How to Enter
1: Complete the appropriate submissions form:
Books and Journals Entry Form
Jackets and Covers Entry Form
2: Submit payment for your entries:
3: Ship ONE copy of each of your entries to the AUPresses Central Office:
Association of University Presses
Attention: Kate Kolendo
Book, Jacket, and Journal Show
1412 Broadway, Suite 2135
New York, NY 10018
Deadline for Entries: Friday, January 19, 2024
ENTRIES MUST BE RECEIVED BY THE ENTRY DEADLINE TO BE CONSIDERED FOR THE SHOW. NO EXCEPTIONS. NO EXTENSIONS.
Please mail entries as soon as possible to avoid a deluge of entries arriving close to, or after, the deadline.
View the call for entries PDF.
Entry Fees
$45.00 per book/journal
$35.00 per jacket/cover
Fees are due upon submission.
books and journals
Scholarly typographic, Scholarly illustrated, Trade typographic, Trade illustrated, Poetry & literature, Journals, and Reference
jackets and covers
Book Jacket design, Book cover design, and Journal cover design
explanation of categories
Books can be entered for competition in the AUPresses Book, Jacket, and Journal Show in the following categories: Scholarly typographic, Scholarly illustrated, Trade typographic, Trade illustrated, Poetry and literature, and Reference. Books may also be submitted for their jacket or cover design. Journals are judged on their overall design or on their covers.
SCHOLARLY BOOKS are intended for a specialized audience, oftentimes for academic instructors to use as texts in college courses. They are not widely distributed to sell in bookstores and are most often available from online retailers and directly from the publisher. They are reviewed in academic journals and advertised directly to their core audience. The text structure is typically more complex, requiring a design that helps the reader navigate the variety of text elements and scholarly apparatus, including footnotes, endnotes, and appendices. These books are given a specialist or short discount, which usually indicates that they will not be stocked in brick and mortar retailers; and online retailers may sell to customers at full price or less than their usual discount.
SCHOLARLY TYPOGRAPHIC: A book with no or comparatively few illustrations that are clearly subordinate to the text.
SCHOLARLY ILLUSTRATED: A book in which the visual elements (such as photography, art, or graphic design) are the focus and the text is subordinate.
TRADE BOOKS are intended for a general audience and to be widely distributed. The design is typically open and accessible and the text features few, if any, notes, appendices, and bibliographies. They are available for sale in bookstores and are reviewed and advertised in general interest and national newspapers, magazines, websites, and other media. These books are given a trade discount by publishers so that they may be stocked by brick and mortar retailers, and online retailers may sell them to customers at a discounted price.
TRADE TYPOGRAPHIC: A book with no or comparatively few illustrations that are clearly subordinate to the text.
TRADE ILLUSTRATED: A book in which the visual elements (such as photography, art, or graphic design) are the focus and the text is subordinate.
POETRY AND LITERATURE Poetry books often require line-for-line formatting and have unique spacing requirements, while works of literature typically have few formatting needs.
REFERENCE books may be primarily intended for a trade or a scholarly audience, depending on the subject. Because they will not be read from beginning to end, reference books must organize information in a way that allows for quick location of specific entries in the text, which should be easy to read. The text may be paired with illustrations or other visuals.
JOURNALS are intended to be available to readers in libraries and other reference collections for many years, so design for both interiors and covers must be timeless. Balancing the need for fresh design against the importance of honoring the journal’s brand (which might be decades in the making) is also an important consideration. A note on the cover design: it must work on its own and as part of a series. The spine design is particularly important, since journals typically sit together on a shelf.
Eligibility
This competition is open to members of AUPresses only. Presses may submit any number of books, jackets, and covers published in the current calendar year, 2023, and journals published at least twice during 2023. Books may have been manufactured anywhere in the world, but imports or copublications from another publisher are not eligible.
The Jurors
books and journals
George Kirkpatrick
George Kirkpatrick is a book designer based on Isle Madame in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. During a decades-long freelance career he has designed hundreds of covers and interiors for university presses and academic publishers in Canada and the United States. A graduate of Trent University he studied publication design at the Banff Publishing Workshop and photography at Toronto Metropolitan University. While much of his practice is taken up with book cover design, he has always returned to text design and composition.
