Vernacular Publishes ‘Second Hand’
The independent publisher co-founded by Andrea Trabucco-Campos releases its second title.
We’re excited to announce the second title from Vernacular, the independent publisher co-founded by Pentagram partner Andrea Trabucco-Campos and former designer Martin Azambuja.
Second Hand is a new book by Jesse Reed, co-founder of Order (and a former Pentagram associate), that documents a forgotten history of graphic design as captured in his snapshots of book covers found in used bookshops around the world.
Rediscovered second-hand books are not just vessels of knowledge, but also windows into the past. These overlooked objects preserve the art of book cover design, often created by unsung heroes of the craft.
The book grew out of Jesse’s posts on his Instagram, where he shared photos of remarkable covers seen while he was browsing the stacks at various bookstores, from local NYC shops like Book Thug Nation, Human Relations and Aeon, to spots in LA, Mexico and Korea.
The 288-page limited edition book includes images of 260 covers by designers including Fred Troller, Chermayeff & Geismar, Josef Albers, Milton Glaser, Paul Rand, John and Mary Condon, Gilda Kuhlman, Rudolph de Harak, and Celestino Piatti, among many others. While the majority of the included titles were published in the 1960s and 1970s, the earliest dates back to 1946 and the most recent is 1994.
To help catalog these largely forgotten works, Vernacular’s small research team created an index with all the information they could find on each title (including Designer, Author, Publisher & Imprint, Year, Edition and Bookstore name/location). The covers will eventually be featured on a publicly accessible online archive launching later this year.
Preorder your copy of Second Hand here. Shipping in early Summer 2024.
Project team: Andrea Trabucco-Campos, Martin Azambuja, Camila Pérez, Ethan Pidgeon.
Photography: Daniel Forero.
