Frontier Metropolis was published by Wayne State University Press to celebrate Detroit’s 300th birthday. It chronicles the city’s pre-photographic history using more than 280 maps, artifacts and documents from collections all over the world.

Premium uncoated paper was selected to reflect the warm, tactile qualities of the original maps depicted in the book. The 18- by 13-inch page size and 300-line color separations allowed for large, highly detailed reproductions but also meant a physically challenging volume to navigate. To aid the reader, the dates of each work and figure numbers were placed in the outer margin for easy reference.