I was sad to find this sign in the window of a little used bookstore on Berlin-Friedrichshain’s Niederbarnimstraße, where we used to look in regularly. We often found oddities, treasures and gifts there, in recent years priced by the kilo: a volume of Grzimek’s encyclopedia of animals that inspired us to buy the whole set; a beautiful hand-colored print of a hummingbird for a friend.
Dear customers! The used book store will close on May 1, 2014. I have enjoyed selling books to you, holding interesting conversations and getting interesting feedback. That’s over now and I will miss it very much. Keep on reading! —Anette Wargowske
We will miss you too.
Blog
This Friday: Eight short films about a boy and his window
Last week, I made my first short film. As you may know, I love taking classes and workshops on new skills, be it drawing animals at the zoo or hand-lettering. So I jumped at the chance to join a free intensive video workshop at the nGbK, focusing on the current exhibition, Tagore’s Post Office.
Needle-sharp package design
The design of this packaging, for sewing machine needles, caught my eye. It looks quite Modernist to me, with the simple grid with a space for a different fabric and/or stitch pattern for each type of needle. Schmetz is an old German company, founded in 1851. However, I saw these needles in California.
Landpartie / eggs
Yesterday, on a Landpartie (countryside outing) to brainstorm some ideas for Schloss Wartin, I admired this sign, whose weird 70’s typeface clashed oddly with the surrounding village, which looked more like 18th or 19th century. ‘frische eier!’ means ‘fresh eggs!’
Great Berlin windows: Malerladen
A voice sings out when you call this old-fashioned paint shop in Berlin-Kreuzberg: “Malerladen!” The full name is actually Frauenkollektiv Malerladen, as it’s run by a collective of down-to-earth, middle-aged women. Coming from a variety of related professions, including carpentry and construction, they believe in renovating old Berlin apartments the old-fashioned way, with high-quality linseed oils and pigments to be mixed into paints and stains.
Lover, lover, torn in two
Last week, a poster in a glass case in one of Berlin’s subway stations caught my eye. Or rather, half a poster. The whole poster, including the word (Love? Lover?) and the image (a woman’s face) had been torn in half from top to bottom, and only the left side remained.
Lovable lettering around Berlin
Tomorrow is Martina’s lettering workshop and I’ve been collecting more Berlin lettering to mentally prepare. Above, the window of an after-school activity center in a Neukölln storefront, painted paper letters proclaim “On Fridays, it’s really happening!
Script signs seen in Berlin
Berlin isn’t a bad place to go sign-peeping. Not just at the Museum of Letters, but also right on the city streets, there are signs from East, West, and pre-Wall Berlin, and some lovely new signs as well. I’m designing some script lettering right now, so I’ve been looking at the many script signs around the former East for inspiration.
Looking for lettering on the street
As you may recall, I took a workshop on hand-drawing lettering in December. The teacher, Martina Flor, started and ended the class by showing photographs of shop signage and other lettering on the street. I’ve also been looking out for great lettering on the street for many years, but haven’t been very organized about taking and collecting pictures of what I see. Continue reading
Winter Kohlrabi Salad with Garlic & Mustard Seeds
In my native California, it’s no sacrifice to eat with the seasons. At any time of year, some sort of juicy fruits and leafy greens are in season; winter means blood oranges, grapefruits, Meyer lemons. Only when I moved to New England at 18, then later to Germany, did I encounter the homelier winter produce of the colder regions, like parsnips, turnips, beets, and kohlrabi. Continue reading
