Last year, when Unit Editions of London published Manuals 1: Design & Identity Guidelines, the 432-page gloss-wrapped hardback sold out fast.
Who knew so many people would be so interested in thumbing through reproductions of the graphics-standards manuals of British Steel (1969), the Atlantic Richfield Company (1970), the U.S. Department of Labor (1975), and 17 other government, corporate, and cultural entities. Turns out a lot of people actually collect the ring-, perfect-, and spiral-bound originals that spelled out everything from fonts and colors on corporate stationery to the way signage must appear on smokestacks and water towers. The originals, showcasing the work of Lester Beall, Paul Rand, Saul Bass, and many others, are tough to come by, hence the popularity of Manuals 1.
Manuals 2 picks up where Manuals 1 left off, in terms of its size (260 by 310mm), weight (6 pounds), the number of manuals it reproduces (20), and its own precise, deliberate design. Like the manuals it showcases, Manuals 2 has its own guidelines. Horizontal rules run rampant, pages from original manuals (some of which are large enough to be legible, many others of which are not) are always backed by gray, and photographs of the often well-worn manuals themselves are always shot against black. Reading through Manuals 2, we can’t help but think about how much work it once took to update a company’s corporate design and disseminate new guidelines to satellite offices around the world. Today, that task is as simple as clicking a button that reads – in whatever font – “Send.”