Last week the new yearly award De Kapitaal, recognising a person, institute or initiative for an exceptional contribution to Dutch book design, is handed out to Studio Joost Grootens. We designed the award for this year and the upcoming years.
award
commissioned by The Best Dutch Book Designs
porcelain production by Marieke van Heesbeen, 3d model by Roel Deden
photos De Kapitaal by Titia Hahne
In the summer, we made this exhibition in Asahiso Noma, Osaka, Japan: a wallpaper of letters, made with a tile type tool we're currently developing with Janine Zielman. The exhibition is up until mid September.
exhibition
commissioned by Tetsuya Goto
photos by Takuma Uematsu
Our exhibition in the 3sec.gallery just opened: the worlds only drive-by gallery in the parking garage of the Chassé Theater Breda. The 60 posters show some of the first results of a tile type tool we're currently developing with Janine Zielman. The exhibition is up until mid September.
60 A2 posters
commissioned by Graphic Matters
photos by Edwin Wiekens
We made a follow-up of the book Daily Spins by Thomas Trum, for Porsche. It shows new work and the process of making. We sprayed their covers with Thomas in the south of France, resulting in 600 different books, with 3 layers of paint each.
book, special edition for Porsche
printed by robstolk
covers sprayed by Thomas Trum
typeface by Dinamo
commissioned by Thomas Trum
The Time Tower, next to Huis Sonneveld in Rotterdam, is open this month. This temporary intervention and exhibition is part of Rotterdam Architecture Month and designed by Alexandra Sonnemans. The exhibition is curated by OMI Rotterdam, we did the graphic design. The pattern on the facade echoes the curtains in the kitchen and serving room of Huis Sonneveld, designed in 1930 by Elise Djo-Bourgeois.
spatial intervention
exhibition design
commissioned by OMI / Alexandra Sonnemans
photos 1, 3 by Ossip van Duivenbode
Last month we designed the cover of the Volkskrant cultural supplement about Holland Festival. We made our own typographic version of a test image. It's the first outcome of the tile type tool we're currently developing together with coder Janine Zielman.
newspaper cover
commissioned by Volkskrant
The last fresh ink of 2023 just got in - the Stedelijk A–Z collection catalogue for Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam. It shows more than 130 well-known and lesser-known works from the collection. The makers are organized alphabetically by their first names, ranging from Agus Djaya to Zanele Muholi. We combined all versions of the typeface Union SMA, that were developed for the museum for different occasions, to underline the large variety of the content.
catalogue
commissioned by Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam
typeface Union SMA by Radim Peško
Exhibition at Block C and ARTisBOOK Groningen. A presentation of our latest works, including two Jacquard woven curtains and screenprinted suits, a drinking bowl for cats, as well as previous projects.
exhibition
many thanks to Saskia van der Meer, Michiel Teeuw, Koen Taselaar, Judith Peskens and Tineke Hoogewerf
photos by Titia Hahne
I See Double - a small edition of jackets made out of the surplus fabric printed for Kunstinstituut Melly. The jackets are one size and are screenprinted and sewn in the Netherlands, and available in our webshop.
jacket
thanks to Tineke Hoogewerf
Together with architect Atelier Tomas Dirrix and artist Koen Taselaar we were asked to re-design the ground space of Kunstinstituut Melly in Rotterdam. The space functions as bookshop, small cafe and eventspace all in one. We dipped our toes into eachothers professions and collectively designed and produced a set of dancing furnitures, tilted bookcases, patterned pillows, an inside billboard and a poster set as wallpaper.
spatial design
thanks to Phil Procter
photos by Titia Hahne
commissioned by Melly
The book of Thomas Trum is just out. 'Daily Spins' shows a (very) large part of his finished work as well as stills of the process, printed on sections of blueback paper. The covers of all books are hand sprayed by Thomas, resulting in 1500 different color combinations.
book
published by Jap Sam Books
printed by ZwaanLenoir
covers sprayed by Thomas Trum
typeface by Dinamo
photos by The Book Photographer
Last week we were in Milano setting up this paper wall painting that mimics sunblinds, spelling out a secret word.
