QUILLBLOG

Who needs book designers?

In a cute stunt, Penguin U.K. has asked musicians to design new covers for six of its classic titles. As The Guardian reports, Beck took on the French novel Le Grand Meaulnes, Johnny Borrell of the band Razorlight did The Great Gatsby, and Ryan Adams did Dracula. Adams tells The Guardian he

used oil paints to create “a weird outline or silhouette juxtaposed with the idea of the castle – you know, Dracula’s headquarters, his hang.”

You can see all six musician-designed covers here. In Quillblog’s opinion, a couple are actually pretty cool, including Beck’s and Adams’, while others, like Borrell’s Gatsby cover, should remind the Penguin brass why they have real designers on the payroll.

Also being hyped is a reader-designed cover for Aesop’s Fables. A reader-designed cover? That’s right, this whole rock-star-cover thing is promoting an even cuter stunt: Penguin recently released a bunch of classic titles with blank front covers, encouraging viewers to design their own. The gallery of reader submissions is here.