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Gatefold

Type of packaging for music albums

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMay 22, 2026
Entity authoritySource title only
Source-derived summary

A gatefold cover or gatefold LP is a form of packaging for LP records that became popular in the mid-1960s. A gatefold cover, when folded, is the same size as a standard LP cover. The larger gatefold cover provided a means of including artwork, liner notes, and/or song lyrics that would otherwise not fit on a standard record cover. It became famous as an extension of progressive rock, as the expansive, transient gatefolds by artists such as Roger Dean, H. R. Giger, or Hipgnosis became associated with concept albums.

Editorial summary

“Gatefold” enters the record as type of packaging for music albums. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Gatefold, Type and packaging can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current 89-word lead offers orientation but no explicit four-digit date, so chronology should not be assumed. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Gatefold, Type and packaging.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Gatefold” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Gatefold, Type and packaging provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 22, 2026.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Gatefold”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Gatefold primary sources, Gatefold archive and Gatefold research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Gatefold”?
  2. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
  3. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
Subject index

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Gatefold” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.