Weltformat is an annual graphic design festival which takes place in Lucerne (CH). It was one of the rare events that were realized despite the virus in 2020. The newly launched Welformat magazine offers background information, this year’s theme was “Not (Yet) Canceled.” Sound familiar? The essays and projects were manifested, initiated and kick-started because of the pandemic. Read thoroughly, flip slowly, and enjoy a surprise parallel appearance in the end.
Buy it here

We finally have our reward (thank you COVID19!) with Intimations, a collection of essays that tells us exactly what Zadie Smith has been thinking all this time! She walks us through her personal experience of the pandemic. She writes as a coping mechanism, as a place to hide. She looks into herself, then her people, and the people outside. She writes about the city she lives, loves and leaves (New York), and the rotten roots of the country and its ongoing bad behavior. When you finish it, you feel like you’ve undergone heart surgery; the heart aches but you’ve been given a second chance to live life with a new set of priorities.
Buy it here

In this article, Orhan Pamuk demonstrates the remarkably consistent ways in which humans throughout history have responded to fear. After extensive research for his new novel, Pamuk takes us on a journey through many of the most enjoyable pandemics in history; both fictional and true.
Read it here

In this unusual interview, Fred Alan Wolf, quantum physics specialist explains the concept of parallel universes so that even the interviewer begins to understand it! Wolf says that quantum physics explains many facts of physical life. Yet it is still a mystery to most experts which isn’t very reassuring. Perhaps they have it all figured out in another universe.
Read it here

Ryan Gander isn’t just the joker in the pack.
Look behind the poker-faced humor of these parallel cards (playing cards where both sides are the front) and you realize there is more depth to the concept. His perception of playing cards has taken on a journey of its own since he was a child and the aesthetics of their usage within this deck opens up a universe of new possibilities.
Get them here

In this essay, Ted Gioia explores (and delights in!) The Third Policeman—a novel by Flann O’Brien (the pen name of Irish author Brian O’Nolan). This surrealist crime novel, now regarded as a literary classic, remained unpublished until 1967, one year after his death (nobody appears to have made a crime novel out of this fact!) “A book that starts out with overtones of Crime and Punishment, says Giola, “soon takes on a flavor more akin to Alice in Wonderland.” Incidentally, you’ll be hard pushed to find a more enjoyable book cover design!
More here

A joy-read on Iki (粋/いき), a Japanese aesthetical concept which translates roughly as chic or stylish, but means so much more. The word was used in 19th-century Japan to define the endless charm of the geisha. Design is crucial for the manifestation of iki. These lines on parallel lines are drawn from the fourth chapter of Kuki Shūzō’s 1930 book Reflections on Japanese Taste —The Structure of iki (Tokyo: IwanamiShoten, 1930), brought to you by the Serving Library.
Download here

Weltformat is an annual graphic design festival which takes place in Lucerne (CH). It was one of the rare events that were realized despite the virus in 2020. The newly launched Welformat magazine offers background information, this year’s theme was “Not (Yet) Canceled.” Sound familiar? The essays and projects were manifested, initiated and kick-started because of the pandemic. Read thoroughly, flip slowly, and enjoy a surprise parallel appearance in the end.
Buy it here

We finally have our reward (thank you COVID19!) with Intimations, a collection of essays that tells us exactly what Zadie Smith has been thinking all this time! She walks us through her personal experience of the pandemic. She writes as a coping mechanism, as a place to hide. She looks into herself, then her people, and the people outside. She writes about the city she lives, loves and leaves (New York), and the rotten roots of the country and its ongoing bad behavior. When you finish it, you feel like you’ve undergone heart surgery; the heart aches but you’ve been given a second chance to live life with a new set of priorities.
Buy it here

In this article, Orhan Pamuk demonstrates the remarkably consistent ways in which humans throughout history have responded to fear. After extensive research for his new novel, Pamuk takes us on a journey through many of the most enjoyable pandemics in history; both fictional and true.
Read it here

In this unusual interview, Fred Alan Wolf, quantum physics specialist explains the concept of parallel universes so that even the interviewer begins to understand it! Wolf says that quantum physics explains many facts of physical life. Yet it is still a mystery to most experts which isn’t very reassuring. Perhaps they have it all figured out in another universe.
Read it here

Ryan Gander isn’t just the joker in the pack.
Look behind the poker-faced humor of these parallel cards (playing cards where both sides are the front) and you realize there is more depth to the concept. His perception of playing cards has taken on a journey of its own since he was a child and the aesthetics of their usage within this deck opens up a universe of new possibilities.
Get them here

In this essay, Ted Gioia explores (and delights in!) The Third Policeman—a novel by Flann O’Brien (the pen name of Irish author Brian O’Nolan). This surrealist crime novel, now regarded as a literary classic, remained unpublished until 1967, one year after his death (nobody appears to have made a crime novel out of this fact!) “A book that starts out with overtones of Crime and Punishment, says Giola, “soon takes on a flavor more akin to Alice in Wonderland.” Incidentally, you’ll be hard pushed to find a more enjoyable book cover design!
More here

A joy-read on Iki (粋/いき), a Japanese aesthetical concept which translates roughly as chic or stylish, but means so much more. The word was used in 19th-century Japan to define the endless charm of the geisha. Design is crucial for the manifestation of iki. These lines on parallel lines are drawn from the fourth chapter of Kuki Shūzō’s 1930 book Reflections on Japanese Taste —The Structure of iki (Tokyo: IwanamiShoten, 1930), brought to you by the Serving Library.
Download here