Jan Tschichold's advice
From the book "Selected Essays on Book Design"
"Perfect design rests on
the absolute harmony of all its elements.
The essence of harmony is the relation of proportions"Jan Tschichold
In continuous roman text, emphasis should be set in italic.
Lowercase letters should never, under any circumstances, be letter-spaced.
Roman capitals must always be letter-spaced, under all circumstances. But the spacing must be at least 1/6 of the type size.
Marking the beginning of a chapter by setting only the first word in a capital and small caps is best done without an indent, which under a heading is naturally pointless.
It is not enough to separate the main text groups within a chapter by a blank line alone. The first line of a new text group should start without an indent, and its first word should be set in a capital and small caps. Better still, put an asterisk centred above that opening line.
Headings are more often set in lowercase than in capitals.
First- and second-level headings should be centred; those of the last level shifted to the left.
A line should hold 8 to 12 words. Lines with more than 12 words need more leading.
The design of the title page must match the design of the book.
An important prerequisite for a title page is good wording.
The lines of the title page must not exceed the type area. It is better if the main line of the title is noticeably narrower than the full measure.
The main line of the title should be set at least two sizes larger than the body text of the book.
The large white space between the title and the publisher’s name must not look accidental and empty. A good publisher’s mark can be useful here.
The page with the imprint is better placed at the end of the book.
The title page must be set in exactly the same typeface as the book.
Bold type, even one that suits the body face very well, must never be used on the title page.
Lines of capitals must always be letter-spaced and carefully balanced.
Numbers in the title page text should be spelled out; only the year is set in arabic numerals.
The fewer type sizes on the title page, the better. Only in exceptional cases should more than 3 sizes be used; sometimes two are enough.
The main lines can be emphasised in lowercase, and the less important lines subdued by setting them in capitals.
The publisher’s name should be set smaller than, or at most the same size as, the author’s name.
The title should sit in the upper third, not at all in the optical centre of the title page.
The text on the verso of the title page should be placed so that, where possible, it falls on the groups or lines of the title page, preferably without exceeding them.
Headings and groups on title pages are set without full stops.
A dash must not be used in place of a hyphen.
Within one publication, quotation marks must have the same form.
Note numbers must be set in the same typeface as the body text.
A superior figure or asterisk (*) should not be followed by parentheses, either in the text or in the footnotes.
A footnote should be preceded either by a space or by a solid rule without indent running the full measure.
Under a centred heading, a paragraph indent is pointless and ugly. The first paragraph should begin without an indent.
Under a left-aligned heading, an indent is necessary.
Italic is used to emphasise key expressions; names — and in some cases place names — are set in small caps.
Titles of books, magazines, works of art, buildings and ships should be set in italic, in which case they take no quotation marks; so should words and phrases in foreign languages.
Small caps must always be slightly letter-spaced.
Quotations are set in ordinary type but enclosed in quotation marks.
Quotation marks usually enclose rarely used expressions that need explanation.
Little-known proper names, as well as words used rarely, figuratively or with reservations, may be put in quotation marks and are set in ordinary type, not italic.
If the body face is italic, upright type is used for emphasis.
The more end lines or lines of varying length there are in the text — that is, the more uneven the texture of the setting — the wider the line spacing should be.
A book line should measure 9 cm (20 cicero).
A book needs no extra space between paragraphs. The same goes for the space between individual footnotes.
A footnote number must not be glued to the word. A space is needed.
In the footnote text the figures must be the same size as the rest of the footnote.
If a book has only one footnote, or some pages have single footnotes, the figure 1 looks odd; an asterisk should be used. If a page has several footnotes, figures are better.
Every footnote should end with a full stop.
If several short footnotes follow one another, they should be arranged in a horizontal sequence separated by spaces.
Very long footnotes should be split, one half on the left-hand page and the other on the right. This should be avoided, however.
Starting the footnotes from 1 on every page is not recommended. Better to number them continuously through the book, or at least through each chapter.
Moving all the notes to the end of the book is not a mistake, but it sometimes makes the book harder to read.
Every page should have a constant number of lines — the mark of a well-set book.
An illustration and its caption should together form a rectangle whose proportions approach the golden section.
Illustrations turned sideways look bad and should be avoided. If they predominate, use a landscape format and set the text in two columns.
The inner margin should be half the width of the outer margin.
Tall, long pictures are placed in the middle of the page.
Every printed sheet should carry, at the foot of its first page within the type area, a signature consisting of the sheet’s serial number and a keyword. The keyword is usually the author’s surname.
The signature should be placed on the left.
The signature is set in a small size, indented by as many points as the paragraph indent.
If the page number is at the foot, the signature should be set on the same line.
The beginning of a chapter should be set off from the opening line by generous white space, and draw attention with a drop cap or something else.
Small illustrations should be placed so that the ratio between the distances from the top and bottom trims is 1:2 or 3:5.
