Euclid gets a makeover
While most designers think of themselves more as artists than mathematicians, geometry plays an indispensable role in our work. From page layouts to spacing and everything in between, designers’ lives would be near-impossible without math. Now, after thousands of years, the most impactful and widespread tome on geometry, Euclid's Elements, is getting a minimalist refresh.
Euclid's Elements of Geometry book cover
Kroncker Wallis, a small publisher known for their gorgeous edition of Isaac Newton's Principia, recently launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund the new book.
Their Kickstarter page points out that Elements, written in roughly 300 BCE, often appears opaque to readers. It's composed of 13 books, each one dense with mathematical theorems and proof. Fairly tough sledding. In the 1800’s Oliver Byrne re-wrote the first six books to be more approachable, with colorful illustrations and visual representations.
Oliver Byrne's edition of Elements, 1847
Kroncker Wallis aims to pick up where Byrne left off—completely rewriting Euclid's Elements from the ground up, designing new, straightforward graphics for each complicated proof.
A spread from the new Kroncker Wallis print of Elements
The book, which they aim to ship in December 2018 features page after page of colorful illustrations and plenty of whitespace. It's available exclusively through the Kickstarter campaign for about $140.
