charlota, 'The Observing Mind': brand reference book for hermeneutic

What it is, and who made it

Two spreads of a brand reference book called "The Observing Mind", for a company named hermeneutic. Spread 1 is a mood board beside a large serif title. Spread 2 shows two symbol plates: an eye drawn as concentric rings (plate 11) and an atom of crossed orbits around a four-point star (plate 12).

Parts, layer by layer

• Layout (O):
  • running heads in small tracked mono capitals (THE OBSERVING MIND on the left; CONCEPT or SYMBOL INSPIRATION on the right);
  • plates numbered ( 11 ) and ( 12 );
  • a keyword line at the foot of every spread: CONTEXTUAL, INTUITIVE, INTELLIGENT, DISCIPLINED, HUMAN;
  • a page number at the foot right;
  • two families: a light high-contrast serif and a mono.
• Plate 11, the eye: an almond outline in several looped strokes around 4 to 5 concentric rings, chalk white on dark grain (O). From the centre, a line crosses bright strokes 9 times horizontally and 5 times vertically (M), so the lids add strokes sideways.
• Plate 12, the atom: three tilted elliptical orbits crossing around a four-point star, in rough printed line (O).
• Mood board (O): the ring eye, a dotted event sheet, a synesthesia card, a broken dashed ring, a starburst of arrows, two engraved hands, a card with smeared type, an embossed sheet.

The framework behind it

A reference book reads as a sequence of boards. Each spread has a running head (where you are), numbered plates (the evidence), and a keyword line (what it means). The motifs share one idea: a centre held by rings or orbits, which is how an observing mind is drawn.

The same idea in distant fields

• Specimen books and type catalogues: a running head, numbered specimens and a caption line.
• Scientific plates: numbered figures with a legend.
• Our canon: the aperture and the luminous orb.
• Physics: Bohr's atom, the orbits as a picture rather than the physics.
• The concept layers' ring bridge (89 units in 11 mediums): ripples, drum modes, an iris, a halo.

Dual edge

A keyword line can tell the reader what to feel before they look. On our boards it should come from the measured concepts, not from adjectives.

Measured

Concepts

• aperture eye
• bleed
• checking as craft
• collage recut
• contrast
• data
• diffusion
• engraving carving
• field
• glass
• grain texture
• horizon
• identity name
• layering
• light
• line hatching
• loop cycle
• paper
• path stroke
• plane sheet
• reading order
• repetition rhythm visual
• ring orbit
• sound
• specimen plate
• tempo rhythm
• thread textile
• type
• wave form

All studies