Designs for the Printed Page, Fortune Magazine [Leo Lionni]

Designs for the Printed Page by Leo Lionni, c. 1959. Fortune, New York. 10.25 x 13, pp. 47 with English text. Designed by Leo Lionni, Fortune’s Art Director.

Lionni’s promotional book on design and form in advertising features (47) individual designs (many color) as single and double-page spreads aimed at promoting Fortunes “high standards of graphic excellence”. Each example, which “can be applied to virtually any advertisement”, includes a brief interpretation of the designer’s intent such as — “Variations in size and color on a constant theme” and “Rhythmic repetition can make a relatively uninteresting form memorable”. An excellent book with thoughtful content designed using Century Schoolbook.

Lionni was an “adopted” Italian, born in the Netherlands but studied and worked in Italy before arriving in Philadelphia where he landed a job with Art Director, Charles Coiner at N.W. Ayer & Son, America’s oldest advertising agency. In 1948, he became Art Director of Fortune where he helped redesign the magazine in a more readable, softer style. Lionni’s distinctive design approach merged European imagination with an American professionalism, he said: “I felt 100% Italian and 100% America.”

A very good plus softcover with lightly handled pages and some scratches to one spread. The stapled binding is detached from the center spread. In it’s original good decorated publishers yellow slipcase.