Exhibition at Parco Gallery on show this whole simmering summer.
exhibition
invitation by Parco Gallery
photo 2-5 by Cartacarbone
Women in Architecture is the first publication in the new series Documents and Histories. With this series, nai010 publishers highlight missing voices in architecture.
book
designed with Wibke Bramesfeld
typeface by Charlotte Rohde
initiative by Laurence Osteyn, nai010 publishers
contributions by oa Catja Edens, Setareh Noorani, Indira van 't Klooster, Lara Schrijver
A curtain, functioning as a scaled-up type specimen of a set of letters we’re currently working on. The lettershapes derive from the 'Sun dog' phenomenon, an infinite mirage reflection of the sun. The somewhat hidden typography is part of the songtext of Wordy Rappinghood by Tom Tom Club - one of the curtain owners' favorite songs.
curtain, printed
photos by Titia Hahne
Captions and text folding around the works and exhibition space of Thomas Trum at Het Noordbrabants Museum. The design flows out of Thomas' book we’re currently making, and this exhibition will slide back into the book again.
The book will be published by Jap Sam Books and launched mid May.
exhibition titles
photos by Titia Hahne
commissioned by Het Noordbrabants Museum
We developed a letterset as graphic identity for the architects of Falsework, with which they can show their world in their own words.
graphic identity
website icw Janine Zielman
commissioned by Tim Peeters & Violette Schönberger
A book for Vlisco - a visual translation of their company's values, with drawings by Henning Wagenbreth that can be read and combined in different ways.
book
drawings by Henning Wagenbreth
commissioned by Vlisco
This identity for the State of Fashion biennale 2022 is an ever changing Cadavre Exquis of images of the work of all participants. We designed a digital tool, together with Vera van de Seyp, that can generate an infinite amount of different posters.
visual identity
key visual video i.c.w. Vera van de Seyp
key visual sound by Ruben van Asselt
visitors guide i.c.w. Kai Udema
commissioned by State of Fashion
As part of the identity for the State of Fashion biennale we designed the graphic layer for the exhibition in the Eusebius church in Arnhem. The exhibition 'Fashion as Encounters' makes room for changes and additions, and this reflects in the typography that plays with open spaces for imaginary answers.
exhibition signage
curated by Not___Enough Collective
photos by Eva Broekema & Jeroen Verrecht
exhibition design by Studio L A
commissioned by State of Fashion
For a residential building in Rotterdam we developed a Jacquard woven curtain, sized 9,5m x 3,9m. We made a layered design, almost as if you’re looking through a space filled with columns and pillars. The somewhat hidden typography says: ‘Was it a cat I saw?’ — a palindrome, referring to the curtain that moves and slides from left to right and right to left.
curtain, Jacquard woven
developed at TextielLab, Tilburg
photo 1 by Henny van Belkom
photo 2-4 by Pim Top
The majority of the book Rollable Ramblings comprises reproductions of Koen Taselaars' elaborate tapestries, and zoom-ins on them. This visual component is complemented with essays shedding light on the textile works, and on the history of textile art in general. All image pages are printed on glossy paper, and text pages are printed on thin uncoated paper. The book has a Japanese binding and a silkscreened cover.
book
commissioned by Koen Taselaar
initiative by Block C, Groningen
texts by Katalin Herzog
printed by Zwaan Lenoir
published by Jap Sam Books
photos by The Book Photographer
Selected for Best Dutch Book Designs 2021
This publication shows an ongoing visual typographic research into city surfaces, that we started during our residency in Seoul. It is an assemblage of an ongoing and ever-expanding built set of letters. The text is written by artist Michiel Huijben.
220x305mm, 48 pg, soft cover, 4 pantone + black, ISBN 9789090345543. Available for purchase in our shop.
book
self-commissioned
text by Michiel Huijben
printed by Drukkerij Tielen
distributed by Idea Books
The exhibition Versatile Volumes in KF Gallery, Seoul, is an exhibition with the 33 Best Dutch Book Design books of last year and 18 Korean artists' books. We developed the Dutch part of the exhibition and the graphic identity.
exhibition
icw The Best Dutch Book Designs, Dutch Embassy Seoul, Korea Foundation, Art Book Press
Korean type & typesetting by Dongbin Han
photography prints in exhibition by Kyoungtae Kim
This book for Land Art Flevoland contains a collection of 10 iconic land art works (ao Robert Morris, Marinus Boezem), studies about them through interventions by a new generation of artists (a.o. Melanie Bonajo, Gilles de Brock) and texts (a.o. Floris Alkemade, Mariska van den Berg).
