Village book store

Upstairs Gallery Space

About: 

• Started in the corn exchange at the end of 2012 - wanted to provide a creative space where independently created and published books could be displayed and sold. 
• Wanted to bring stuff from outside of the city into the city, bringing international works into Leeds and create a space where creatives within Leeds can get exposure for what they are working on. 
• Someway of creating a permanent creative community in Leeds.
• Above the bookstore, there is a gallery space; gives the chance for creatives in Leeds the chance to display their work. Above there is the fresh space exhibition where work from alumni was presented. 
• Village Books Website
• Sell a lot of Zines, short magazines/ really anything creatively focused and independently published.

Why Independantly publish?

• In the age of the internet when it is so easy to have your work seen by hundreds of peoples work every day, there is a passive process involved where they are also seeing hundreds of thousands of other peoples work also. 
• A zine slows the audience down it is a physical process of engaging with someone's creative output. The designer is creating a physical output after a process. 

What we look for?

• Heavily focused on photography books because that is Village's specialised area.
• Every element and aspect of the book says something about what could be found inside, it needs to be something that when the audience picks it up they know what it is instant; the whole piece is coherent and a singular piece. 
• The concept of the book - e.g. useful photography, makes books used that is not particularly used for anything else, one was based on photos taken from photos that were put on jigsaws. 
• Format - has the potential to communicate a lot about the book. e.g. funny money - a book in response to western tourists, the designer went round Namibia, with $1700, and offered people money to take their photo whilst holding the money. Created a book with these photos. 

Funny Money

• Overtime -  Documents photos of people working in London presented in an official document style, representing the whole concept within its format. 
• Design - 'Fire in Cario' the first page only takes up half of the page the final one is full bleed, the idea is increasing the clarity of the audience as the book progresses. The book is also bound backwards, which isn't evident until the final page, communicating how you can think you know everything about a situation but until you have fully engaged with something you cant properly understand it.

Fire in Cairo

• The process must be influenced by the content, sometimes it is better to create something that is relevant and coherent rather than just 'pretty' 
• Surface Phenomena - Entire book is the same position of the ocean from the same point over a series of months, the paper stock used is matted and tactile; broken between gloss divisions, which makes the colours pop more. the juxtaposition between the two keeps the audience engaged and this shows how design decision can influence the content to appear in a particular way.