In this project, I designed and handbound a museum book capturing the intimate biography of sculptor David Smith, written by his daughter, Candida Smith. The narrative alternates between Candida’s personal reflections and a third-person account of Smith’s career.
I approached the design as both an archive and an artifact—something that preserves memory while honoring the physicality of sculpture itself.
Because David Smith was a sculptor, I wanted the book to feel sculptural, too. I thought about how a reader moves through space and material—how turning a page could feel like walking around one of his large-scale works. I embedded smaller, diary-like pages within the book to hold Candida's first-person reflections. These interruptions break the rhythm of the standard layout, adding dimension and intimacy, like moments of memory surfacing within the larger story.
This book tells two parallel stories: one of David Smith, the artist, and one of David Smith, the father. The design reflects this duality. Candida's reflections appear as handwritten diary entries on translucent pages, while the rest of the book uses a more traditional, structured layout to ground the historical narrative. These contrasting treatments guide the reader between public history and private memory.
The entire color palette draws from soft, natural greens—grounded in David Smith’s connection to the outdoors and his practice of building massive sculptures in open landscapes. I wanted the book to feel earthy and honest, with materials that echo a family album you might find in an attic. The raw board cover, black spine tape, and mounted photograph are all small gestures meant to reflect the personal and archival nature of the story.
This was a project that required thinking beyond the page. I had to consider how design could carry emotion—how layout, materials, pacing, and texture could reflect both a life and a relationship. Building this book by hand made the process feel even more personal. It reinforced the idea that design can act as preservation—a way to hold onto the fragile pieces of someone’s story and share them with care.