Writing Instruments
Namiki: a surface worth slowing down for.
Namiki’s vermilion No.20 turns an everyday gesture into an encounter with Japanese lacquer.
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58 stories · Page 5 of 5
Glass & Everyday Design
The detail at the bottom of the glass.
Adolf Loos’s 1931 glassware hides its most elaborate work where you might least expect it.
Contemporary Lacquer
Light held in lacquer.
Keiji Onihira’s small makie box makes a changing natural scene visible through layers of lacquer and metal powder.
Contemporary Craft and Interiors
A home woven into a wall.
The Frafra Tapestry project translates a family compound in northern Ghana into a work woven by the people who know its spaces.
Rare Books & Maps
When the world became a book.
Ortelius’s 1570 atlas shows why an old map’s identity matters as much as its beauty.
Decorative Arts
The woman behind the Wisteria lamp.
Clara Driscoll’s design offers a more precise way to see one of Tiffany Studios’ most recognisable lamps.
Rare Books
Before you call it a first edition.
Darwin’s Origin of Species appeared in 1859. So did copies that are not the first edition. The book teaches us how bibliographic evidence works.
Alternative Assets
The catalogue that became collateral.
In 1997, future royalties from David Bowie’s existing songs became the cash flow behind a bond. The idea is stranger and more useful than the nickname.
Rare Objects
A window into an asteroid.
Olivine crystals suspended in metal: the Imilac meteorite makes deep time visible at the scale of an object.
Alternative Assets
Beyond the record price.
A quieter market can reward a more exacting eye. What a broad collectibles index can and cannot tell us.