This week is PHAIDON WEEK on Fixabook.com — For the very simple reason that  they are doing things with design and packaging that we can all learn from…

Normally at Fixabook we try to stay away from the purely beautiful. Our preference is to focus on the strategic aspects of design.

But to be honest we couldn’t resist this cover. It is gorgeous.

Even so there is a cleverness to it: Most obviously the choice of an imprint of  wooden planks as a means of focusing on concrete.

This little bit of playfulness softens the starkness of the title and at the same time disrupts our (probably negative) pre-conceptions about concrete.

It means that the cover has ended up being intriguing, beautiful and tactile — none of which we would have expected.

Quite simply it makes us want to open the book and learn more.

Job done.

The tactile element is heightened by the embossing on the cover. This is something that normally we hate because it rarely adds anything to the design but a lot to the cost. In this case though, the effect is very seductive.

Finally, one cannot let this cover go without picking up on the Publisher branding on the front. Many people argue that logos ‘spoil’ their designs. This belies a lack of understanding of the bigger picture and the increasing need for publishers to move in this direction as the world goes digital.

We would simply add to our previous comments on this subject that if Phaidon can slap a logo on their usually gorgeous covers — then frankly, anyone can do it.