How to Choose the Most Beautiful Book

How to Choose the Most Beautiful Book?
What makes us consider a book beautiful? Is it the typography, the paper, the printing, the binding, the page proportions, the relationship between text and image, or perhaps the effectiveness of the overall publishing concept?
We invite you to a discussion accompanying the exhibition “The Most Beautiful Polish Books 2025.”

 

We’ll discuss the criteria for evaluating books in design competitions, the work of the jury, and the relationship between taste, experience, and professional reflection on form. Our starting point will be the 66th edition of the “Most Beautiful Polish Books” competition, organized by the Polish Book Publishers Association.
Participants in the discussion will include: Dr. Ola Kot, designer and member of this year’s jury; Magdalena Heliasz, designer, winner of previous editions of the competition, and publisher of Print Control; and Prof. Artur Frankowski, designer and member of this year’s jury for the
“Best Book Design from all over the World” competition.
The discussion will be moderated by Tomasz Fudala, former jury chair and juror for four editions of the Most Beautiful Polish Books competition.
The participants in the discussion will examine the book as a whole: from concept, graphic design, and typography to materials, printing, binding, and the way the publication is experienced. They will discuss how a well-designed book differs from a visually striking one and how to evaluate publications with different functions, scales, and visual languages.