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Tag: Books

Favourite Books 2010: Matt Nashlenas

by Dan
Food & Drink + Graphica + News / December 10, 2010

Ramayana: Divine Loophole
Sanjay Patel
Chronicle Books ISBN 9780811871075
$34.95

I have a continuing interest in how stories, myths and legends persist and find new ways to become relevant to us. How these stories are written, designed, mediated, packaged, and consumed gives us the barometer from which we deduce the direction and health of our artistic culture. Amidst the eddy’s and currents that move our society, somehow these stories are still relevant and important in ways we might not have imagined before.

 

From Seed to Skillet: A Guide to Growing, Tending, Harvesting, and Cooking Up Fresh, Healthy Food to Share with People You Love

Jimmy Williams
Chronicle Books ISBN 9780811872218
$35.00

Seed to Skillet deals with my two favorite subjects: food and eating. We should all learn to grow as much of our own food as we can.

 

KENK: A Graphic Portrait
Richard Poplak, illustrated by Nick Marinkovich
Pop Sandbox ISBN 9780986488405
$27.95 

Because I always wanted to steal a bike but could never bring myself to do it. 

 

 

 

 

Matt Nashlenas is Special Sales Associate at Raincoast Books. He tried to cobble memories of his life together so as to define himself for this bio but got distracted by lunch. Now, after a satisfying meal of lentil curry, homemade Philipine-style spring-rolls, and home-made almond roca he has eaten too much (again), and is thinking about drifting over to the cake-couch for a cat-nap, if for only a moment, to reflect on the ways in which food compliments and complicates the act of remembering. 

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Favourite Books 2010: Siobhan Long

by Dan
Art & Photography + Design & Typography + News / December 09, 2010

Stickwork
Patrick Dougherty
Princeton Architectural Press ISBN 9781568989761
$39.95

The sculptures that Patrick Dougherty makes from twigs and sticks completely amaze me. If I could live in one of his stick houses, I would. They are magical.

If you like Andy Goldsworthy, or were envious of the huge wooden fort they built in the Where the Wild Things Are movie, then you should check out this book. 

 

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28th Annual Alcuin Awards for Excellence in Book Design

by Dan
Design & Typography + Events + Vancouver / October 19, 2010

This Thursday (October 21st) is the Vancouver presentation of the The Alcuin Society's annual Awards for Excellence in Book Design in Canada at Emily Carr University of Art + Design, and we're really proud to say that speaker at this year's ceremony is none other than Chronicle Books' Creative Director Michael Carabetta. Michael will be giving a talk about Chronicle and "Seeing Things Differently".

The award-winning books from this year's design competition will also be available for viewing before (and after) the evening's events. As the event in Vancouver is free and open to the public, be sure to invite your book loving friends to come! 

2009 Alcuin Award Winners Ceremony, hosted by Emily Carr University
6:45pm, Thursday, October 21st, 2010
Emily Carr University of Art + Design
Room 301, South Building
MC: Roberto Dosil (CCSP Press, Vancouver)
Speaker: Michael Carabetta (Chronicle Books, San Francisco)

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The Diary of a Disappointed Book

by Dan
July 29, 2010

I *think* the message of this cute short film by Studiocanoe is that you should be nice to your books:

I know you would never treat your books like this, would you? 

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Raincoast Wins Bookseller Award for Service

by Jamie
News / May 31, 2010

The Canadian Booksellers Association held their annual Libris Awards this weekend in Toronto and Raincoast came away a winner! We were picked as the best distributor in Canada as voted by booksellers across the country.

Distribution is the selling, promoting, shipping and customer service aspect of bookselling; skills that really matter in a country as big and diverse as Canada. We have been shortlisted or won this award every year for the last decade, so we must be doing something right!

In accepting the award, our CEO John Sawyer, made the case for why we feel the future of traditional books will be very bright. You will be reading more about this theme on our blog in the weeks to come.

Rorie Bruce, our sales representative for the Prairies won the Libris for Rep of the Year which gave us a double reason to celebrate. Rorie has many years of experience in the book industry and his passion and breadth of book knowledge is one of the reasons that the book culture is thriving in western Canada. Congratulations Rorie.

A full list of the winners can be seen here. Congratulations all.

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The Future of Publishing?

by Dan
News / March 17, 2010

This video from UK publisher Dorling Kindersley is rather wonderful (make sure you watch until the end):

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Q & A with Jason Godfrey, Bibliographic

by Dan
Author Q & A + Design & Typography / January 20, 2010

Bibliographic: 100 Classic Graphic Design Books (published by London's Laurence King) was one of my favourite books last year. It's an incredible cross-section of design books that would be a beautiful addition to any design enthusiast's shelf.

