Connective Tissue
Client:
Cro+Kow
Brief:
To explore how publishing might evolve within a circular, low-impact future, we initiated a two-day creative residency with collaborators, members and friends Sylwia Kowalczyk and Simon Crofts. The intention was to interrogate what we keep, what we pass on and what forms our creative legacy when traditional print processes are stripped back.
As a team, we gathered in Sylwia & Simon’s studio to collaborate on Sylwia’s Speculations project and test how far we could push a magazine before it is no longer considered to be a magazine. Following on from our two days with Sylwia & Simon, we were tasked with creating a unique publication to document our findings. Instead of producing a polished publication, the brief called for a rapid, instinctive piece that captured the energy of the experience itself – a record of conversations shared, sketches doodled, recipes discussed, questions posed and observations generated in real time.
The aim was to create a publication that functioned almost like a field diary: a distilled snapshot of boom saloon’s ethos, internal thinking and cultural DNA, produced with minimal waste and maximum candour. We created a small, hand-finished zine that demonstrated the principles of circularity through its very construction. The publication was created from a single sheet of paper, cut and folded into form without binding or excess materials, and completed within an intentionally constrained 25-hour window.
Unedited and unproofed by design, the zine had to embrace imperfection as method, allowing spontaneity, constraint and material limitation to shape both content and form. The final piece serves not as a traditional magazine, but as a raw, intimate artefact; proof that sustainable publishing can be playful, immediate and deeply human when process, concept and material are brought into alignment.
Services:
Branding, Graphic Design, Publication Design, Editing, Print Management
Specification:
Full, 594 mm × 841 mm; Folded, 126 mm × 176 mm
Typefaces:
Neue Haas Grotesk, Christian Schwartz; Consolas, Luc(as) de Groot; Editorial New, Pangram Pangram; Times New Roman, Monotype
Stock:
Uncoated, 170gsm
As part of our ‘meanderings’ series, we held a thought provoking event with Ryan Filchak, director of Kentucky based creative hub Institute 193, and writer Austyn Gaffney. They joined us in conversation to discuss the concept of ‘creative space’ and the communities that these environments nurture – sparking a discussion around non-tangible relationship networks, regression vs advancement and the connective tissue which binds us all. Inspired by this, we decided to continue the conversation by creating a collaboratively produced publication exploring what connection means to the boom saloon community, inviting them to be a part of its creation.
To enable this, we designed a series of invitations which enclosed a leaf of tissue paper. Double side riso printed in medium blue on 298gsm Loop Birch, the invitations asked our community to use the tissue paper included to send us a word, a poem, a sentence, a drawing or a diagram about connection. We’re currently collating the responses received, which will form a singular publication showcasing the thoughts of our global community – connecting us all through paper and ink and manifesting a singular, tangible form representing us all.
