Typologie, a captivating collection of design books that delve into the essence of everyday objects, has just released its fourth issue, and it's all about the humble wooden crate. We often encounter crates at outdoor markets. Stacked up like scaffolding and laid out on stalls, they are used to transport and display fruits and vegetables. Our eyes wander from leeks to turnips, while we tend to overlook these simple yet ingenious objects: a few slats of poplar wood, stapled together in perfect efficiency and function. Although this classic design has been around for over sixty years, its principle has remained more or less unchanged.⁠ ⁠ Partnering with The Vitra Design Museum, Typologie showcases 45 striking photographs printed in bichromie, 30 colorful illustrations, a thought-provoking text by Alexandre D'Orsetti, and a fascinating interview featuring Philippe Weisbecker, a French artist, Pierre Cornu, a historian, and Jean-Luc Baley, the director of a wooden crate factory. This issue meticulously inventories the crate's various shapes, manufacturing process, and history, bringing to life the enduring relevance of this often-overlooked object. If you're curious about the world around you and love thoughtful design, you won't want to miss Typologie's latest issue. Buy

A humorous tribute to Matteo Thun, one of Italy’s most distinguished designers and architects, and his work. In the summer of 2009, Swiss artist Walter Pfeiffer made an extensive trip from Zurich to the Italian island of Capri, taking shots of some fifty of Thun’s design objects en route. Yet, rather than doing a mere documentation of these items, Pfeiffer created highly lively “tableaux vivants.” The artist was accompanied on his journey by Thun’s two then teenage sons, who thus form the main visual narrative of the book and appear in many pictures together with their father’s creations. A brief introduction by Matteo Thun’s wife Susanne and an index of the depicted design gems round out this extraordinary and entertaining visual travelogue. Buy

Not happy with the cold weather? Considering how long the Berlin winter lasts, there's still plenty of time to reach for the knitting kit and knit yourself some warm jumpers... And honestly with the book by Lærke Bagger at your side, it couldn't be more fun!⁠ Her mantra "Better unique than perfect" fits perfectly with the new DIY and upcycling of vintage clothing that is currently taking over fashion. Laerke is a trained textile designer and has been knitting with recycled materials since she was a teenager. So this book does not only teach you knitting scrunchies, socks, jumpers or even a ball gown, but also how to do it with recycled materials, yarn scraps and incorporating real found objects. In the process, you will be encouraged to stand by imperfections.⁠ Buy

The Dictionary of Color Combinations is probably one of the most beautiful books we ever held in our hands! After it has been sold out for a year, we finally have it back in stock and are mesmerized as before.⁠..⁠ ⁠ The pocket size jewel offers 348 incredible color combinations by Japanese painter Sanzo Wada. The compositions of two, three, and four tones could not be more intriguing and with its index registering the CMYK code of every shade used it is an indispensable tool for every designer.⁠ Buy

Theriaca is the independent label managed by artist and fashion designer Asuka Hamada. Based in Germany and Japan, she is currently engaged in a creative project that focuses on the endless creative potential of knitwork. This art book compiles her works and process as part of this endeavour.⁠ ⁠ Discover colourful objects made of yarn, derived from the artist’s fluid inspiration, and unique pieces knitted from non-traditional materials like shoelaces, straws, or paper. The volume provides a comprehensive look at Hamada’s own thought process, spanning from ideation, experimentation, and implementation to actual designs, all while pushing the boundaries of what knitting is capable of. Buy

The world today faces overwhelming environmental and social problems. To combat, change and overcome these challenges, collective action is necessary and inevitable. This has led to new forms of collective art and design practices: Artists collaborate with non-artists, make products for their local environment and take on multiple identities such as researcher, community activist, computer hacker or business consultant.⁠ ⁠ The book "Making Matters" by the fantastic publisher Onomatopee looks at art practices on all continents where the boundaries between art, design, research and activism are blurring or dissolving. ⁠ Buy

Plates like paintings, teapots in primitive style and sculptures with abstract forms and bold colours that defy any purpose or function - the ceramic works of Shun Kadohashi seem to combine prehistoric forms with abstract modernist painting. His works are the first to be featured in the Unearth book series, which explores the practice and processes of artists working with ceramics.⁠⁠ Buy

