LSD #02 – A Typographic Issue

There is no one-size-fits-all approach to design. It is as much a practice as it is a methodology or way of thinking, a multifaceted discipline that moves with society’s progression. Throughout the creative process behind every design, learnings happen. Designers learn to adapt, adjusting their positions relative to the context. This volume spotlights self-organised, spontaneous, sporadic, and informal educational initiatives within the realm of creative practices, both historical and contemporary. The initiatives presented here show that any attempt to control a narrative and limit it to a single understanding risks stifling potential innovations that might arise from unexpected origins.

Featuring contributions from Amanda Ariawan, Andriew Budiman, Carlos Romo-Melgar, Chabib Duto Hapsoro, Czar Kristoff J.P., Filippo Sciascia, Fiorent Fernisia, Gideon Kong, Jacob Lindgren, Jeremy Sharma, Keni K. Soeriaatmadja, Limestone Books, Livian Aurel V. Purwanto, Mac Andre Arboleda, Nishkra, Prananda L. Malasan, R.A. Dita Saraswati, Reza Afisina, Rouzel Waworuntu Saad, Savira Aristi, Trevor Embury, and Virliany Rizqia Putri.

Since 2011, the Velvetyne collective has been dedicated to creating and distributing typefaces under open-source licenses. Its members advocate and promote an uninhibited typographic practice, guided by political principles and aesthetic risk-taking.

This monograph celebrates a generous collective creation—pioneering and recognized on the international scene—that continually questions and reinvents itself. Velvetyne Saved My Life reveals the distinctive workings of this unconventional structure within the contemporary type foundry landscape, its commitment to free-culture and open-source principles, its singular editorial policy, and its pedagogical practice.

The book is structured around a polyphonic interview conducted by Sandra Chamaret with the members of the collective, a series of in-depth articles on emblematic typefaces from the foundry, as well as an exhaustive catalogue of the more than 70 fonts published by nearly as many international authors. 

Halfway between text and type specimen, this book is both a story to read and a manifesto to see.

Dear Friend is a monthly letter format publication covering design events, issues, and ideas. This publication distributed via snail mail is initiated by Sandra Nuut and Ott Kagovere.

The publication edited by Sandra Nuut & Ott Kagovere features all the letters from the Dear Friend publishing project, which they initiated at the Graphic Design Department of the Estonian Academy of Arts in 2018. The book includes contributions by Singapore-based design writer Justin Zhuang, designer and writer Else Lagerspetz, and artist Lieven Lahaye. The book is designed by Ott Kagovere and published by Lugemik and Estonian Academy of Arts.

Texts by Justin Zhuang, Lieven Lahaye, Else Lagerspetz

Letters written by Alicia Ajayi, Stuart Bertolotti-Bailey, Claudia Doms, Nell Donkers, Maarin Ektermann, Rosen Eveleigh, Maryam Fanni, Saara Hannus, Eik Hermann, Paul John, Maria Juur, Ott Kagovere, Maarja Kangro, Arja Karhumaa, Kristina Ketola Bore, Nicole Killian, Rachel Kinbar, Tuomas Kortteinen, Keiu Krikmann, Kadri Laas, Else Lagerspetz, Lieven Lahaye, James Langdon, Jungmyung Lee, Kai Lobjakas, Michelle Millar Fisher, Maria Muuk, Sheere Ng, Sandra Nuut, Laura Pappa, Jack Self, Indrek Sirkel, Paul Soulellis, Triin Tamm, Laura Toots, Alice Twemlow, Loore Viires, Sean Yendrys, Justin Zhuang

Werkplaats Typografie presents a catalog of Works from the Collection of Holly van Houten. Spanning multiple decades and personally selected from around the world, the collection includes over a thousand items that memorialize the life of this candidly private, bohemian connoisseur. Carefully examined by our specialists, a curated selection of rarities, antiquities, oddities, and works of art is available in this catalog, which accompanied an exclusive auction held during Printed Matter’s LA Art Book Fair in May 2025 in Los Angeles, Van Houten’s beloved city.

Project by: WT Year 25 & Year 26 for LA PMABF led by Hannes Drißner, Lisa Lagova, Nuno Beijinho

Designer: Hannes Drißner, Lisa Lagova, Nuno Beijinho. Objects photographed by Augustinas Milkus and Jordi de Vetten

The book Posting brings together a selection of feminist posters from Dutch archives to reflect on posting as an activist strategy, holding the potential to create counter-publics to mainstream culture and to fight against the erasure, exoticization, or tokenism of bodies and experiences that deviate from normative preconceptions.

As is the case for many professions, in the history of Dutch graphic design the absence of women, non-binary, queer, Black designers is striking. This doesn’t only point back to systematic processes of exclusion in the first place, but also to the biases at play regarding whose work is remembered and archived. While efforts have been made to add forgotten names to the existing canon, the many posters, flyers and other printed matter shelved in queer and feminist archives remind us to question the notion of single authorship altogether and instead study graphic design as a decisively collaborative and transdisciplinary practice, which is especially true for community-led and volunteer-based projects.

The posters featured in this book point to this rich landscape of feminist organizing, and were found at the International Institute of Social History and the International Archive for the Women’s Movement (IAV-Atria) in Amsterdam.