Matthew Doherty Design

The AUA Centennial History book provides a detailed look at doctors and related professionals who developed and championed, and continue to champion, the unique contributions this specialty makes to the medical profession. The editorial challenge for Executive Editor Wendy Cowles Husser was to unify the “voices” of over 35 authors into a coherent, uniformly presented story. Her unerring effort to shape the tone and content into a single work was supported by design concepts approved at the launch of this five year project.

The primary design approach was to create a “fine book” in the tradition of classic books with a timeless look and feel—one that will entice the reader to explore this text driven manuscript through an inviting and interesting layout.

The initial concept was to integrate the running text of each chapter (primarily histories of the national organization and regional chapters) with bio photos, location and event photos, and historical margin notes relaying “current events” in the wider world at that time.

The editor worked toward a common voice chapter to chapter throughout the entire book, while allowing the flavor of the individual original author’s language to remain. Sorting photos and inserting text references became a much larger task as the scope and scale of the image program grew. Historical anecdotes (placed in the margins as space allowed) had to be reviewed and sequenced for each chapter. Since many chapters covered the same time period and no anecdote was repeated, hundreds of anecdotes were required.

The page design was developed based on a page proportion of 2:3, determining margins with a non-arbitrary method similar to methods used by scribes and early printers.

The design was modeled in the tradition of “fine books” so this history will have a timeless feel. A distinction between the historical photos, biography photos, and presidential photos was developed so the hierarchy is evident as the reader scans the pages. The variety creates visual interest as one pages through the chapters.

The quality of the materials and craftsmanship in the book conveys a level of importance to the history.

The scope and scale of the book grew from a projected 800 pages with 300-350 images, to over 920 pages and 1,400 images.

The greatest challenge to this successful design was introducing an element that would engage even a casual reader with little or no knowledge of the organization or history of the AUA. The history anecdotes inserted in the margins (as space allowed) provided some relief to the photo-heavy sections, and provided some textual variety in the sections that had few or no photos to draw the readers attention. Besides being complimentary to the “time line” discussed in the adjacent text, they were often informative, revealing, and humorous.

The design was developed starting with the optimum font size for sustained reading (Jenson Multiple Master). Line length, margin column, and page grid were developed using a classic method rediscovered by Jan Tschichold.

Each chapter was laid out beginning on a recto page to avoid paging conflicts (because the manuscript was not in sequential order). Margin anecdotes were assigned using the first page proofs and cut and pasted into place.

Several passes were made through each chapter file to convert ligatures, set old style numbers, customize specific diacritical characters, and finesse line and page breaks.

Two years before the book would go to the printer, the first two signatures were submitted for press proofing and inclusion in the binding dummy. As a result, a detailed check list of procedures and quality control issues specific to this project was created and used quite successfully when the book went to press.

The design was developed to accommodate a manuscript of unknown length and complexity. Originally projected to be two volumes, 800 pages, with 300–350 images, it expanded to over 920 pages, and over 1,400 images.

The flexibility of the design worked very well with the fluctuating image load from chapter to chapter.

The success of this project was due in part to the relationship of the publishing team to the committee. The executive editor had authority and responsibility for all client (committee) contact, freeing the designer to focus on the design and management of the project proper. The committee chair was a strong advocate for the project and managed all publication issues on the client side. This combination proved to be an ideal working relationship, keeping the project on track while potential delays and internal issues were resolved.

When dealing with a project of this scale and expense, vendors and manufacturers are willing to provide premium services and support when you clearly articulate your needs and expectations.

From the outset, maintaining an awareness of the final stages was paramount. Thoroughly planning for a smooth transition to the printer and the manufacturing phase was critical to assuring the books timely delivery. Successfully concluding a five year effort, the book shipped on the appointed date.

Several authors were pleased with the manner in which the individual contributor’s tone was retained while the over all “voice” had a singular style.

The trio of managers—Committee Chair, Executive Editor, Design and Manufacturing Manager—proved to be a dynamic and very successful team.

Project management and the binding dummy “practice run” proved so critically successful to the overall project — and final manufacturing in particular — the printer said “this project generated a file (records of all transactions, including change orders and all correspondence) a fraction of the size typically generated for a book project one-tenth this length.”