The Design Duo Behind The Century’s Most Famous Album Covers

In the 1970s, designers were treated as rock stars–album cover designers, that is. “You were regarded almost like the fifth member of the band,” says Aubrey Powell, whose studio Hipgnosis was responsible for the album cover designs for artists like Pink Floyd, Paul McCartney, Genesis, and Led Zeppelin. A new book, Vinyl. Album. Cover. Art, revives Hipgnosis’s complete catalogue, displaying 480 illustrations from the studio’s archive. It’s a glimpse into a pre-digital era when a single...