Photographer Fien Muller and sculptor Hannes Van Severen only made their debut as a design duo in 2011. But already their first collection of furniture met with a great response. It was the simple materials and an incredible sense for shapes and colour combinations that made them stand out and still do today.⁠ ⁠ Over the last decade they created an influential body of work – elementary forms shape functional sculptures that grow into vibrant spaces. With both Fien Muller and Hannes Van Severen being artists, it’s- natural that their collections sit somewhere between design and art. This book unveils the origins, the complexity, and the references embedded in the DNA of Muller Van Severen’s work.⁠ Buy

MJKVDL 2021 presents the first published overview of the experimental work of architect-turned-clothing designer Mark Jan Krayenhoff van de Leur.  After a 30 year career as an architect, Mark began experimenting with clothing design after he and his husband, the artist AA Bronson, relocated from New York to Berlin in 2013. His designs emerge from labour-intensive and formally unique processes, responding to problems or provocations raised by traditional approaches to garment construction and tailoring, and subverting established norms of production. Rather than a fashion collection, Mark’s clothes exist outside of capitalist cycles of seasonal production and consumption; each garment is unique and no multiples are made or sold.⁠ Designed in the layout of a fashion lookbook, the publication, however, shows in a very intimate way the garments that are imbued with autobiographical narratives. The very personal is underlined by the photographs, most of which were taken at home in the Berlin flat Mark shares with his husband.⁠⠀ Buy

For a long time, sustainable products had the reputation of being unsexy, aesthetically somewhere between a tie-dyed T-shirt and a haystack. But these times are fortunately over. Sustainability, longevity and circularity are not only in demand as properties, but also their visibility within the material.⁠ At ECAL students of product design, established materials specialists, manufacturers and researchers came together with the aim of exploring and defining the aesthetic potential of a new generation of sustainable materials. The result of this research-through-design project is a series of fourteen case studies involving the development of materials made from textile waste, recycled paper, rubber granulate or vegetable fibers such as algae, rice husks, hemp, flax and wood. The resulting new materials can be shaped, pressed, woven or welded and offer future designers a range of practical tools and applied knowledge about the methods of analyzing and processing seminal materials, utilizing their advantageous qualities and developing functional, yet aesthetically intriguing objects.⁠ Buy

Oh yes! It is finally here: the first comprehensive book about the astounding work of the master of pottery and sculptures, JB Blunk! At the very moment when Blunk got introduced to the craft of Japanese ceramics "...something went PING!" Although it took him a few more years before he finally made his way to Japan this was the very beginning of a life-long journey dedicated to the ancient knowledge and traditional techniques of unglazed, wood-fired stoneware ceramics. To what extent JB Blunk's passion for what nature has to offer shaped not only his trans-disciplinary artwork but fully converged into his life can be seen in numerous undisclosed archival photos of his home and studio, accompanied by essays from Lucy Lippard, Glenn Adamson, Fariba Bogzaran and Louise Allison Cort. This book is a heart-warming tribute to the beauty of earth, water and fire and a man who has honed the imperfections of nature to perfection!⁠⠀ Buy

Vertical lines bound by razor-sharp rims, meet gently rolling bodies of symmetric beauty, round vessels with asymmetric collars and irregular appearing spikes that seem to be sometimes thorns, sometimes nipples, glowing in burnished graphite black or soft terra cotta.⁠ Magdalene Odundo's work is inspired by the human body, by traditional vessels, ethnological objects, and sculptures. "Study whatever has gone before, not with a view to becoming a copyist, but with the object of gaining knowledge." Fascinated by these words of British industrial designer Christopher Dresser she absorbed the British museums and pieced what she saw together into a language truly of her own.⁠ "Making is a journey of collecting, piecing together the collected or recorded memories." This publication translates Odundo's quote into print and shows her work next to all the objects that inspired her, insightful essays about her method and practice round it off.⁠ We are so happy that with the second edition we have this jewel back in our shop.⁠ Buy