John: The content always comes first. Then I think what can we do with the content like with my new book - or "books" - whatever you want to call it, Thirty-Two Inch Ruler and Map of Babylon. It's like two sides of the same position. So I want to figure out a way of not doing a second chapter because the second chapter is always responsible to the hierarchy of the first chapter. I wanted equal chapters. So how do you do that? How do you not make one an aside to the other? You can do two volumes in a slipcase very simply but can you think of a way to not make it separate? Those questions led to the design from the content. So that's how it always happens.

Jeff: Finding the suitable house for this work.

John: Right. How can I think outside the box. Jasper Johns has this great working phrase that I read once, "Do something - Do something else to it." So it was always sort of like yeah you can do two books in a slip case or can we do something else? What's the next possible step?

Jeff: Seems with books there are sort of parameters that maybe one needs to keep.

John: Oh yeah.

Jeff: Like you probably have to be able to turn pages. (laughter)

John: It's a lap medium. It's defined by the physicality of someone's hands and lap. People don't look at books from across the room. People shouldn't make 16 x 20 inch books because they are too big and no one can operate them. (laughter) One of the reasons for the Anthony Hernandez design of the Loosestrife book came from the fact that I don't personally find it very comfortable to open big horizontal books. I find them awkward. I own a number of them and I've seen people do them, but I don't particularly like them. I don't use them because