Interview with a Book Designer: Jordan Wannemacher—Part Two
Imposter Syndrome is a Bitch
Hello, Dear Reader!
This is A Book Designer’s Notebook, a newsletter about books, design, and what I’m working on. I’m Nathaniel Roy.
This is part two of my conversation with Brooklyn-based book designer and entrepreneur Jordan Wannemacher. You can read part one here.
In this interview:
Some of Jordan’s favorite projects
The necessary evil of external validation
Designers that make us jealous
Flannery O’Connor, Elena Ferrante, and Jordan’s favorite books
Nerdy spreadsheets
What Jordan wishes people knew about book design
Whether Jordan would rather give up reading or designing books
This interview has been edited for clarity and anonymity.
We’ve talked about money. We’ve talked about some Jordan-specific things. Do you have a favorite project that you’ve worked on?
Well, my first 50 Books | 50 Covers winner is one that’s very near and dear to me. Because it was a hard cover1 to do. It was one of my first challenges where I did, like, 90 comps or something. It was crazy. It was a book about interracial couples—a sociology book for Columbia—and it was such a sensitive topic. Doing UP books, some of the subject matter is so sensitive. You have to figure out a way to creatively portray something without showing stereotypes. There’s a lot of soft gloves to portray something in a way that’s respectful.
Right. While still being interesting and thoughtful.
Exactly. That is a challenge I love. This was really my first challenge of this kind. I was sort of giving up on this book, and I was like, “I just don’t want to deal with this anymore.”
I’m very high and low in my taste in life. I will read a 1,200 page Russian novel, and then I have seen every single episode of the Real Housewives canon. I love TV. I’m such a garbage TV person. I was binging Seinfeld, and someone was dating somebody who was Black. They made a joke with this black and white cookie. And they were like, “Oh, it’s the best of both worlds.” And it was kind of stupid, but I brought that to Columbia and said “what about a black and white cookie?” We were doing covers with families that just weren’t working. Some ideas were disastrous.
So I used a black and white cookie, and I was kind of doing it as a joke, because at that point, I was just exhausted. Let’s just see, you know? And it made it through. The author loved it, and it got approved. And I won my first 50 Books | 50 Covers award. It was my first big design award—the design award—and it was early in my career.
I just submitted something for the first time—a coffee table book I designed called Cinema Ann Arbor. I’m nervous, but hopeful.
As a freelancer I like the awards, conceptually, because I like to look at them and get inspiration. In-house, you’re constantly learning from other designers and seeing what they’re doing. So I like the design contest because the winners are kind of like my new mentors, you know? I like seeing what other people are doing. But I don’t like how expensive these awards can be to submit to.
And then my first big book project as a freelancer was doing a coffee table book for Oprah. That was definitely a favorite project. One, because it was my biggest name that I’ve ever designed for. So my ego loved that. But at the same time, it also gave me confidence because it was right when I was starting to freelance full-time, and I was so scared. Getting that big name book gave me confidence to say “Okay, I can do this.” But I’m still waiting for my invite to her Malibu estate [laugh].
That makes a lot of sense. You don’t want to only rely on external validation. But you need a certain amount. And a project like that where there’s good taste, there’s money, there’s a name, and it’s a success, you can say “I’m not crazy for thinking I can do this.” It fills you up.
Yeah, my god. You need external validation, even though you shouldn’t rely on it. Getting that little wind in your sails. I think especially as a designer—and I’ve tried to explain this to people—I need it so badly because you deal with the opposite so much. People tell me all the time how much they don’t like what I did, how bad this is. I constantly feel picked apart. I still, to this day, will open emails and cry. I know it’s not personal, and I don’t take it personally anymore, but it hurts my ego.
Imposter syndrome is a bitch. I mean, when I talk to people who are like 20 years older than me, they still say the same thing, which is reassuring, but I’m also like, “Wait, it doesn’t go away? I have to deal with this forever?!” [laugh]
Speaking of imposter syndrome, who’s a designer that most often makes you say “I wish I did that”?
