Graphic Designer's Essential Reference

Effectively Using a Column Grid

Most any three-, four-, six-, or eight-column grids will usually work well; it’s the way in which columns of text interact with negative space—and with each other—that truly determines how a grid is articulated. The spaces above and below columns play an active part in giving the columns a rhythm as they relate to each other across pages and spreads. Every approach has a dramatic impact on the overall rhythm of the pages within a publication, ranging from austere and geometric to wildly organic in feeling—all the while ordered by the underlying grid. Changing the column logic from section to section provides yet another method of differ-entiating informational areas.

Column Logic and Baseline Alignment

When columns ...