The Great Gatsby (Penguin, 2010)
Coralie Bickford-Smith, Reading graduate and senior cover designer at Penguin Books, used Penumbra Serif for the hardback edition of The Great Gatsby that marked the 70th anniversary of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s death. It is part of a whole series of books by Fitzgerald.
I designed the patterns in an attempt to give these books something of the elegance and glamour of the art deco period, with the sense of ornate detail fused with the modernist aesthetic of mechanical repetition. The combination of metallic foil and matt paper is designed to feel good in the hand as well as look good on the shelf; by evoking the jazz age of Fitzgerald’s stories, I hope these books will give a little tactile enhancement to the reading experience. — Coralie Bickford-Smith
