Designers success with Audrey Eagle masterwork

MEDIA RELEASE
30 July 2007

Designers soar to success with Audrey Eagle's masterwork in book design awards

Eagle's Complete Trees and Shrubs of New Zealand, written and illustrated by Audrey Eagle and published by Te Papa Press, swooped away with half of the awards on offer in the 2007 Spectrum Print Book Design Awards, announced last night. Please see full list of winners below.

Designers Neil Pardington (Base Two) and Robyn Sivewright (Afineline) won Best Illustrated Book, Best Cover, and Best Book overall for their work on this landmark publication. This is Pardington's third consecutive win.

Audrey Eagle's botanical drawings were first published in 1975 by William Collins (New Zealand) Ltd; with a second volume following in 1983. As well as all of the artwork from the previous two volumes, the new volumes contain over 170 new paintings and drawings by Eagle, and showcase every presently known tree and shrub in New Zealand.

The treatment of Eagle's Complete Trees and Shrubs of New Zealand by Pardington (covers) and Sivewright (interiors) has also helped to earn Audrey Eagle and Te Papa Press a nomination for Best Illustrated Book at the Montana Book Awards.

'The judges unanimously agreed that this magnificent two-volume set easily met, and indeed surpassed, the criteria by which the entries had to be judged.' said Denis Welch, Deputy Editor of the New Zealand Listener and convenor of judges. 'Decades will pass and Eagle's will stand on the shelf as a monumental achievement of scholarship, art and design.'

Brief Lives (Auckland University Press) won designers Sarah Maxey and Katrina Duncan, along with artist Brendan O'Brien, the Best Non-Illustrated category of the awards.

The other winners were Cheryl Rowe, awarded Best Children's Book for Legends of Ngatoro-i-rangi (Reed Publishing), and Rose Miller, awarded Best Educational Book for Te Kete Kupu (Huia Publishers) - the first children's dictionary completely in te reo Māori.

'The high overall standard of the entries indicates a publishing industry in remarkably good shape,' said Welch, who was joined on the panel by bookseller Beth Davies and William Chen, founding Art Director of Metro magazine and Art Director of Cuisine.

The book design awards have been run annually since 1997 by the Book Publishers Association of New Zealand.

ENDS

BEST BOOK
Eagle's Complete Trees and Shrubs of New Zealand
Author Audrey Eagle
Designer Covers by Neil Pardington (Base Two) interior by Robyn Sivewright (Afineline)
Publisher Te Papa Press

BEST COVER
Eagle's Complete Trees and Shrubs of New Zealand
Author Audrey Eagle
Designer Covers by Neil Pardington (Base Two)
Publisher Te Papa Press

BEST NON-ILLUSTRATED BOOK
Brief Lives
Author Chris Price
Designer Cover by Sarah Maxey, interior by Katrina Duncan
Publisher Auckland University Press

BEST ILLUSTRATED BOOK
Eagle's Complete Trees & Shrubs of New Zealand
Author Audrey Eagle
Designer Covers by Neil Pardington (Base Two) interior by Robyn Sivewright (Afineline)
Publisher Te Papa Press

BEST EDUCATIONAL BOOK
Te Kete Kupu
Author Huia Publishers
Designer Ross Mills
Publisher Huia Publishers (NZ) Ltd

BEST CHILDREN'S BOOK
Legends of Ngatoro-i-rangi
Author Mervyn Taiaroa and Karen Taiaroa-Smithies
Designer Cheryl Rowe
Publisher Reed Publishing (NZ) Ltd

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