When a Book Becomes Art

First off, yes, I know, books are ALREADY art! It was just a catchy title okay? It seemed too wordy to say "When a Book Inspires an Artistic Response in Me that Translates into Learning a New Skill and Recreating a Book Cover" :P

Over the past number of months I have been working hard to learn some graphic design skills. I thought it would be a fun way to expand my creativity and also meld it with my love for books!

One of my favorite things that I've been able to do is learn a little bit about how to create a book cover. I thought it would be fun to share one of the ones I have made on here and see what you think.

I could not have done this without taking a lot of courses and lots of practice (which is still happening), but this is my starting point, and hopefully I'll get to do a lot more from here on out!

First off, I did multiple classes on Skill Share in order to learn the basics of Procreate and Illustrator. Wow is it overwhelming, but also fun!

I wanted to recreate a cover for a book I read recently (and adored), but in my own style.

Note: I'll earn a small comission if you purchase any of the books through the links below as an Amazon Associate.

The book was The Clockwork Princess by Cassandra Clare, which is book three in The Infernal Devices series, taking place in the world of the Shadowhunters but in the time of Queen Victoria.

(If you are curious, the original Shadowhunters series is The Mortal Instruments with City of Bones and our B.A. main character Clary Fray.)

If you know me, you know I like to hop around between books in a series to cleanse the palette, usually I'll read a mystery or something in between books in a series. But not with this one. For this series, I had to read them almost one after the other. They were just that good.

The Clockwork Princess created such a visceral response in me, giving me emotional whiplash and tears of both sadness and joy: I just had to bring it to life with a new cover!

So, if you like a series full of magic with EXCELLENT character development, exciting action, swoon-worthy romance, and a bit of historical fiction mixed in, please, please, give this series a try!

On to the book cover!

First off, I wanted to use a ruby necklace because it is referred to multiple times throughout the book. When I couldn't find a free license one online to manipulate in Photoshop, I decided to draw my own in procreate. I was super pleased with how it turned out, especially since this was my first attempt at something more realistic looking:

Next I needed to incomporate it into a cover that would make me want to pick up the book. If you look at fantasy book cover trends recently, they generally are pretty simple with one specific focal point and some flourishes around the edges.

Here is my sketch of roughly how I wanted it to look (sketching it out before digitizing is so important!!) If you notice, there is SO MUCH text to fit on the cover; it needs to be laid out very carefully or else it'll just take over.

Below is my digitized version, I used the necklace to be the focal point and drew some flourishes for the edges (including a hand drawn stele) . I also used some silver dust effects on the bottom in reference to one of the characters, Jem. Here is the cover as just an image:

And here it is as a mockup. What do you think? Would this draw your eye on the shelf?

You can also take a look at the original cover here: The Clockwork Princess: you can tell the artist put SO MUCH thought into it, if you zoom in there are so many easter eggs on the cover that refer to the story itself.

What book cover would you be interested in seeing me redesign? I'd love to give it a shot!

As always, if you are strugging to find your next read, remember that Shelf/e can help you out with customized recommendations just for you!