City Neighborhood Posters

Ork Poster for San Francisco
After reading my posts about maps, my friend Elaine wrote to tell me about a typographic map she’d gotten for Christmas, with all of the districts/neighborhoods in type — smaller or larger to fit in the appropriate location. Turns out I knew exactly what she got — the map to the right, from Ork Posters. (They’ve done maps of Seattle, Manhattan, Chicago, Toronto and more.) I’ve seen these before, and sent the link to more than one person, but had quite forgot about them — so I’m posting here so I’ll be reminded of them again when I browse my map posts…

Spelling Words

At the BABA book jam in October, calligrapher Cari Ferraro stopped by my table to say hi, and when I asked about the book she’d just finished, I got a huge treat when she brought it over for me to look at. Here’s what Cari says about the book on her website:

Spelling Words explores the roots of the English word “spell” and its intersection with letter magic. The book has two beginnings which meet in the center spread where the book may be turned over and read again from the other direction. Each side of the book begins with dictionary definitions of the word spell, the verb and the noun. Alphabets, magical symbols, and various rules and instructions for spelling fill the other pages.

Reading and handling her book was quite a pleasure: the handcrafted care of the painted paper, binding, and book case; the beautifully lettered words and page layout; and the wonderful surprise of reaching the middle of the book and having to turn it around to read the rest. Reading from one end, the words are loose, relaxed, breaking free of the page layout. From the other, they are more constrained and regular.
Below is a detail from Spelling Words. Cari has lots of pictures of page spreads and more details on her website as well as her blog.

Cari Ferraro’s Spelling Words

Map Calendar

Even though 2009 has barely begun, I’ve started thinking about my 2010 calendar. As I was poking around the web looking at what others have done for 2008, imagine my delight in finding this calendar based on maps called ‘2009 Railways Map Calendar & Poster’ and designed by Lart Berliner! The railway lines are months, and you can see from the detail that important days are marked as stops on the routes. I immediately bought one. (Berliner also did a map-ish calendar in 2008 — Lakes and Territories of the Greater 2008.)

2009 Railways Map Calendar & Poster

Book Collecting: it has been many moons

In October 2007 on a errand at the San Francisco Center for the Book, I ran into my friend Katherine Emery letterpress printing a broadside of haiku by Suzanne Friedman. Some of the haiku look traditional

autumn’s breath—
nothing but green raspberries
on the vines

and some don’t

dandelion puff the wind makes my wish

I contacted Suzanne about getting a copy of the broadside to hang in my print shop. Happily for me she sent it along with her much more substantial book of haiku and very short poems about the moon. They are arranged seasonally and some use names from the moon in other cultures. It’s letterpress printed with a few linocut illustrations. The book is long and slender, and fits very nicely in the hand for reading. Below are two more, these from the book:

hay moon—
what meaning do you have
in this city?

frost moon the doe leaves its breath

S.B. Friendman: it has been many moons