folkore (2019)
book, bookbinding, graphic design, layout design
A hand-bound book with coptic stitch, printed on recycled paper. The book contains numerous folklore stories, found from cultures rooted in Australia, North Africa, South Africa, and other locations around the world. folklore is wrapped in a map printed on newsprint, bringing the book and the stories within together as one. Each story is positioned on the page based on the location of origin.
Based around a single word ‘Folklore’ explores stories told for generations all around the world. I broke it up by different continents and found stories within each place. Each section of the book is broken up by these continents, not only by section title and order of stories but also by physical placement of the story on each spread. The spread is designed into different quadrants of a world map, giving each story a unique home based on the coordinates of their origin. This is carried through in the table of contents and the book cover that is wrapping around the full book. The book cover features a simplified world map, along with images from each place of origin on the inside. These images are also found at the beginning of each section, wrapping around and protecting the placement for each story.
I also printed out the book myself, printing on tabloid paper, folding it into the different signatures, binding together with thread, and trimming the pages. I believe that this process is just as much important to the design process as designing the layout of the book is. I spend a lot of time making sure that the pages are printing out correctly, and that the binding is just as clean. The wrap for the book was printed on newsprint, double-sided. In order to fit the newsprint in the printer and actually have it catch onto the paper, I had to tape multiple sheets together. I then flipped the pages and taped them back together to print the back. The cover is not only to keep the book clean and protected but also to bring all the stories together as one, connected by the earth.