book
commissioned by Land Art Flevoland
printed by NPN Drukkers
published by nai010 publishers
photography ao Johannes Schwartz
A catalogue of this years selection of the 33 Best Dutch Book Designs of The Netherlands. Designed in lockdown, the book felt like an aerospace, with no top or bottom, front or back.
book
commissioned by Esther Scholten (The Best Dutch Book Designs)
photography of books in the book by Kyoungtae Kim
book photos by The Book Photographer
This book contains an exploration of alternative models of architectural and urban thinking and representation – with projects by a.o. Le Corbusier, Constant, Archizoom, Superstudio and Rem Koolhaas. In the design we have woven text pages (white) and image pages (black) into each other, as if it were an assemblage of two separate books. Each 'enter' in the text is not a white space but consists of a full stop. These dots are like bread crumbs suggesting the grid throughout the book, as a small reference to concrete poetry.
book
commissioned by WAI Architecture Think Tank & nai010
In the newest book by Jeroen Junte, Do It Ourselves, he describes a new ‘post-crisis generation’ designers. We connected all projects in the book by turning them into a long scroll where the end is the beginning and vice versa, with the text pages inserted in between. The Whyte typeface is stretched here and there to make the letters fit imaginary A4 papers.
book
commissioned by Jeroen Junte & nai010
thanks to Dinamo
A publication with the works of Ide André, playing with repetition and rhythm of the content and the book itself.
book
commissioned by Ide André & Sieger White Stichting
published by Jap Sam Books
Selected for Best Dutch Book Designs 2019
Last week the Raketstart exhibition opened at Stedelijk Museum Breda: a selection of works by Breda-based artists. We warped the Lars typeface into space and used this as a base for the graphic identity.
visual identity
i.c.w. Kai Udema
commissioned by Stedelijk Museum Breda
thank you Bold Decisions
We designed the publication for this years edition of Archiprix, a selection of/prize for the best Dutch graduation projects in architecture and urban planning.
publication
commissioned by Archiprix
thank you Floor Weijs
Each year, we turn our class at ArtEZ Arnhem into a Character Club for 5 weeks. The students all get 1 letter to fall in love with, by only making this one letter, in every analog way possible, as many as possible. Out of all letters we collectively make a book, that can function as a catalogue of 700+ possible typefaces.
book
made with all first year students of GDA, ArtEZ Arnhem
Seoul based studio Corners asked us to design a poster for their Ink Village A2 risoposter exhibition. The letters are constructed out of patterned bricks we found in Seoul and the sound of the words is that of our favorite Korean dish: dolsot bibimbap. Available for purchase in our shop.
poster
thanks to Corners Studio Seoul
We're teaming up with Crimson Architectural Historians and ZUS Architects for the design of Independent School for the City, their new postmaster program in Rotterdam for post-graduate students from all over the world (in the field of design, planning, sociology, history,...). October 19th was the official kick-off with lectures and exhibitions and it was a blast. More coming soon.
visual identity
lecture photo by Maarten Laupman
commissioned by Crimson Architectural Historians
With winter coming up, we've printed a stack of TT sweaters (dark green & pink, sizes S/M/L) and are selling them for 25 euros. If you would like some TT to keep you warm, just send us a message (currently sold out).
Every six weeks one of the members of Het Wilde Weten, an artist space in the center of Rotterdam, hosts a public event deriving directly from their artistic practice, under the name of Disclosed. The design of this riso-printed poster series is loosely based on emails we like to send: designing text as expressive as possible using the simple design merits of an email. In addition to this, we use no more than 3 layers, take no longer than 2 hours for the design and we don’t show the posters to Het Wilde Weten until after they’re printed.
posters
commissioned by Het Wilde Weten
For the sixth edition of Prospects & Concepts we sketched and scribbled in the space with the letters previously made for the exhibition. The catalogue becomes a small fully scribbled notebook, the carpet of the entrance is smudged and the workspace wall is smeared with shapes.
