AJ and Sofia’s Book of Aughts

BACK IN 2011, AJ and Sofia in New York City approached us with an interesting challenge. For many years, they had traveled abroad extensively with their young children. As AJ is an avid and talented photographer, the family had thousands upon thousands of wonderful pictures of their travels, including the destinations, people, and, of course, every major family event over all those years.

They wanted to create a compendium of an entire decade in pictures. As the plan unfolded, we decided to tell several stories in parallel. Some vacations were spent hiking or back-backing, some trips centered on visiting family and friends around the world, while others focused of seeing the sights wherever they went. And so we developed unique sections for each of these categories, as well as for friends and family, and for special family events. We distilled the five sections down to these titles:
Walk, See, Visit, Celebrate, Love.

Sample Title Pages. We wanted each section to be boldly titled, hence the single, strong word for each.
Then we added ‘key words’ to encompass the scope of each experience.

Since each category, or section, covered the entire decade, from 2000 to 2009, we developed a simple timeline that flows along with the stories in each section, so the reader always has an idea of where they are chronologically. This wanted to be ‘quiet,’ almost invisible, but available when needed. Sections were also assigned unique background colors to further inform context.

As each section flows through the years, the appropriate year is highlighted at the bottom of each page.

The book came to be entitled Our Aughts as it covered the ‘two thousand aught’ years. But it also became too much for a single volume. By the end we had over 500 pages, spanning three volumes, (in Blurb’s large square format).

The Front Covers. As you can see, maintaining continuity was important, while also creating unique iconic introductions to each volume.

The children still open these books often, almost as a mirror into their own past. The connections get stronger for them every time they look deeper into these rich family chronologies.

In fact AJ recently ordered a fresh set, to replace the old threadbare originals.