Intermezzo by Sally Rooney, Faber & Faber and Claassen editions
Front and spine of Faber & Faber’s book jacket
Intermezzo is Irish writer Sally Rooney’s latest novel. The “exquisitely moving story about grief, love and family” was published in the UK in September 2024 by Faber & Faber. It comes with a modern and thoughtful book cover with bold graphic design and an unconventional mix of typefaces.
The book jacket was designed by in-house designer and illustrator Kishan Rajani (you can read about the process in an interview for GQ). It features three main elements stacked upon each other on a white background: the author’s name, in Maax Display Ultra, shown in the signature electric blue also seen on the book’s back and in much of the marketing campaign, which started months before the release. Underneath sits a square illustration featuring a man’s silhouette standing in the background while the legs of another walking man frame the picture in the foreground, with a fallen chess piece at his feet. The third element is the title, set in the open-source font Le Murmure, also in all caps.
The whole communication makes thorough use of the typeface duo and of the blue-white-black trichromy; on posters, tote bags, the dedicated website, coffee cups, enamel pins, stickers, T-shirts, etc. The publisher even organized live jacket design events where illustrators (Yuk Fun, Maria Ines Gul and Nänni-Pää) would draw custom designs onto jackets that were printed out with the illustrated square left blank.
The hardback version is available both with a white and a blue background. Review copies of the book were also sent out featuring a temporary cover that already featured the distinctive colors and fonts, but not yet the illustration.
The German hardback edition (translated by Zoë Beck) by Claassen follows the same basic design as the one by Faber & Faber, also featuring Maax Display and Le Murmure.
Front of Faber & Faber’s book jacket. “Author of Normal People” at the top is set in Futura and Futura Black.
The hardback book cover depicts a sitting dog and also features Maax Display and Le Murmure.
The back of the jacket continues the chess theme with blue and white fields. The typeface is an italic Garamond, possibly Garamond Premier.
Review copy of the book, on top of a tote bag
Shop window decorated with promotional posters and oversized chess pieces
Early birds with promotional cups and plastic bags
A jacket with custom illustration in the making
One of the jacket designs with custom illustration, alongside a bookmark ft. text in Futura and a chess sticker
Promotional enamel pin and a paperback edition of the book
The sign at this book shop features a magnificent rendering of the book jacket and its typography in chalk. Due to the medium of the blackboard, black and white are reversed.
The book plus a matching tote bag
The book and an advert on the London Underground
Book jacket and cover of the German edition by Claassen
Claassen’s limited first edition comes with blue edges.
1 Comment on “Intermezzo by Sally Rooney, Faber & Faber and Claassen editions”
Thank you, Arno! Jérémy also noticed this fine use of his Le Murmure, and submitted a post about it, too. Since we don’t post duplicates, I’ve merged several images and some of his notes and observations into this post – merci, Jérémy! Kudos to Matthijs for tracking down the missing font ID (and a shout-out to Identifont for providing helpful tools).