At the beginning of the project, the author and the editor had a clear idea of how they wanted the cover to look. They envisioned a single drop of water rising out of a body of still water that filled the cover — they described it as something universal and timeless that would be so captivating, it would be hard to look away from. The target audience for Splash! is not only swimmers, but sports historians, history and micro-history readers, sports fans generally, and athletes of all stripes. Although the cover was initially assigned to another designer, I was ultimately handed the brief and I was very excited to take it on.