When I was researching layout as a potential future design field for myself, I was enamored by Irma Boom’s experimental books. My goal was to create a 11” x 15” monograph that did her history, design process, and catalogue justice. Irma Boom is a Amsterdam-based graphic designer most well-known for pushing what a book can be. She’s the youngest person to have won a Gutenberg Prize and is the only living bookmaker to be collected by the Museum of Modern Art.
Visually, the monograph has the framework of a bookcase. The majority of the images in the monograph are longer horizontally than vertically, creating the mental image of pulling these books off of Boom’s extensive shelves to get a better look. The biggest part of the page is always the spread, aligning the gutter to the gutter of the monograph in order to simulate the experience of reading one her books on a smaller scale.
