Awards Book Archive

Hysteria: A Memoir of Illness, Strength and Women’s Stories Throughout History
  • Finalist

Designed by
Alissa Dinallo
Category
Best Designed Non-Fiction Cover
Year
2021
Publisher
NewSouth Publishing

About the Designer

Alissa is a Sydney-based book designer who has worked in-house at Allen & Unwin and Penguin Random House. When not designing for commercial publishing houses, Alissa also works closely with writers to create artist’s books and typographic works. She is also a co-founder of BookEating Press, a boutique publishing company. She was named Young Designer of the Year at the 2015 Australian Book Design Awards.

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Design Rationale

Hysteria explores author Katerina Bryant’s struggles and experiences with psychiatric disorders, and the complex world of mental health, specifically that of women, and their questionable treatment throughout history. For the cover I used an image of a classic bust of Venus that has been glitched and distorted, a visual representation of how the women Bryant writes about have been viewed by the medical industry. To compliment this, I also distorted the typography so that some letters were stretched out.

Details
Dimensions
135 x 210 mm
No. pages
208
Credits
Internal Design
Jo Pajor-Markus
Typesetting
Jo Pajor-Markus
Printing
Griffin Press
Author
Katerina Bryant