The Book as a Pedagogical Laboratory: Experimental Editorial Practices in a Studio-Based Design Course

Abstract

This paper presents the pedagogical model of the project “The Book Beyond the Book”, developed within a studio-based master’s course in editorial design. The project invites students to reconsider what a book can be in today’s post-digital context, not through theoretical analysis but through practical, material and conceptual experimentation. Each student defines a theme of personal relevance and develops an authorial editorial intention that guides the creation of an experimental book-object.The course is structured around a sequence of interconnected stages: topic selection; formulation of an editorial concept; low- and medium-fidelity prototyping; and systematic experimentation with typographic, spatial and structural strategies. Throughout the process, students refine their work through guided studio critiques, progressively recognising how decisions concerning structure, sequence, rhythm and material choices influence meaning and shape the reader’s experience.The pedagogical model builds on perspectives that treat the book as a visual-material system (Drucker) and on approaches to design education that understand design as a specific mode of knowledge mediated by material and visual processes (Cross). Over the duration of the course, the project has supported the development of greater conceptual clarity, material awareness and authorial autonomy, enabling students to articulate coherent editorial intentions and translate them into consistent formal strategies.By framing book-making as a process of exploratory design practice, the project contributes to contemporary design education by fostering critical engagement, reflective skills and an expanded understanding of the book as a dynamic space for communication and authorship.

Keywords: Editorial Design, Experimental Book Design, Design Education

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1007626