Notebooks III
Produced between 2017 and 2021, the eight notebooks launched in 2024 are all graphic interpretations of the environment of each of the designers and design studios, which were selected in conjunction with the Made Thought creative studio (London & New York) because of their cutting-edge approach to the printed object. Thus the Barcelona of Hey Studio is literally presented in a landscape filled with sea and sun, the Berlin of Eike König in a disruptive logbook of a digital wandering, the London of Zak Group in an in(de)finite punctuation, the Melbourne of Fabio Ongarato Design in a richly complex demographic diagram, the New York of Lotta Nieminen in the abstract expression of a topical energy, the Paris of H5 in a laconic invitation on a journey, the Taipei of Page Tsou in a raising of ecological awareness, and the Tokyo of Hattori Kazunari in a nuanced maxim. Together, these eight unique objects form a little mosaic that reflects a state of the world, a spirit of the times, whose singular geo-poetry it emanates.
The delayed launch of this third collection gives it a depth that is just as singular. The few years of distance make it possible to retrospectively note continuities as well as breaks, endurances and evolutions, between past reminiscences and ‘speculative stories’. In this sense, beyond their geographies, the Notebooks III are also conveyors and witnesses of historical moments.
Among these, between the lines, one deciphers the moment of the 2022 closure of Arjowiggins Creative Papers, a precious partner of this collection printed on the iconic Conqueror and Pop’Set (now Olin Colours) artistic paper ranges, which have been relaunched by the Antalis group under the umbrella brand Creative Power.
One can also perceive the moment of the recent migration of the Imprimerie du Marais from Rue Chapon to Cité Griset. An arrival, departure and anchorage point, Cité Griset and its 8 production workshops under one roof constitute the figurehead of the Imprimerie du Marais’s international locations in London, New York, and Geneva. Thus, the story of a lifetime-passion continues to be written across new geographies.
In these intermixtures, the Notebooks III by the Imprimerie du Marais are all the more an invitation on a space-time journey, from the carte blanche principle to the vivid memory of the black box. Made Thought designed the latter to serve as a showcase for this biodiversity of artistic printing, evoking by turns an archive box and a mini trunk, and invoking the spirits of collection and travel; a journey that richly imprints itself upon us.
Thus we enjoy losing ourselves in this new collection to better find our way, under the benevolent gaze of a debossed Eiffel tower, symbol of the city where the Imprimerie du Marais was born and still resides, a point of reference and a beacon in the night. This cosmopolitan and itinerant dimension is also constructed from one marketing space to another, from the Imprimerie du Marais’s online shop to specialised bookshops and other concept stores duly selected to become embassies. The journey of the Notebooks III ends when another begins, in the palms of your hands, in the collection of wild thoughts that will decorate their pages and inspire new possibilities…
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In the same vein as the two previous collections published in 2011 and 2014, the Notebooks III by the Imprimerie du Marais contribute to asserting and developing the essence of what, over the years, has become the Art of Possibility. Between tradition and innovation, they crystallise an avant-gardist, international view of superior artistic printing, filled with outstanding expertise in pre-press, photo-proofing, prototyping, foiling, embossing, debossing, silkscreen printing, litho printing, packaging, hand finishing, and binding.
The fruit of cartes blanches handed to eight designers and graphic design studios around the world (a new group of them for each edition), the collections of small notebooks by the Imprimerie du Marais are true poetic explorations of printing techniques, materials and designs. Eagerly anticipated by specialists and enthusiasts of graphic art and special savoir-faire, these little tours of the print design world are an ode to imagination, expressed in unique and unusual combinations that inspire the various specialists of the Imprimerie du Marais to push the limits of possibility a little further, beyond boundaries. This results in collector’s items that are as varied as they are collaborative, and pervaded by a broad cultural diversity. In this sense, the Notebooks III particularly resonate with the very essence of that spirit of collection whose renewals punctuate the development of the Imprimerie du Marais.
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