Amsterdam Gumshoe

Posted on May 2, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

Every year, the city of Amsterdam spends millions of euros cleaning up tons of used chewing gum. To bring attention to this disgusting and expensive problem, the Iamsterdam tourism marketing organization collaborated with the Gumdrop company, design firm Explicit Wear, and Publicis One to create the Amsterdam Gumshoe, a sneaker made from 20% recycled chewing gum collected from city streets, parks, and attractions. The sneakers, which have a map of Amsterdam on the soles,will be available for purchase from Amsterdam shops in late June.

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Reading Nook

Posted on May 1, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

French artist Thierry Mandon uses video, performance art, and installations to reflect on the poetic nature of everyday existence with a twist of absurdist humor.

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Bookstore Tourism: Rome

Posted on April 30, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

I don’t remember if I found the Open Door Bookshop on my first or second visit to Rome, but I do recall meeting the store’s founder the writer and journalist Charles Nopar. Secluded on a lovely street in the picture-postcard Trastevere neighborhood, the Open Door is an Aladdin’s cave of treasures for book lovers, packed floor to ceiling with secondhand and antiquarian titles. Although the forty year-old bookstore specializes in English language books, you can discover some great possibilities in Italian and French as well. The only problem is that you won’t want to leave and get back to your tourist itinerary once you start browsing.

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Americain En France

Posted on April 29, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

A French “reading and conversation book” for American soldiers prepared upon the entry of the United States into the First World War. This volume belonged to David S. Blondheim, at that time an associate professor of French and later a professor of Romance philology at Johns Hopkins University. Blondheim’s penciled notes suggest he might have used the book to prepare lessons for soldiers during his affiliation with the Army Educational Commission for American Soldiers Abroad from 1918-1919.

Algernon Coleman and A. Marin La Meslée, Le soldat américain en France (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1917). 

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Get Thee To A Bookshop

Posted on April 28, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

Today is Independent Bookstore Day across the United States. It’s an annual party to celebrate independent bookstores, authors, readers, and literacy. If you are in the U.S., you can find one of the 500+ participating indies right here. All of the bookstores will be hosting special events, including readings, concerts, games, give-aways, book sales, political rallies, and much more.

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Literary Road Trip

Posted on April 28, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

You might not agree with all of the choices that Mike Nudelman made for this literary map of the U.S. —I certainly didn’t—but it’s a good effort.

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Helsinki Rebranded

Posted on April 27, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

I was surprised to discover that up until very recently Helsinki never had a single or consistent brand system. Last summer, Finland’s capital finally commissioned the creative group Werklig to develop a contemporary brand design that would work across all municipal agencies.

Werklig was tasked with creating a consistent look that had aesthetic appeal. was recognizable for residents and visitors alike, and worked graphically. The agency chose to base the new brand on Helsinki’s historic city crest, the cupola of the Helsinki Cathedral, the coastal geography, and the color palette of the municipal transit companies.

The resulting branding is cohesive and consistent, but doesn’t say Helsinki to me. A city’s identity is so much more than fonts and graphic design. While I haven’t spent much time in Helsinki recently, when I think of the city what resonates the most to me is the natural setting, the architecture, the urban topology, the history, and the big northern skies.

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Book Power

Posted on April 26, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

BOOK POWER
by Gwendolyn Brooks

BOOKS FEED AND CURE AND
CHORTLE AND COLLIDE

In all this willful world
of thud and thump and thunder
man’s relevance to books
continues to declare.

Books are meat and medicine
and flame and flight and flower,
steel, stitch, and cloud and clout,
and drumbeats in the air.

Pulitzer Prize winning author would have been 100 years=old this week. In 1969, she wrote this wonderful poem to celebrate National Children’s Book Week. Later, the poem was printed on bookmarks for national distribution in schools and libraries.

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You can call me a library rat anytime

Posted on April 25, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

I hadn’t heard the expression “library rat” since my undergraduate university days until I stumbled across this new mural by the Spanish street artist known as Xav. The work, which was commissioned by the Barcelona-based Contorno Urbano Foundation, celebrates those of us who happily hang-out in libraries. Part of the mural art project 12 + 1, the work is located in the town of L’Hospitalet de Llobreqat just outside of Barcelona.

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Long Walk To A Dark Place

Posted on April 24, 2018 by Brian D. Butler

A big h/t to Cameron Booth for the link to this marvelous Middle Earth “transit” map. Commissioned by Empire magazine,the brilliant map which plots the journeys of the key characters through the Peter Jackson film adaptations of The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, was created by British illustrator Christian Tate.

 

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