Lovely Penguin covers

Does Coralie Bickford-Smith have one of the nicest jobs around? She's a 'senior cover designer' at Penguin, a publishing house with a knack for producing covers so good they've become modern icons. Her cover designs for their recently released series of F. Scott Fitzgerald books seem to perfectly interpret the early twentieth century aesthetic and lifestyle that Fitzgerald's writing is famous for. I have copies of most of these books but I now want to own them in these editions. There is something lovely about reading your favourite books beautifully bound. I suppose that makes a great cover design - something that captures the imagination of the reader and will encourage them to buy the book again, just to have it in that form.

More great cover design here and here.

David Pearson's cover design for Penguin's Great Minds series. (via cosstores.com)

The R.A.G.E Record Store.

We recently discovered this excellent little record store on Fade St. (it's funny how I can't take the name of that street seriously anymore thanks to that awful RTE show). It is everything you expect a second hand record store to be; well stocked with quality old vinyl all in good condition. For those with a taste for vintage video games they have old consoles and games for sale (SNES, N64, Segas etc). Everything is also reasonable, the kind of price one pays in Berlin or London. I picked up Let's Dance by David Bowie and Born To Run by Bruce Springteen for under a tenner each. Not something I'm used to doing in Dublin, where on the rare occasion I have found old records I have been expected to pay through the nose for them. This place is just what the city needs. So if you're a fan of vinyl or old computer games or thinking starting a colection of either, get to the street forever tainted by the fools at RTE and check out this shop. Here are some pictures Alex took.