Prospects & Concepts is an exhibition organized by the Mondriaan Fonds, taking place every year during Art Rotterdam and includes work of all artists who received a starter stipend in the previous year.
visual identity
exhibition design Tom Postma Design
commissioned by Mondriaan Fonds
An exhibition made during our recent residency at MMCA Museum of Contemporary Art Seoul, South Korea. The starting point for the prints is the City Sample Database we made: a collection of pictures we took of surfaces such as bricks, facades, shop windows and patterned clothing we encountered on the streets of Seoul. This results in a series of five bojagi-inspired fabrics in which we combine the patterns with words, forming potentially new city facades.
exhibition
photos by EH (Kyoungtae Kim)
thanks to Stimuleringsfonds
During our residency in Seoul we were asked to design a steel installation for Ilsan Park, Goyang. Deriving from the flags we made previously (showing the word SPIELTRIEB), we translated the word into spatial steel ‘posters’. Later in the year it will be installed permanently in between the trees of the park.
steel sculpture
commissioned by Dong Yeon Koh
In the first week of our residency at MMCA Seoul we were commissioned to make flags for the MMCA Changdong entrance. We made a design reacting to the residency atmosphere and based on a bedcloth we previously made. The flags, spelling out the word SPIELTRIEB, were produced with Korean efficiency and finished before we knew it.
flag series
photos by MMCA / Koen Taselaar
commissioned by MMCA Seoul
Diptych of lyrical poems and sonnets by Emily Dickinson and Edna St. Vincent Millay; two well-known American poets. The poems are for the first time translated in Dutch by a female translator, Ans Bouter, who compiled and published the book herself. The book is divided in two halves and has two spines – if placed the other way around on a bookshelf, this one book appears to be two different books. Each poet has her own part, printed in one color. All mutual information is printed with a mix of those two colors.
poetry book
available here
commissioned by Ans Bouter & Benjamin Groothuyse
Selected for Best Dutch Book Designs 2016
Bronze Medal Schönste Bücher aus aller Welt 2017
Ongoing from 2012 we design the visual identity for the annual exhibition Prospects & Concepts, organized by the Mondriaan Fonds and taking place during Art Rotterdam. The exhibition includes work of all artists who received a starter stipend in the previous year. We've designed a lettering system that is adapted in a different manner every year. The identity consists of invitations, exhibition guides, animated type, signage and a catalogue for every edition.
visual identity
exhibition design Tom Postma Design
video teaser in collaboration with Alice Saey
commissioned by the Mondriaan Fonds
This book contains an anthology of new and older articles from online magazine Vers Beton about the changes and upturn of the city of Rotterdam through the past five years. The revival of the city is approached from a number of themes, supplemented with contributions of Rotterdam photographers and illustrators. Starting point for the design was the collection of photos we took over the years of stickers in public space, leaving marks and ‘labeling’ the city.
book
photos book launch by Victor Wollaert
commissioned by Vers Beton, nai010publishers
available here
nominated for Rotterdamse Persprijs 2017
Moving Futures is a traveling dance festival through 7 Dutch cities showing work of contemporary choreographers. Like the first edition of the festival, we designed a template poster with the information of all cities on it. This time, contrasting with the highlight-markers of last year, we censored the information that was not applicable to the particular city. During a drawing workshop in an empty dance studio, we manually manipulated all 2000 posters with black markers.
visual identity
thanks to drawing assistants Koen, Sander, Alice, Tijs and Twan
commissioned by Dansmakers Amsterdam
South Korean typography biennale Typojanchi invited us for the Small House Big Door project. We were asked to design an object that could be presented in a hotel room. This bedcover also functions as a tent and has some hidden typography in it.
bedcover
commissioned by Typojanchi Biennale Seoul
Granfalloon is the title of 2015s degree show of the Masters Art & Science, Fine Art and Photography of Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts in London. This word, introduced by Kurt Vonnegut, means "a proud and meaningless association of human beings". The catalogue shows the work of all graduating students of these three sections. We underlined the title by using one sheet of paper per student, and designed the whole catalogue in alphabetical order. Then we threw the whole stack of pages in the air, deciding the order of the book by how we picked them up. Therefore all pages are mixed and bound together again in random order. The perforations that came out of the binding were used as confetti at the degree show opening itself.
exhibition catalogue
photo exhibition by Dennis Vanderbroeck
commissioned by Central Saint Martins London
This tablecloth was originally made as an extension of the KWARTET II card game by Marijke Appelman & Koen Taselaar. It’s can function as a backdrop for an evening with friends, food and card games. The tablecloth is made of 100% cotton and silkscreened by hand. Available for purchase in our shop.
