrospect, we could have done fine with Jane Patterson’s Skyline or Tobias Frere-Jones’ Niagara. (Ann Pomoroy’s Corvinus Skyline hadn’t been created yet).

Giants of Jazz, The New Press 2
Source: kismetdesign.com © The New Press, Illustrations by Robert Galster. License: All Rights Reserved.
Giants of Jazz, The New Press 3
Source: kismetdesign.com © The New Press, Illustrations by Robert Galster. License: All Rights Reserved.
Corvinus specimen page from Dover's Classic Typefaces and How to Use Them.
Source: kismetdesign.com © The New Press, Illustrations by Robert Galster. License: All Rights Reserved.

Corvinus specimen page from Dover's Classic Typefaces and How to Use Them.

Giants of Jazz, The New Press 5
Source: kismetdesign.com © The New Press, Illustrations by Robert Galster. License: All Rights Reserved.

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