Victor Mingovits
Victor Mingovits is a book designer based in New York City, creating book covers and interiors for a wide variety of projects—from traditional trade titles to limited edition publications for cultural institutions. Victor received his Design MFA from University of Gothenburg. He worked at Mucca, art directing books for various publishing clients, including HarperCollins, Penguin Random, and Simon & Schuster. He also served as Senior Art Director for Motivate Books in Dubai. His design work has been recognized by AIGA 50 Books/50 Covers, Communication Arts Design Annual, Graphis Design Annual, PRINT Regional Design Annual, Type Directors Club, and the Association of University Presses.
jackets and covers
Dominique Jones
Born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, Dominique Jones is a Designer at Dutton, a division of Penguin Random House. She graduated from Mercy University (previously known as Mercy College) in 2018. In addition to her design work, she is the founder of Blk + Brwn Book Designers, a New York-based community formed to benefit underrepresented graphic designers in the Black and Brown communities with design skills, knowledge, and access to opportunities to succeed in the book publishing industry.
Michel Vrana
Michel Vrana’s love for publication design sparked during his studies in photography and printmaking at the Ontario College of Art in Toronto. His creative journey unfolded steadily: from crafting comics, graphic novels, and magazines to leading a successful design studio in Montreal for a decade. In 2009, Vrana charted a solo path focusing on book cover design, creating covers for numerous Canadian and American trade publishers and academic presses. His designs have garnered acclaim, earning a place in the prestigious Association of University Presses Book, Jacket, and Journal Show over several years. Continuing to push boundaries, in 2019, Vrana revitalized his comic book micro press, Black Eye Books, showcasing his unwavering dedication to the art of visual storytelling.
About the Book, Jacket, and Journal Show
The Association of University Presses Book, Jacket, and Journal Show honors excellence in design produced by its member presses. The show recognizes meritorious achievement in the design, production, and manufacture of books, jackets, covers, journals, and digital publications by members of the university press community. 2024 marks the 59th anniversary of this book show.
What you may notice first about the publications by AUPresses members is the wide variety of subjects, forms, and approaches to disseminating scholarship. This variety reflects the diversity of the members themselves. Some members are among the very largest scholarly publishers in the world while other presses are offices with small staffs and limited resources. It also reflects the variety of new forms and formats available to publishers including digital and print-on-demand technologies in addition to offset printing. The budgets for the publications themselves reflect the market needs of the individual project, the press’s resources at hand, and decisions a press makes about physical aspects of the publication. What unites these books, however, is something you cannot see. It is the fact that these publications have been subject to the rigorous standards of peer review.
The design and production aspects of these publications are also integral to the very mission of the Association. Excellent design contributes to a book or journal’s reception and its impact in the larger world.
In addition to recognizing excellent work, the AUPresses Book, Jacket, and Journal Show provides an evaluation of members’ work and serves as a focus of discussion and a source of ideas for intelligent, creative, and resourceful bookmaking. The 2024 show will include books published by AUPresses members in 2023 and jackets and covers of books published that year. Books may have been manufactured anywhere in the world, but imports, and copublications designed and produced by a with a foreign publisher, are not eligible.
Through the show, and its acclaimed annual catalog, the Association seeks to expand the conversation about the essential importance of good design in scholarly publishing.
Special thanks to the 2023–2024 Book, Jacket, and Journal Show Committee
David Zielonka, Stanford, Chair
Ashley Bernicky, Toronto
Alison Cobra, Calgary
Mark Lerner, Fordham
Lori Lynch, Alabama
Wendy McMillen, Notre Dame
Michelle van der Merwe, British Columbia
Isaac Morris, New Mexico
Lydia Osborne, Liverpool
Peter Perez, North Carolina
Kate Kolendo, Communications Program Manager, AUPresses
Trevor Nau, Administrative Coordinator, AUPresses