We talk to Rumors about its art direction for Verso Books

Rumors makes ambitious work that utilises the potential of the internet. Through identities, apps, exhibitions and publications it seizes the opportunities of a medium in its infancy, that is flexible by nature, and an ever-changing network of production, distribution and encounters. Its work with Verso Books started with the Radical Thinkers series and has since gone on to become a long-term consultancy role, encompassing all print and online titles and content. We spoke to Andy Pressman about the collaboration with the radical publishers.

Your collaboration with Verso Books began with the Radical Thinkers series, could you tell us about your design approach?

Radical Thinkers is an ongoing paperback series of reissued political and philosophical titles from Verso’s catalogue. For a while the series was published on a yearly basis; now it’s a bit more frequent. To date I’ve done something like 70 covers, all of which are built on a strict design system of type and simple line illustrations.

When I first developed the system, I wanted to play against clichéd “radical” design gestures, like the ripped paper or aggressive typography you’d see in advertising. The books in the series are radical for their ideas and arguments, less so for their rhetoric and styling. The covers called for restraint.

But since the hope was that the covers would draw in new readers, I still wanted to produce something that was visually compelling. So I developed an illustration system that could reflect, however obliquely, the texts at hand. Some of the illustrations are easily read, and others are abstract or elliptical. It depends on the book, and the author’s intent. Most book covers provide context, but these rarely do. If anything, they un-clarify — they turn the polemic into the poetic.

I’m occasionally asked whether we read all the books prior to designing their covers, and the answer is no. God, no. I sometimes have just two or three weeks to assemble sketches, which isn’t enough time to do more than skim. I read them once they’ve come out, though. Some of them, anyway — maybe a third I read with ease, another third are a very pleasurable struggle, and then a final third require a literacy that I do not possess.

On shifting through to further involvement – redesigning the website and working with the catalogue, how familiar were you with the content of their publishing, and how did the Verso Books thinking affect your decision making?

I was familiar with Verso before I worked on the Radical Thinkers series, but only as an occasional reader. One of the most influential books I read as a student was Hal Foster’s Design & Crime, which Verso published (and which I later had the thrill and terror of designing a new cover for), and that had me looking at other titles in their list. But designing the Radical Thinkers series was something else entirely, and meant spending weeks researching and thinking about Verso’s back catalogue. So once we moved on to the website I’d already spent some time internalising how Verso thought and operated.

We still had to figure out what that meant for the web, of course; the structure and functionality of the website weren’t predetermined. But the aesthetic ideas were already forming. We knew we wanted to develop a page-building logic, rather than a series of page templates. We ended up with a design language built around discrete clusters of related content. These clusters slot next to one another based on the needs of the page, with no fussing over placement or shape. It feels like an argument rather than an artwork, which I like.

The site’s almost five years old now, and starting to show its age. We’re in the process of reworking it to address some needs that have emerged in the meantime.

As well as the redesign, you seem to be involved in an ongoing consultancy role – could you tell us about this, and is this a common relationship that arises out of your work?

We work with Verso to make strategic use of design, whether in their books or on the internet. The publishing industry is experiencing rapid change, which is an excellent opportunity for a publisher that wants to rethink how their books are designed, distributed, and received. Verso is a smart, forward-thinking partner, which makes for a collaborative and engaged process. It’s a good fit.

This is what we’re good at, and so it’s increasingly the kind of work that we’re doing. We tackle immediate needs, even as we help our clients develop strategies that look a few years ahead. The immediate needs are apparent right away, and are often identities and websites. The long-term needs and opportunities take time to think through. That’s why we start from the ground up, with research and conceptualisation, so we can acclimatise ourselves to what has to happen now while also clarifying and laying the foundation for the as-yet unknown.

Even on jobs that aren’t explicitly about long-term strategy, our process requires that we reach an intimate familiarity with our clients’ operations and goals. Moving into an advisory role often makes the most long-term sense.

What are your plans moving forward?

Rumors is now based in the Pacific Northwest, after having spent five years or so in New York City. But most of our clients are still in New York, or are dispersed internationally. So I’d like to grow our practice here on the west coast. People tell us that there’s only tech in Seattle, or entertainment in Los Angeles, but I think that’s dismissive of what could emerge there, of what is emerging there.

It may just be a prejudice that my corner of the design industry has towards the NYC-centered art world, which historically fostered forward-thinking design work. But design literacy is growing everywhere. It’s easy to dismiss that literacy off-hand, and to say that everyone’s just mindlessly consuming images on Tumblr or Pinterest, but that’s a short-sighted argument. We’re much savvier design readers. We read both text and image fluently, and we increasingly see the internet as a designed experience worthy of consideration and critique.

These are golden days for cultural and editorial groups who see the potential of the internet, and who serve thoughtful and critical audiences. We’ve had good success attracting like-minded clients to date, and our plan moving forward is to find more.