Brick & Mortar

Charter magazine issue for the Sacramento Public Library

Brick & Mortar is the charter issue of a magazine designed to promote Sacramento’s rich literary history, and the Sacramento Public Library’s own unique I Street Press and Espresso Book Machine. Bridging the two, the Sacramento Public Library has a role both as archive and as a source of new publications.

I forged a collaboration of old and new, using mostly historical images and antique-appearing cream paper, along with more modern image use and type treatments. I also created proprietary advertisements featuring several I Street Press-published anthologies, which are available to check out from SPL’s Central Library on I St. The title itself, Brick & Mortar, references physical libraries amid an emerging digital world. Likewise, the cover juxtaposes an image of the building’s original exterior entryway with a photo of a bookshelf in the Sacramento Room. With the title between these two images, the shelved books read as the foundation upon which the library is built, or, more literally, the mortar holding the library together.