tablecloth
photos by Alexandre Furtado
Het Nieuwe Instituut organised an exhibition about the material plastic and its future; 3D-printing. The exhibition (or: docubition, as it was called, a combination between exhibition and documentary) focusses on the political and economic industry around plastic and poses questions about the critical point in time where plastic is at right now: is the future of plastic in our own hands or in the hands of big powerful cooperations? The design reflects the subjective tone of the docubition. Inspired by punchlines of American documentaries, we designed a selection of slogans, extracted from the narration, posing questions about plastic.
visual identity
in collaboration with Tal Erez, Submarine, Daphna Laurens
commissioned by Het Nieuwe Instituut
Moving Futures is a traveling dance festival through 7 Dutch cities showing work of contemporary choreographers. We translated the dynamic mentality of the festival by making a template tourposter with the information of all participating cities and the whole festival printed on it. On the posters we manually highlighted the information appropriate for the specific city, with a big red marker. We organized a workshop drawing week that resulted in a series of 2000 different posters.
visual identity
commissioned by Dansmakers Amsterdam
thanks to drawing assistants Bas, Ing, Koen and Thomas
winner second prize at International Poster Competition of Graphic Design Festival Scotland 2017
jury rapport
Publication for the Walls project of artist Thomas Trum. Folded A2 blueback posters compiled into a booklet with a silkscreened cover.
book
commissioned by Thomas Trum
Kwartet is a Dutch card game using the simple premise of collecting a complete family/set of four cards (a so-called kwartet) per given category. In this version, initiated by Marijke Appelman and Koen Taselaar, the fourteen families are formed by artworks grouped by their underlying subject matter or the formal principles used, like Doors In Doors, Over The Edge, Used To Skate and Watermelon. We designed a dazzle pattern for the cards, package, and a little pin brooche for the winner. To play the game in full effect, we made a matching silkscreened tablecloth.
card game
commissioned by Marijke Appelman and Koen Taselaar
available here
Artists Marije Vermeulen, Marieke Coppens, Annegret Kellner and Cindy Moorman each took over the space of gallery Outline in Amsterdam for one weekend with a solo exhibition. To take-over Amsterdams public space, we designed silkscreened stickers that were spread all over the city by the artists and their friends.
flyer
commissioned by Marieke Coppens
I Like To Watch Too is a contemporary dance and performance festival that turned Paradiso into a one weekend dance temple with performances not only on stage but in the hallway, on the stairs, and even in the toilets. We made a dazzle camouflage pattern for this ‘dance performance expedition’, based on movements of the body. Our workspace turned into a photo studio for several weeks – we shot a lot of images of moving body parts, dressed in graphic patterns and stripy fabrics.
visual identity
commissioned by Paradiso Amsterdam
Video Vortex is a series of talks and workshops about online video in Trouw, Amsterdam. Geert Lovink writes in the Video Vortex reader: “We no longer watch movies, we watch databases.” Based on a filing and labeling system, we created a scanned and photocopied identity on scale 1:1, as a reference to the growing amateur YouTube culture.
visual identity
commissioned by Institute of Network Cultures
The exhibition To All Tomorrows Parties in TENT Rotterdam consisted of mainly performances and no static work, with the aim to put people in motion. The title was a reaction to the crisis and the financial cuts in the cultural field: Not only think, but act! The design shows a physical, festive demonstration as an identity: a manifesto as an invitation, pasted posters on the outside wall and portable wooden demonstration boards as signage inside the gallery.
visual identity
photos by Aad Hoogendoorn
commissioned by TENT Rotterdam
The Great Indoors Award is an international interior design award. The edition of 2011 with the theme IN BETWEEN wants to reflect on the importance of temporal solutions in a period of growing vacancy and the need for durable solutions. This temporality is reflected in the design by the use of solely paper in the exhibition design. One kilometer of paper was designed and used in the interior, as a reference to wallpaper and the constant change in identity. The action of tearing the paper comes back in the interior as well as in the award show itself. Instead of opening a golden envelope to announce the winners, we made five upscaled block calendars where pages could be torn off, eventually revealing the winner.
visual identity
interior design in collaboration with EventArchitectuur
photos by Bert Janssen
commissioned by FRAME Magazine, Marres Centre for Contemporary Culture and NAiM/Bureau Europa