Birds are increasingly often in the news these days, and fanatical birders are by no means an unknown phenomenon in the Netherlands. In recent years there have been several submissions of books about birds and almost every year one of them made it through to the final selection. Their authors’ agreeable obsession with their subject bursts off the page and the pleasure they take in photographing birds and then collecting and arranging the images has translated itself into visual jokes and other ideas that work so beautifully thanks to the dry presentation. This work, the product of a great deal of research, is surely one of the most original books of 2016. The typography is excellent and the paper used is beautiful. It is all very seductive, and it made the panel very happy. And to cap it all, under the dust jacket the hollow spine is covered with a beautiful strip of linen giving it strength while allowing the book to lie open flat.

The panel were unanimous in their selection of this book, which later in Leipzig was awarded the Golden Letter in the vote for the Schönste Bücher aus aller Welt (Best Book Design from all over the World).

Golden Letter Best Book Design from all over the World, Leipzig 2017