Oh, man. There’s a couple of book designers where I’m almost mad at them when I see what they do. Alex Camlin is one. I hate him. I love him. He’s so sweet, and he’s so nice. When I see his work, I’m like “goddammit.” There are certain jackets of his I’m still obsessed with years later because they are so freaking clever and so cool. He did this one book, Heads, that might be my favorite book cover of all time.
Kimberly Glyder. The output of that woman. I admire her a lot—she’s like one of my freelance gods.
She does a lot of illustration work, right?
Yeah, exactly. She does so much illustration and is a good example of someone using her creative skills for more than one thing. I’ve seen her do calendars and gift stuff too. She doesn’t just do books. But her creative output is so amazing. I don’t know where she finds the time.
Her and my friend Caroline Johnson, they both do their side projects outside of publishing. Caroline does Terror Terroir, which is like a monthly screening that pairs wine and horror movies. Jo (Joanne O’Neill) does the Blink-182 poster project. They’re so good.
I love seeing book designers that like to stretch, you know? I’m trying to think of others. There’s so many. I know there’s other people in his studio, but I’ve also always been a Rodrigo Corral fan.
Charlotte Strick did the repackaging of all of the Flannery O’Connor novels. She’s my favorite writer, favorite author, favorite everything. Like, I am obsessed with Flannery O’Connor. That’s one of my favorite design packages, from Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
My wife just got me O’Connor’s Collected Stories [not the Strick cover, though] because I love short stories. I’ve only read one story so far. Big anthologies are intimidating!
Oooh. I love it. So, her anthology is both short story collections combined. I’m glad your wife got you the anthology, but I like Everything that Rises Must Converge better. All of those stories are in the anthology, but that’s just a volume that I prefer. It was published posthumously, and it was the stories that she wrote at the end of her life, when she was sick. She was so sick. She died at 42 of Lupus. She was in a dark place writing those, and it shows.
Some of the stories, you’re reading and then you’re just like, “Oh fuck.” That’s the kind of short story I love. I love a really intense, dark twist. It’s also very southern.
Based on the O’Connor reference, I was going to ask if you were from the south.
Yeah, I grew up in South Carolina and went to school in Savannah. She’s from Savannah. I’ve been to her childhood home a million times. I’m going to the march for the centennial—for her 100th birthday. As a Southern Catholic, she just speaks my language and really sees me.
Speaking of FSG, they were like the first time that I started to identify publishers. I was looking at all the books on my shelf, and all my favorite writers were from FSG.
My answer to my own question might have been “anybody at FSG.” Like Na Kim—
Oh my god, Na is insane.
She’s one where I am like, “I hate you! Because I’ll never be you.” [laugh]
I have a lot of respect for people who have been doing this for a really long time. Like Robin Billaredello, she has been at Harper2 for like 20 years. And she has such a prolific body of work there. She does all of the Ann Patchett books and has built this visual language for her, you know? And that is something that can only be afforded to someone who’s had a job for a long time and has the ability to invest that time in others.
[Here, we chat for several more minutes about other riveting insider topics like Publishers Lunch, who has what job, using nom de plumes for crappy books, and the shocking insight that book covers are the best medium for graphic design.]
You’re a great interviewee; you keep touching on the things I want to ask about before I ask about them. You brought up Flannery O’Connor—I wanted to ask what your favorite book is.
My favorite book is actually a series: the Neapolitan novels by Elena Ferrante. I. Am. Obsessed with her. I think about Lila and Lenù on a regular basis. I am constantly like, “What are they up to?” I wonder how the girls are doing.
Those books are on my vague, mental list of books to read. I don’t have a real TBR because for me, it’s kind of pointless. Books come in and out and the list is so long. But I need to read those.
They’re so, so, so good. I remember being on an airplane reading book four and just sobbing. And the guy next to me said, “Are you okay?” I was like, “No!”
Then there’s Everything that Rises Must Converge, like I mentioned. I’m a big Karl Knausgård reader. I’ve read all of his My Struggle books.
That’s a big commitment!
