This
brief essay—which really should go in Architectural Digest, Dwell, Interior Design, Elle Décor, or
House Beautiful—is about designing with books but also says something about
communication and how our decorating says something about who we are.
Recently, we
had our loft decorated by a professional decorator who was excellent, except
for one thing: He wanted to remove the dust jackets (book jackets, dust covers)
from my rather extensive library. I resisted. But I figured that this may be a
standard decorating principle and so I journeyed to the large department stores
and where books were displayed, there were no dust jackets in sight. Apparently,
it is a decorating principle, but one that needs to be revisited and removed
from the decorator’s handbook.
Dust jackets are integral to the book; they are a part of the
book, not like a candy wrapper that is removed and thrown away. Dust jackets
are a preview of the theme or the mood of the book and serve much the same
purpose as the introduction or preface, but ideally in an extremely brief but visually
arresting way. They tell the potential reader something important about the
book, with their words obviously, but also with their fonts, colors, and
visuals.
Dust jackets serve an attention-gaining function, much like
the introduction to a speech or article. They draw attention to the book; they
invite you to look more extensively at the book, to spend some time with it.
And, again, much like the introduction to a speech or article, they provide the
potential reader with a preview, explaining or hinting at the content of the
book, at what is to follow.
Dust jackets individualize books. Whereas books without dust
jackets look very much the same, dust jackets make each book visually distinct.
And, of course, each book is distinct and different from every other book.
Books without jackets lose a good part of this distinctiveness, a distinctiveness
that adds variety--color and dimension—to a shelf that would otherwise be
totally bland—especially when the books number in the hundreds.
Dust jackets are given considerable attention by publishers
and are often works of art. And although the dust jacket is nothing more than a
type of poster, it still is a work of art that can be enjoyed in and of itself.
Furthermore, if the book is a first edition or otherwise rare, it will be worth
far less without its original dust jacket. So, by destroying the dust jacket,
you destroy a good part of the value of the book, perhaps its total value. And
you don’t want a client to discover that a once-valuable book is now worthless.
Consider too the different messages that a bookcase of
dust-jacketed books and jacket-less books communicate about your clients, who
they are and what their priorities are. A good argument could be made that the
impression the dust jackets create is of a lover of books, a reader, someone
with a mind. The jacket-less books more likely communicate clients more
concerned with appearance than substance.
From a purely practical point of view, they help the user
find the book, especially when the library is extensive. And once this now
easy-to-find book is found, the jacket serves as a reminder of the mode or
theme of the book.
So, decorators, think about the important functions that dust
jackets serve and consider the values of leaving them exactly where the publisher,
designer, and author put them.
