Book design refers to the art of incorporating the content, style, format, design, and sequence of the various components of a book into a coherent whole. Style may refer to genre, design, format, or appearance, including: Clothing: fashion Flower part: flower Music: music genre Sundial part: Gnomon Titles or honorifics: Style (manner of address) including Chinese courtesy names Web design: Cascading Style Sheets Writing: style guide and literary genre Linguistics: Variation in language use of an... Format has several meanings; did you mean: Disk formatting — the process of preparing a disk for use File format — various ways information is encoded in computing Format — a command in the Common Lisp programming language Radio format — the musical style and programming philosophy of a radio station. ... Design as a process can take many forms depending on the object being designed and the individual or individuals participating. ...

In the words of Jan Tschichold, book design "[...] Though largely forgotten today. methods and rules upon which it is impossible to improve have been developed over centuries. To produce perfect books these rules have to be brought back to life and applied." Jan Tschichold was a German typographer and book designer. ...

The basic unit in book design is the page spread. The left page (called verso) and right page (called recto) are of the same size and aspect ratio, and are centered on the gutter where they are bound together at the spine. The verso of a broadsheet, pamphlet or any printed document is the side that is meant to be read second or the left-hand page of a folded sheet. ... The recto of a broadsheet, pamphlet or any printed document is the side that is meant to be read first or the right-hand page of a folded sheet. ... The word gutter refers to a long, thin trough, usually one that runs straight. ...

Book design concerns itself with the following elements:

• Overall layout, type choices
• Front and back covers
• Title page
• Edition notice
• Table of contents
• List of figures
• Preface
• Body chapters
• Appendixes
• Glossary
• Index

Layout, in publishing, is the process of arranging editorial content, advertising, graphics and other information in a manner that creates an effective presentation. ... Typographic work Typography (from the Greek words typos = form and grapho = write) is the art and technique of selecting and arranging type styles, point sizes, line lengths, line leading, character spacing, and word spacing for typeset applications. ... The title page of a book, abbreviated t. ... A table of contents is an organized list of titles for quick information on the summary of a book or document and quickly directing the reader to any topic. ... A preface (Med. ... This is a list of glossaries (pages containing terms and their definitions or explanations). ...

See also

• Print space
• Van de Graaf canon
• Golden section (page proportion)
• Gutemberg canon
• Book binding

The Print space (German Satzspiegel) is a typographic term and determines the effective area on the paper of a book, journal or other press work. ... The Van de Graaf canon, used in book design to divide a page in pleasing proportions. ... The page proportion using the Golden section canon, has been used in book design in many manuscripts. ... The Gutemberg canon is the canon used by Gutemberg to design the page layout of books. ... Bookbinding is the process of physically assembling a book from a number of separate sheets of paper or other material. ...

References

• Tschichold, Jan, The Form of the Book (1991), Hartley & Marks, ISBN 0-88179-116-4
• Van de Graaf, J. A. . Nieuwe berekening voor de vormgeving. (1946)
• Rosarivo, Raúl M., Divina proporción tipográfica, La Plata, Argentina (1956)
• Hendel, Richard, On Book Design, Yale University Press (1998) ISBN 0-300-07570-7