INTRODUCTION

Like all graphic designers, publication designers love wrangling type and image into something engaging, pleasing, and aesthetically coherent on the page. But designers who devote much of their professional life to books, magazines, and newspapers take this interest one step further— they are fascinated by what the words and images actually say. Publication designers are committed to reading what they’re given to design and turning it into something that will entice other people to read it as well. They are enchanted with the process of making something that has dimension and weight, and they enjoy imagining the commuter on the train, the couple on vacation, the visitor at the museum, the person relaxing with a cup of coffee on a Sunday morning picking up what they’ve made, turning the pages, engaging intellectually with what’s in their hands, and, after a few minutes or hours, finding himself a better informed, perhaps even more interesting person for having done so. Those most successful in this endeavor, whether they’re making a little literary journal or a mainstream, widecirculation magazine, see themselves as custodians of the work that writers, editors, illustrators, photographers, and artists have entrusted to their care. They express a remarkable degree of humility and deference in the face of what someone else has made and spend much of their day using their creative skills in service to the output of other creative minds. In the following pages, more than thirty designers, illustrators, editors, and writers freely share their insights, ideas, lessons learned, and satisfactions achieved while making reading material for a voracious world. Each expert brings a unique perspective to what makes a publication designer successful.

Pol Oxygen is an Australian-based international magazine of design, art, and architecture. As art directed by Marcus Piper, its pages reveal the designer’s appreciation for the form, function, and dimensionality of publications.