A Continent Takes Shape

Design: Alison Forbes
Date: 1971
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Alison Forbes was at the height of her considerable powers when she designed this remarkable large format book in 1971. Max Harris, Australian poet, critic, columnist, commentator, publisher, and bookseller, worked with Forbes on a number of projects. Writing in his regular newspaper column on publishing, under the heading of ‘A book of beauty is a ploy forever,’ Harris described A Continent Takes Shape as ‘an illustrated history of Australian cartography which shows that the meticulous Alison Forbes hasn’t lost her advanced and distinctive sense of the highest design principles’.