Monday Musings | Riverhead Books’ New Colophon

Photo source: Riverhead Books’ Facebook Page

Happy Monday, friends! This week is already off to a great start for me as I’ve been geeking out over Riverhead Books’ new colophon all day! (Am I the only one who learned what “colophon” means today?) I learned about the re-design this morning and I can’t stop thinking about it, especially the gorgeous video they made to reveal it — see above, or on Riverhead Books’ Instagram here.

If you’re like me and hadn’t heard of the term “colophon” before, here’s how Wikipedia defines it:

“In publishing, a colophon is a brief statement containing information about the publication of a book such as the place of publication, the publisher, and the date of publication. A colophon may also be emblematic or pictorial in nature.”

As someone who doesn’t specialize in graphic design, I’ve always been interested in learning how book covers and advertisements are made, but I’ll admit that I never really thought about the process behind creating a colophon. Paste Magazine’s exclusive reveal of the Riverhead colophon gets a little behind designer and Riverhead Art Director Helen Yentus’ inspiration and I think it’s worth a read. As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, and I think Yentus did a fantastic job of modernizing the Riverhead colophon while staying true to its previous version so that it remains recognizable. Now I’m going to pay more attention to everyone else’s!

What do you think? Do you like Riverhead’s new colophon? Do you have a favourite colophon? (Am I ever going to stop saying “colophon”?)