装帧，即书籍设计，是将目录、风格、格式、设计以及书籍其他组成部分集成在一起构成整体的艺术。

前页，即正文前的书页，是书中的第一节，通常也是书中页数最少的部分。书页的页码通常采用小写罗马数字，每一页都计算在页码之内，但是空白页的编码不被打印。

前页通常只出现在丛书的第一册，虽然其他元素(例如目录，索引)肯能会出现在每一册中。

下面的表的可能会对区分前页的不同类型有所帮助:

Book design is the art of incorporating the content, style, format, design, and sequence of the various components of a book into a coherent whole.

In the words of Jan Tschichold, book design, "though largely forgotten today, methods and rules upon which it is impossible to improve, have been developed over centuries. To produce perfect books, these rules have to be brought back to life and applied." Richard Hendel describes book design as "an arcane subject", and refers to the need for a context to understand what that means.