But Bibliographic is not – as the author Jason Godfrey points out in his introduction – a history of graphic design or even a definitive list of 100 books on the subject.

So I wanted to know how the selections were made.

Fortunately, I was able to speak to Jason and ask him a few questions about Bibliographic and what it took to be included in the of 100 classic graphic design books...

Dan Wagstaff: What was the inspiration for Bibliographic?
Jason Godfrey: There was a need for a illustrated resource of graphic design publishing. Many books and articles contained very good reading lists but I had always found them rather detached without the visual reference. The best graphic design books are important artefacts in the history of graphic design and many of the books are becoming difficult to find and access.

DW: What criteria did you use to select the books?
JG: The only rule that was applied throughout was that the books had to be visually interesting, there seemed little point in photographing books that would not look appealing on the page. That the books were designed by some of the cream of graphic design this turned out not to be a big problem but it did mean that some important critical analyses had to be put to one side.

DW: Did you ask other designers for their recommendations?
JG: Whilst mentioning to other designers that I was working on Biblographic I found that they were very keen to promote their own favourite titles and it did help extend the list and also confirm the importance of books that had already been chosen. As part of the book I asked about 20 designers to give me a list of 10 books from their own library, this was an idea borrowed from the designer Tony Brook at Spin who had earlier published a newspaper Spin 2 with reading lists from 50 designers.

DW: Was it difficult to decide which recent books to include?
JG: To gauge which newly published titles will come to be seen part of the canon of graphic design books is not the easiest of tasks. Looking back from a distance helps to establish the relevant trends and lends more perspective to any choices. Regardless the best books all seem to be those that can tell a good story. One recent book, Mark Holt and Hamish Muir's 8vo: On the Outside (Lars Müller Publishers, 2005) did just this, exploring the process of the studio's work and the effect of technological on this process and output in a thoroughly engaging book .
DW: There are photographs of every book included in Bibliographic. Were any of the books difficult to locate?
JG: A number of the books are from my own collection others I borrowed from friends and colleagues. Some were so precious I had to send the photographer Nick Turner over to where the their owner could keep them in sight at all times. A handful of books I could only locate at the St Bride Printing Library who were kind enough to facilitate their shooting.

DW: Were there any books you wanted to include but couldn’t access?
JG: Early in the process of compiling my list of 100 books I decided that many of the early examples of early 20th Century graphic design books particularly those of the typographic revolutions of the 1920s and 1930s would be too difficult to access as they are now the preserve of museums. It would all have taken me too far from my premise that Bibliographic could be representative of a working studio library.

DW: Which books came close to being in the 100, but didn’t quite make the final cut?
JG: Tough choices had to made particularly where an author or series of books were successful. Alan Fletcher is very well represented in the book and I couldn't justify putting in the excellent Identity Kits: A Pictorial Survey of Visual Signals (Studio Vista, 1971) a book he co-authored with Germano Facetti the then art director at Penguin Books. Another book that came very close was Robert Bringhurst's The Elements of Typographical Style (Hartley & Marks, 1992) which I felt lacked the visual punch necessary for Bibliographic.

DW: Of the books you don’t own in Bibliographic, is there one that you particularly covet?
JG: The 1926 Deberny & Peignot, Specimen Général would be a welcome addition to my library. There was copy in a studio I worked for and I was forever using it as a point of reference or just to admire the elegant section dividers designed by Maximilien Vox.

Thanks Jason!

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Advent Books: Great Books Recommended by Great People

by Dan
News / December 17, 2009

Everyone knows that books make great gifts right? But with so many books out there, how do you decide which ones to buy?

Well, if you're having trouble (and there are only 8 days until Christmas!), I suggest you get yourself over The Advent Books Blog ASAP. 

Set up by pals Sean Cranbury of Books on the Radio (Vancouver) and Book Madam Julie Wilson (Toronto), Advent Books is posting short (v. short in some cases!) enthusiastic book recommendations by authors, publishing professionals, bloggers, and booksellers.

All the books recommended are from the past year, but so far they've covered just about every genre, format, shape, size and colour. And with 17 days worth of recommendations already posted, there is surely just the book you are looking for!

Go! Go Now!

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Going West

by Dan
Art & Photography / November 26, 2009

OK, so I know this is for the New Zealand Book Council which is a long way from Canada, but it is (a) awesome and (b) called Going West, both of which are sufficient reasons to post this incredible stop-animation video:

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