the brief
A QUIET STORY, A LOUD TENSION
Dust jacket redesign for Sally Rooney's novel of class, intimacy, and two people who can't quite stay apart. The tangled scribble around the title visualizes what looks ordinary from the outside but is knotted underneath.
Full jacket redesigns across fiction, nonfiction, and culinary editorial. Each cover needed its own authored language, not a house style stretched across every title.
THe problem
A SCENE ISN'T A FEELING
Illustrating a couple directly reads as generic romance, not literary fiction, and gets lost on a shelf or at thumbnail size.
The Insight
DRAW THE CONNECTION, NOT THE COUPLE
Two faces drawn as one continuous line, overlapping at the edges. Neither is fully separate from the other, intimacy rendered as structure, not image.
the brief
Four titles, four visual worlds
Full jacket redesigns across fiction, nonfiction, and culinary editorial. Each cover needed its own authored language, not a house style stretched across every title.
THe problem
Literal reads safe, not memorable
The easy move is illustrating what a book is about. That reads as commercial default and gets lost on a shelf or at thumbnail size.
the insight
Embody the book, don't describe it
The strongest covers carry a book's emotional register, not its plot. Concept first, then type, then image, restraint doing more work than decoration.
Concept Before Illustration
Reads at Thumbnail Size
Distinct Voice Per Title
Full Jacket System
NORMAL PEOPLE
01 THE TITLE
02 the PALETTE
03 the ILLUSTRTION
04 tHE TYPOGRAPHY
The tangled scribble around "normal people" visualizes the tension in the title itself — what looks ordinary from the outside is knotted and complicated underneath. It mirrors Connell and Marianne's relationship: clean on the surface, messy and overlapping in reality.
Cream and red, split cleanly in two. The stark division nods to the class divide between Connell and Marianne — two worlds that look separate until you notice how much they depend on each other. Red carries the intensity underneath the quiet.
Two faces drawn as one continuous line, overlapping at the edges. Neither face is fully separate from the other the line that forms Marianne's profile becomes the line that forms Connell's. It's intimacy rendered as structure, not just image.
Lowercase, serif, understated sally rooney rendered without ornament. The typeface stays out of the way, the same restraint Rooney's prose is known for: spare on the surface, doing the real work underneath.
how to end a love story
01 The PAPER TEXTURE
The type is deliberately hard to parse at first glance, letters compressed and overlapping like the ones we misjudge on sight. It's a small formal echo of the book's argument: we don't actually read people as clearly as we think we do.
02 the SCRIPT
Where the colours and illustration carry Gladwell's bold, bright thinking, the typography holds the ground. It's the sober, journalistic anchor, the part of the cover that says this isn't a novel, it's reporting.
03 the TYPOGRAPHY
The orange is loud and unapologetic, matching the boldness of Gladwell's claims and the confidence with which he overturns what we assume about people. Psychologically, orange reads as energetic and provocative, exactly the jolt needed to pull you toward ideas that unsettle as much as they inform.
04 tHE IMAGE
The two figures are silhouettes only, faceless and mid-stride, never quite placed. Their long shadows stretch across the red, doing the job of a setting without ever naming one. It's a small visual bet that mirrors the title: you're not meant to fully see them, only catch their shape as they pass.
the final product
05 book jacket
06 book interpretation
06 book interpretation
Metaphor vs. direct illustration
Original: a tin of sardines as metaphor for entanglement.
Reinterpretation: two faces drawn in line, depicting the people directly.
Bold color vs. neutral background
Original: olive green, high contrast.
Reinterpretation: muted off white, letting the line work carry it.
Contained vs. overflowing linework
Original: the tin sits neatly in its own space.
Reinterpretation: the line tangles upward over the title.
Bold sans serif vs. quiet serif
Original: chunky, all caps, built for shelf visibility.
Reinterpretation: lowercase serif, closer to handwriting.
WARM, MODERN, ROOTED IN CRAFT
Concept Before Illustration
Distinct Voice Per Title
ONE OWNABLE SYMBOL
Reads at Thumbnail Size
Concept Before Illustration
LEGIBLE IN LIGHT & DARK
Distinct Voice Per Title
Reads at Thumbnail Size
SCALABLE ACROSS PRINT, PACKAGING, SIGNAGE
Full Jacket System
the brief
A QUIET STORY, A LOUD TENSION
Dust jacket redesign for Sally Rooney's novel of class, intimacy, and two people who can't quite stay apart. The tangled scribble around the title visualizes what looks ordinary from the outside but is knotted underneath.
