Among those familiar with Ellen White’s books, they are often cited by their acronyms: PP, PK, DA, AA, and GC. In light of this, we decided to design monograms for each book and we used the shapes found within the sanctuary as inspiration. The Outer Court and Holy Place are rectangles using a 2:1 ratio; the Most Holy Place and altar are perfect squares, and the laver is a circle. These shapes were stacked together to establish the underlying grid that was used in the creation of each monogram.

The monograms are presented in white foil on the spines, blind embossed on the cloth covers, and embedded within patterns printed on the endpapers within each book. 

The Conflict Beautiful is available with two distinct cover options—an elegant grayscale, hinting at the struggle between light and dark, and a sanctuary palette of scarlet, purple, and blue. 

In both cover options, the books are organized using a chiastic structure, which was a very common literary device used throughout the Bible. Essentially, the most important content is in the middle with the content before building to it and the content after mirroring that process in reverse. So The Desire of Ages (Ellen White’s book on the life of Christ) becomes the focal point in The Conflict Beautiful.

Every set of The Conflict Beautiful is delivered in a custom slipcase that’s wrapped in the same soft cloth that’s used on the covers of the books. The slipcase is also angled back to assist in removing and replacing the books. 

When it comes to book design, a really great typeface is one you don’t even notice. Your eyes glide across the page effortlessly moving from letter to letter, word to word, and line to line. This might sound simple, but designing a typeface that does all those things well is extremely difficult. After extensive exploration we decided to use Pensum Pro, a beautiful, highly readable font family designed by TypeMates, a foundry located in Germany.

The paper used on the interior of The Conflict Beautiful is made by Salzer. It’s silky smooth to the touch, ink sits beautifully on the page, it’s acid-free, chlorine-free, non-yellowing, has a high opacity, and best of all it’s entirely wood-free. This is a premium paper made specifically for books, and we think you’re going to love it as much as we do.

We created a dual-page numbering system to make sure it was easy to cite or lookup a specific passage, while not dictating the design of the page. 

The numbers in black along the bottom of the page are the page numbers for The Conflict Beautiful; the numbers in gray are the page numbers in the original editions of the books. The symbols in the outside margin mark the first complete paragraph of the original-edition page listed in gray type at the bottom of the page. To look up or cite a passage from a subsequent paragraph, simply count the paragraph breaks that come after the symbol.

We used Smyth Sewn binding for The Conflict Beautiful, which is the highest quality binding technique available. Each page is physically sewn in, resulting in a book that will stand up to heavy use over many years. Smyth Sewn books also open flat, making them a pleasure to read, and easy to highlight or jot notes in the margin.

The shape mimics the cloth slipcase that comes with The Conflict Beautiful. 

This allows the cloth slipcase to stay on the books when placed inside the sycamore case so you don’t have to find somewhere to store it.

The front of the case angles back toward the top to make it easy to remove books (and display the marbled edges if you have them!). 

The Conflict Beautiful monogram is laser engraved on the sides of each sycamore case and the Types & Symbols seal is laser engraved on the back. 

Each case is is made from solid quarter-sawn sycamore, and we choose that material for a couple of reasons. 

1. We love the symbolism. Just like Zacchaeus climbed a sycamore tree to get a better view of Jesus, the books within The Conflict Beautiful are all about deepening someone’s relationship with Christ.
2. Quarter-sawn sycamore is stunning. It has a warm tone, and the beautiful grain pattern varies greatly meaning each case is truly a one-of-a-kind work of art.

The only other material used is acacia for the four splines on the back corners. This is the same wood God instructed Moses to use in the construction of the sanctuary furniture, so it only seemed fitting to use it for the joinery that would help fortify the case.

Standard page edges are what you might expect with most books that you’ve purchased—simple and beautifully understated. 

These sets come with beautiful marbled patterns, designed by Lucy McGrath, printed onto the page edges. The printed patterns are different for each book within a set, but sets will all share the same marbled pattern when compared to each other.