i don’t know how this piece made its way to my inbox but it’s my favorite thing i’ve read all week. i’m in kind of a pixel-pushing era and this was a nice reminder that i do actually care about design and how much i value this kind of playfulness, and how flexibility can be built into credo.
Love the “The Borzoi Credo” … it’s like the Hobo Code. Also, I never lend friends books… I just give them my copy off the shelf and then buy another one because I have friends who never get around to returning books 😀
Now I have a question about spine design. Why are some colophon horizontal and some vertical? What design decisions were made and why? This is gonna bug me. 🫠
I don’t know for sure, but based on the variety of logos they use, I’d say it’s based on a philosophy of treating each book as its own individual object before its status as being part of a publisher. Each spine is customized for the book it adorns!
My favorite in the gallery is the Borzoi being tossed in the air by the human figure on the pink spine.
Oh that is cool. It’s a dogbird, like a catdog… is the dog being tossed in the air or being set free… or maybe the hands are extended as a landing pad for the dogbird. And the juxtaposition in the bird with dog… that the borzoi is flying and not jumping… I have all sorts of questions and yet one more book to read to discover the answers… or perhaps more accurately, more questions to ask.
What a cool example of how a logo doesn't have to look exactly the same to create a strong brand. They must not have been worried about counterfeiters?
What a delightfully crunchy post, full of fascinating history!
It gets me thinking about intellectual property and trademarking, though. I doubt any newer publisher today would be so free and easy with their logo; which, in turn, brings up the "quality vs. property" discussion. Knopf was more concerned about quality. Nowhere in the Borzoi Credo is the phrase "ensure continuously greater profit for shareholders no matter what." The credo addresses business concerns within the context of producing products of inherent value and worth. Modern business thought is to protect the IP at all costs, even social and cultural ones, and definitely over quality.
I'm very copy-left in general, which I think stems from my training as a librarian. That's a hard stance to maintain in a late-stage capitalism world, but it's important. I mean, we wouldn't have ALLLLL those delightful borzoi logos if Knopf was more concerned about locking his logo down than he was about fostering great design (and great books!).
I had similar thoughts about copyright and trademarking while writing this! Some logos, like the new Patreon rebrand, is MEANT to be playful and have variety—but in a much more controlled way, to your point. (https://news.patreon.com/articles/patreon-redesigned)
What I love about the Knopf logos is how organic their development was.
“A bevy of borzois” is such a funny little statement that made me smile! Really enjoyed reading this little twist on history and design today.
Haha thank you for noticing that—I was probably too proud of that phrase. Thanks for reading!
i don’t know how this piece made its way to my inbox but it’s my favorite thing i’ve read all week. i’m in kind of a pixel-pushing era and this was a nice reminder that i do actually care about design and how much i value this kind of playfulness, and how flexibility can be built into credo.
anyway, i love the endpapers SO much 😍
I don’t know how either, but I’m so glad it did! Thanks for reading 🙂
Love the “The Borzoi Credo” … it’s like the Hobo Code. Also, I never lend friends books… I just give them my copy off the shelf and then buy another one because I have friends who never get around to returning books 😀
Now I have a question about spine design. Why are some colophon horizontal and some vertical? What design decisions were made and why? This is gonna bug me. 🫠
I don’t know for sure, but based on the variety of logos they use, I’d say it’s based on a philosophy of treating each book as its own individual object before its status as being part of a publisher. Each spine is customized for the book it adorns!
My favorite in the gallery is the Borzoi being tossed in the air by the human figure on the pink spine.
Oh that is cool. It’s a dogbird, like a catdog… is the dog being tossed in the air or being set free… or maybe the hands are extended as a landing pad for the dogbird. And the juxtaposition in the bird with dog… that the borzoi is flying and not jumping… I have all sorts of questions and yet one more book to read to discover the answers… or perhaps more accurately, more questions to ask.
What a cool example of how a logo doesn't have to look exactly the same to create a strong brand. They must not have been worried about counterfeiters?
I suppose not! I have also wondered at the copyright/trademark situation of all of these marks
What a delightfully crunchy post, full of fascinating history!
It gets me thinking about intellectual property and trademarking, though. I doubt any newer publisher today would be so free and easy with their logo; which, in turn, brings up the "quality vs. property" discussion. Knopf was more concerned about quality. Nowhere in the Borzoi Credo is the phrase "ensure continuously greater profit for shareholders no matter what." The credo addresses business concerns within the context of producing products of inherent value and worth. Modern business thought is to protect the IP at all costs, even social and cultural ones, and definitely over quality.
I'm very copy-left in general, which I think stems from my training as a librarian. That's a hard stance to maintain in a late-stage capitalism world, but it's important. I mean, we wouldn't have ALLLLL those delightful borzoi logos if Knopf was more concerned about locking his logo down than he was about fostering great design (and great books!).
I had similar thoughts about copyright and trademarking while writing this! Some logos, like the new Patreon rebrand, is MEANT to be playful and have variety—but in a much more controlled way, to your point. (https://news.patreon.com/articles/patreon-redesigned)
What I love about the Knopf logos is how organic their development was.