Full jacket redesigns across fiction, nonfiction, and culinary editorial. Each cover needed its own authored language, not a house style stretched across every title.
THe problem
A SCENE ISN'T A FEELING
Illustrating a couple directly reads as generic romance, not literary fiction, and gets lost on a shelf or at thumbnail size.
The Insight
DRAW THE CONNECTION, NOT THE COUPLE
Two faces drawn as one continuous line, overlapping at the edges. Neither is fully separate from the other, intimacy rendered as structure, not image.
the brief
Four titles, four visual worlds
Full jacket redesigns across fiction, nonfiction, and culinary editorial. Each cover needed its own authored language, not a house style stretched across every title.
THe problem
Literal reads safe, not memorable
The easy move is illustrating what a book is about. That reads as commercial default and gets lost on a shelf or at thumbnail size.
the insight
Embody the book, don't describe it
The strongest covers carry a book's emotional register, not its plot. Concept first, then type, then image, restraint doing more work than decoration.
Concept Before Illustration
Reads at Thumbnail Size
Distinct Voice Per Title
Full Jacket System
NORMAL PEOPLE
01 THE TITLE
02 the PALETTE
03 the ILLUSTRTION
04 tHE TYPOGRAPHY
The tangled scribble around "normal people" visualizes the tension in the title itself — what looks ordinary from the outside is knotted and complicated underneath. It mirrors Connell and Marianne's relationship: clean on the surface, messy and overlapping in reality.
Cream and red, split cleanly in two. The stark division nods to the class divide between Connell and Marianne — two worlds that look separate until you notice how much they depend on each other. Red carries the intensity underneath the quiet.
Two faces drawn as one continuous line, overlapping at the edges. Neither face is fully separate from the other the line that forms Marianne's profile becomes the line that forms Connell's. It's intimacy rendered as structure, not just image.
Lowercase, serif, understated sally rooney rendered without ornament. The typeface stays out of the way, the same restraint Rooney's prose is known for: spare on the surface, doing the real work underneath.
how to end a love story
01 The PAPER TEXTURE
The type is deliberately hard to parse at first glance, letters compressed and overlapping like the ones we misjudge on sight. It's a small formal echo of the book's argument: we don't actually read people as clearly as we think we do.
02 the SCRIPT
Where the colours and illustration carry Gladwell's bold, bright thinking, the typography holds the ground. It's the sober, journalistic anchor, the part of the cover that says this isn't a novel, it's reporting.
03 the TYPOGRAPHY
The orange is loud and unapologetic, matching the boldness of Gladwell's claims and the confidence with which he overturns what we assume about people. Psychologically, orange reads as energetic and provocative, exactly the jolt needed to pull you toward ideas that unsettle as much as they inform.
04 tHE IMAGE
The two figures are silhouettes only, faceless and mid-stride, never quite placed. Their long shadows stretch across the red, doing the job of a setting without ever naming one. It's a small visual bet that mirrors the title: you're not meant to fully see them, only catch their shape as they pass.
the final product
05 book jacket
06 book interpretation
06 book interpretation
Metaphor vs. direct illustration
Original: a tin of sardines as metaphor for entanglement.
Reinterpretation: two faces drawn in line, depicting the people directly.
Bold color vs. neutral background
Original: olive green, high contrast.
Reinterpretation: muted off white, letting the line work carry it.
Contained vs. overflowing linework
Original: the tin sits neatly in its own space.
Reinterpretation: the line tangles upward over the title.
Bold sans serif vs. quiet serif
Original: chunky, all caps, built for shelf visibility.
Reinterpretation: lowercase serif, closer to handwriting.
WARM, MODERN, ROOTED IN CRAFT
Concept Before Illustration
Distinct Voice Per Title
ONE OWNABLE SYMBOL
Reads at Thumbnail Size
Concept Before Illustration
LEGIBLE IN LIGHT & DARK
Distinct Voice Per Title
Reads at Thumbnail Size
SCALABLE ACROSS PRINT, PACKAGING, SIGNAGE
Full Jacket System