By Rebecca Ceccatelli. Cover image: Courtesy of Pitti Immagine.
Indie books are the future? The blank page has always posed a challenge to anyone who dares enough to approach it, offering a space to be filled with ideas, stories, and images. But how should one go about filling it? And why choose paper as a medium for communication in the first place? Books have long served as vessels for ideas, whether functional or artistic, preserving words behind sturdy covers. Yet, as we move away from traditional formats, a new wave of publishers is exploring fresh ways to transform the book, merging visual art with narrative in ways that push the boundaries of what a book can be.
While classic books will never disappear—and we certainly wouldn’t want them to, as their absence would be as detrimental to us humans as the decline of bees—new forms of books are increasingly emerging. These indie books are often inspired by traditional formats but with a fresh twist. At a festival like Testo in Florence, promoted by Pitti Immagine, where the exhibition theme is the book in all its forms, more booths are occupied by publishing houses that challenge conventional definitions of what it means to “make a book.” This growing trend of using the book form as a platform for experimentation has captured our attention at Testo this year. As a result, we have compiled a list of publishers that encourage the seamless blending of art and literature into a single universe: the realm of the artist’s book. Here are four standout publishers whose works merge art and literature, offering us a glimpse into the future of the book.
4 Indie Books publishers We Discovered at Testo Firenze 2025
1. Libri Finti Clandestini: Innovative Artist Indie Books Made from Recycled Paper
Libri Finti Clandestini is the publishing house that stands out the most due to its unconventional display, which is quite different from the typical book stacks found nearby. Instead of towering piles of books on top of each other, with a few perched on plastic pedestals, Libri Finti Clandestini welcomes you with a small selection of books, often in very limited editions, accompanied by explanatory tags next to their creations. While it may be labelled a publishing house, it’s actually more of an artistic collective (El Pacino, Aniv Delarev, and Yghor Kowalvsky) that focuses its work and research on the artist’s book.
Founded in Rome in the summer of 2012 and later relocated to Milan, the Libri Finti Clandestini project aims to create real books using only “found paper”—the kind of paper people usually consider to be trash. They source materials with eclectic histories from abandoned factories, libraries, warehouses, paper mills, archives, and printing workshops across Europe. The first projects were entirely hands-on for the artists, involving everything from collecting the paper and manipulating the content to the binding process. They sometimes even collaborated with illustrators and printers, creating books and sketchbooks intended for a public that would decide their fate—ready to be written in, drawn on, or imbued with whatever meaning the owner wished to assign to them.
As time passed, the collective delved into the world of artist books, resulting in creations that took on new, unusual forms, often produced in unique editions, such as pop-up books and miniature volumes. Their goal was to work with existing materials, avoid mass production, and create art with minimal environmental impact. They focused on experimentation and investigation in the realms of recycling and degrowth.
2. Lotta Books: Limited Edition Photographic Books & Artisanal Publishing
Lotta Books, located at Testo, is partnered with Libri Finti Clandestini, which facilitates their presence at the festival and shares a conventional booth with them. This collaboration is no coincidence, as both organisations uphold similar principles. Lotta Books is a publishing house focused on photographic works, aiming to promote emerging Italian and international photographers. They focus on limited editions to preserve the artisanal quality and essence of the entire Lotta project. Each book is handmade with meticulous attention to detail.
While Lotta Books aligns with its partner’s rejection of mass production, it takes a different approach by emphasising artistic expression in the form of printed books rather than focusing solely on sustainability, as the creative collective does. The outcome is more than just small-sized books with special bindings—such as ring-bound, spiral-bound, or exposed stitching—each book comes with a wrapper that enhances the narrative experience. These wrappers may include boxes containing items like perfume extracts or stamps, creating an immersive experience for the reader. The goal is to make the perfect home for every artistic project—be it photographic, literary, illustrative, or graphic—while embracing the exciting challenges that each one presents. In addition to publishing, the house also operates as an independent bookbinding centre where clients can entrust the design and production of their editorial projects.
3. Bruno: Independent Publishing with Artistic Craftsmanship in Indie Books
“Bruno is the pseudonym of Andrea Codolo and Giacomo Covacich since 2013. The project, based in Venice, combines a graphic design studio, an exhibition space and a specialised bookstore focusing on visual communication and international independent publishers. In terms of communication design, the studio works on visual identities, exhibition setups, publishing projects, information design and data visualisation in collaboration with institutions, cultural foundations and private clients. Since 2014, bruno has also evolved into a publishing brand.”
This is the introduction that bruno proposes to people exploring their website. It is a digital space that challenges traditional readability and navigation, as even its structure is experimental and independent. The layout is rational and structured, featuring an Arial font that encapsulates the essence of the books produced by bruno. An elegant and minimalist style, almost scientific, introduces both design and content. The clean layouts provide calmness for rational thinkers, while the punk aesthetic adds an edge.
Even though the content is treated with a meticulous approach, it opens pathways for artistic exploration through carefully curated visual aesthetics, often incorporating striking imagery and unique design elements that complement the subject matter. The books themselves are artfully printed with a focus on craftsmanship and attention to detail, creating a sense of both luxury and function. This commitment to quality and design makes each release not only a literary work but also a collectable object to admire on your bookshelf.
4. Ilfilodipartenope: Minimalist Books Crafted with Unique Materials
Last but not least is the continued presence of Ilfilodipartenope after last years’ success. Ilfilodipartenope is a small artisanal publishing house founded in 2003 in Naples with the aim of creating a space for editorial ideation and design. Here, craftsmanship is not simply seen as a revival of manual work; it is a deliberate choice to “design without any preconceived stylistic or formal constraints, striving for naturalness in the creation of things. This approach leads to simple products that use the most suitable materials, among many other solutions found during the design process” (Bruno Munari).
In the Officina-Laboratorio at Via Costantinopoli 48 in Naples, Lina Marigliano and Alberto D’Angelo conceptualise, curate, and produce indie books. These books may contain few words and many signs, or vice versa, but they always reflect the belief that behind the form and marks, there are words, and behind the words, there are forms and signs. Their books are small, fragile, and minimalist, and these qualities are central to the message they aim to communicate. Each book is crafted with unique materials, stitches, fragments, and contributions from writers, artists, poets, and artisans. Through this collaborative process, the book evolves from an individual creation to a shared piece, becoming a space where craftsmanship and artistic expertise come together, turning each work into a collective experience.
