The French graphic designer Massin (1925 – 2020) started working for Le Club du Meilleur Livre in 1952. He bore responsibility for every aspect of the book’s production, not just typography. He made what he called book-objects, books in which aesthetic aspects exist independently of the textual content and – as he himself stated – prevail over legibility. Massin expressed the books’ content through a range of elements: size, binding, layout, paper, typeface, etc. As a result, the text is no longer text and the book is not a book. Moreover, L’Or by Blaise Cendrars was designed as a whole – starting with the cover, which embraces the pages within via colour and typography. Then there are illustrations on the flyleaves; the striking chapter numbers in typography: all in all, a work of art.
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