Design*Sponge Book Cover Evolution

Design*Sponge has an interesting post on the evolution of the Design*Sponge book cover through 30+ cover drafts. I like some of the other covers a bit more than the final cover (the bright red one) but it's interesting to see all the different visual directions explored.

Scandilicious

I love the title font on this book cover. A very elegant and simple design - understated in a Scandinavian way...

Great Food Covers by Coralie Bickford-Smith

Coralie Bickford-Smith brings beautiful color, whimsy and patterns to the Great Food series for Penguin books. My favorite things about this series are the colorful spines and the Love in a Dish cover.

Embroidered Book Covers by Jillian Tamaki

I can't stop looking at these amazingly beautiful embroidered book covers for 3 Penguin Classics books. Jillian Tamaki does beautiful work!

Book Cover Inspiration: Romantic and Vintage

When I look for soft, romantic, vintage design, a good genre to browse is Christian fiction and inspirational titles.

I don't think I've ever used mauve in a design but Dawn's Prelude is prettily romantic in this color. The swirls and collage style design add depth and texure. A Dream to Call My Own has interesting ornamental elements and elegant sepia tones.

I love the red and black striped dress and the vintage detailing around the title in That Certain Spark. The Homecoming's blue background is attractive with its bold color and subtle embossed border. The vintage ticket and pocket watch are a sweet touch. None of the typography is stellar but for the most part, appropriately classic fonts convey a classic touch.

Old Border Road

A lot of little things please me about this book cover: the misty horse photo - burnt to reds and yellows, the white tab, the simple and understated typography, the flowering line art bursting out from the side.

Florida Gardener's Resource

This beautifully realistic flower on the cover of Florida's Gardener's Resource caught my eye. I like the background texture and typography too. It's also a nice layout/design inside - lots of photos, type is well organized and pleasing to read. A good resource for my bookshelf!

Book Cover Inspiration: Moody and Dark

These covers show the drama and atmosphere that the color black can convey. I love the moody silhouette and type on the branch in the To Kill a Mocking Bird anniversary cover. I like how the colors work together in The Bells cover. Torment's strength is artistic photography and interesting fonts. The over the top gothic swirls and grungy photo make Beautiful Darkness deliciously dark.

Book Cover Inspiration: Dark and Light

My favorite in this selection is The Imperfectionists. I like bottom weighted composition and expanse of black space. The high key image and off centered typography in Tinkers are elegantly executed. The suggestion that the most interesting part of the composition is off the frame (Genesis) and the hair silhouette 'O's (A Short History of Women) are also intriguing.

How to Design a Cover in 1:55 seconds

I love this video "How to Design a Cover in 1:55 seconds" I saw posted on design:related. The video:

Book Cover Inspiration from WellMedicated.com

I discovered WellMedicated.com through their recent blog entry: 45 Beautifully Designed Book Covers. Here are my favorites from their selection.

Book Cover Inspiration: Oprah's Summer Reading List

Oprah's summer reading list has some books with interesting design. I love the color and decorative text on Dreaming in Hindi. The extreme cropping and ghostly white text on the light gray background make the Columbine cover moody and appropriate. I like the order and structure of Plan Bee. And for Admission, gotta love the 'A'.

The Book of Dead Philosophers

I first noticed the cover design for The Book of Dead Philosophers because the size was so unusual. I don't usually see books that narrow and it really stood out to me on the shelf. The book within a book concept is clever and the whole design is very creative with white space, perspective, proportions.

Try to See it My Way

Here's another creative photograph on a book cover. The little hearts on the apple and orange add interest and emotion to this cover. Adorable! I've only started reading it but it's an excellent book so far.

Plants and Their Application to Ornament

There's something I love about vintage flower drawings so this book cover really caught my eye. The typography is a bit weak but the illustration and patterns are just beautiful. From Chronicle Books.

Milk: The Surprising Story of Milk Through the Ages

On almost any other cover, this font would be too fussy, too ornate to be used for all of the cover typography. But here, the swirling script works perfectly with the milk bottle and makes this a stunningly simple and elegant cover.

Similar Book Cover Design Elements

When I first saw The Believers cover in Borders, I thought I'd already seen it somewhere else. Turns out I had only seen the same effect—lots of lines/swirls in the background right next to the text—on the All the Sad Young Literary Men cover.

I prefer the All the Sad Young Literary Men cover design. I like the small drawings and the gray swirls feel more purposeful, almost like whorls of a fingerprint.

The Scales of Justice

I like the layers and texture in this cover design from Penguin Books. It's interesting to see how a design can have plenty of depth with a monochromatic color scheme.

The Drunkard's Walk

My favorite thing about this cover is the die cut circled letters that randomly spell out "random" from the full words of the title. The Drunkard's Walk has a simple and interesting cover design and the die cuts add another level of interest.

The Calling

I like the vintage tech look of this book cover. I especially like the simple and moody color scheme and detailed black and white patterns.