This idea is directly from Shotwell. I really loved how in Shotwell one can browse the albums (called events in Shotwell) similarly as images, that is, each album is represented by one photo from the album. A picture is worth a thousand words: https://screenshots.debian.net/screenshots/000/005/917/large.png

It's a very visual, quick and exciting way to see the albums (instead of just plain text names, which is quite boring). Each album is given a photo which is the "cover" image of the album (by default, it could be the earliest, the latest or the best rated image) and it can be set manually too.