Sleeves
The only part of a record you could examine before paying for it
The design of the record: Reid Miles at Blue Note, Peter Saville at Factory, Vaughan Oliver at 4AD, and the object itself.
- Reid Miles Starts Designing Blue Note CoversHow a graphic designer working from contact sheets and a tight budget built the most recognisable visual language in jazz — and possibly in recorded music
- Peter Saville and the Sleeve That Arrived After the Record Was Already in the ShopsTony Wilson gave Saville a brief and received a philosophy; the records shipped while the sleeves were still being argued over
- Vaughan Oliver Builds a Visual Language for a Label That Had No GenreDesign at 4AD was not illustration of music — it was a parallel sensibility, made from the same impulses
- The Paper Circle That Sold the RecordThe 45 rpm single's centre label was two inches of paper, but every major American label treated it as a design brief
- The Yellow Cartouche and What It PromisesDeutsche Grammophon's oval logo has outlasted every format it has appeared on — and keeps working precisely because it never explains itself