Mhmm. That man could scribble on a napkin and I would read it. He is so brilliant and so smart. I get obsessed with authors, not necessarily books, and just kind of fangirl about them, you know? I like a project. It’s kind of like homework—almost like building out this syllabus of a person. I actually used to follow along with my friends’ syllabi for their MFAs.
That’s a great idea. You’re getting your own MFA for free!
Yeah, basically! I also do a lot of book clubs with my friends. We’ll do a “big book” book club. During COVID, we did a reread of Anna Karenina and talked about it. We’re going to do Middlemarch this summer. And then I’m in a quarterly true crime book club.
You showed me a spreadsheet earlier—here’s one of mine. I have one for everything I read in a year. I started it in 2018 and I track a ridiculously nerdy amount of things.
Oh my god, I love this.
I figured you’d get a kick out of that. I’m such a fucking dork. But I started it because I realized I was reading like, a lot of white dudes. I didn’t want to be performative, but I wanted to pay more attention to what and who I was reading, and maybe course correct a little bit. And now it’s so habitual and ingrained. Every time I finish a book, I put it in here. You’re one of the few people that I can show that to you without feeling embarrassed [laugh].
That is a beautiful spreadsheet.
I’m not always this type A, but occasionally I get that way.
I am a type A, oldest child, Virgo. So this, like, massages my brain.
All right. Let’s see. What is something you wish more people knew about book design?
Hmm. This is more a criticism of how I see people reacting to book covers online. Like when a book cover is posted, and there are comments from people—not book designers—being like, “Oh, this looks like shit,” or whatever. I wish people knew how micromanaged covers can be, you know what I mean? When people complain about a cover and I see it, I can see exactly how it happened.
Like, marketing wanted this, and wanted it to look like this other book, you know? I wish people understood how little autonomy the designers actually have in a lot of situations, and how much of it is driven by sales and marketing.
It’s what I love and hate about it. Like you said, it’s a poster. There’s this major tension between art and commerce on a book cover. That exists elsewhere, but I feel it really comes to a point on a book cover.
I think I wish other people knew that stuff, because it makes me appreciate when something is so out of the box. I’m reading All Fours by Miranda July and the cover by Helen Yentus is so well done. I feel like if I tried what she did, I would have gotten yelled at.
I’m pretty sure I know the answer to this next question, but it’s one I want to ask everyone I talk to. I put it on Instagram a while back and the results were interesting. Would you rather never read a book again, or never design a book again?
Easily never design a book again. I would give that up in a heartbeat before I ever gave up reading. Reading is why I do this. There’s no better feeling than coming up for air from a book. I love it so much. You never give that up—it’s perfect.
I love it. Okay, last one. And this can be about work, can be about anything. What are you most excited about right now?
I’m really excited about Salad Sprinkles. I’m really excited that it’s working, it’s growing, and people are reacting to it well. I’m learning so much.
And then a fun book project I’m excited about: I’m working with Linda Secondari on a book project for the Jazz Age Lawn Party, which is a really big festival that they do out on Governors Island. It’s celebrating 20 years this year. It’s basically a Renaissance fair, but for the 1920s.
We’re fundraising on Kickstarter. It’s a full book development. We are going and showing up with photographers to do things like content development, taking pictures, hiring writers to write essays about the history of it and the history of that time period, things like that.
It’s a really fancy, nice book that we’re doing too. And because we’re in full control, we can do all the bells and whistles that we want with the publishing. I don’t have to work backwards on content and design. I can kind of design it as we’re creating it because like we’re in charge of the content too.
You know, it sounds like the things you’re most excited about are the things that you get to author and create yourself.
Oh, that’s a good observation. One of my high school best friends was scrolling through the Salad Sprinkles Instagram and she said, “Jordan, this is the most you thing I’ve ever seen.” And that is the best compliment I can think of for the work that I want to do.
Gratitude & Shameless Self-Promotion
If you have made it this far, thank you for reading. There is much—probably too much—to read in this world, so I am grateful for your time and attention. A big, big thank you to Jordan Wannemacher. It was such a joy to talk to you!
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Until next time!
—Nathaniel
No pun intended!
Part II — Jordan doesn't disappoint. You're a great interviewer!
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