A Comic Book Store with Comic Book Shelves

This may be the best looking comic book store I've seen & I've seen my fair share of comic book stores. The store, called Tokyo's Tokyo, isn't big in size, but is creative in character, as the shelving is design like comic book panels. Each section is designed differently & some even contain word balloons. The display islands are even shaped as such. I don't know if it's even possible, but I would like to see them display their merchandise in some narrative order, like pages in a comic book (although, this is Japan, so you'd have to read it right side of the store to the left.) So, now I have a new destination to hit up when I go to Tokyo (which I hope is sooner than later.)

DIY Bookshelves

Do-it-yourself (DIY) work can be the funniest thing in the world & it can be the worst. Sometimes they turn out the way you thought & other time, not so much. I should know. This summer, I left assisting the Jaffe Center & working with primates at the Palm Beach Zoo to work on a houseboat in the Keys & let me tell you, it was a rough summer, but I got through it & I survived. But, I knew I wanted a special type of bookshelf for my special type of books. I normally have an old toaster by my bed where I keep the book that I'm currently reading, but I wanted something more me, because the regular bookshelf wasn't cutting it for me. I made shelves out of wooden pallets that I received from an order of shutters & they are amazing (part of DIY is patting yourself on the back.) So, I thought I'd share other DIY bookshelf ideas that I found on the inter-web to inspire your own special spot for your own special books. Now I'm searching for an old TV to hollow out.

Wood Crates

An Old Ladder 

A Desk Drawer

Old Benches

Magazine Holder

Wine Crate Boxes 

Industrial Pipes

Church Converted to a Bookstore.

This may be the most beautiful bookstore in the world. It is the Selexyz Dominicanen Bookstore & it is located in Maastricht in the Netherlands. The cathedral is 800 years old & was converted in 2007 by architects Merkx & Girod, who were smart enough to keep with the cathedral's original design & floor plan. The alter became the store's cafe, which contains an amazing cross-shaped table. The cathedral hasn't been a place of worship for 200 year & get this; there are a large number of churches & cathedrals that are abandoned in the Netherlands. I hope to see more useful space to come out of these emptied masterpieces.

Game of Thrones Broadside

I don't know about anyone else, but I'm addicted to Game of Thrones. It took me a while to get into it, as the middle part of season 1 was murky for me & they were adding new characters left & right, it was starting to make my head spin. But, now I've been mentally trained & I'm able to keep the numerous plots in their place & I love it. My favorite is Arya, who was a just a tomboyish poppet at the beginning of the series, & is now a clever, resourceful girl, & Rob Stark, who had become Ned Stark's eldest son into the fearsome, capable King of the North.

I found this broadside printed by Christopher Harrell inspired by the Game of Thrones. On it is a wolf, the animal of Winterfell & it states "Winter is Coming," a common saying in the series, which is notable as to seasons in the Seven Kingdoms can last for 10 weeks or 10 years; there is no telling & the citizens of the Seven Kingdoms are expecting a long winter.

The Altered Books Guy Laramée

The Jaffe Center has a number of altered books. I enjoy them because it turns the book form into something sculptural. It makes the viewer realize that the book form is something to be admired, but also something that can be molded & shaped. The artists often play with the pages or text in creative, unusual ways. I found one artist, Guy Laramée, who has quite an impressive series of altered books that are inspired by mountain ranges & oceans. I have no idea how one can turn pages into looking like waves of water or textured cliffs, but Laramée has crafted an important allegory: the book is just as old as some ancient monuments & mountains.

River of Grass

The semester is over & it means a flood of students come to the library to study for finals, and then they disappear like a magic act. This semester is particularly special at the JCBA because it was the first employment of the Helen M. Salzberg Artist in Residence program. Our AIR this semester was Dorothy "Dot" Krause, an accomplished painter, collage artists & bookmaker. During her residency at the JCBA, Dot created a limited edition book titled "River of Grass," which relates to the Everglades.


The book turned out beautifully & holds complex, layered images of the Everglades from the past that appear to glow. That is the power of the images in the book: they seem to emit some kind of light. The images come from her research & layered the images digitally & with the letterpress here at the Center. It is a portfolio style book & the pages are housed in a saddle brown handmade paper envelope that contains a mahogany tree seedpod closure, which I think is genius.

Dot was truly a welcoming force of creativity & enthusiasm who seemed to cherish the mission of the JCBA & she fitted in very smoothly. We hope to see her around more & she made a great, first Artist in Residence. You can follow Dot & her continuing work at her facebook page.

Center Paige: Bluestem

"Everywhere, as far as the eye could reach, there was nothing buy rough, shaggy, red grass... And there was so much motion in it; the whole country seemed, somehow, to be running." This passage, from Willa Cather's My Antonia, is the inspiration for Karen Hanmer's Bluestem. The book is a double-sided flag book with pigment inkjet prints on polyester film. Illustrations are at the front of the book & the text is on the back.

Hanmer wants you to feel that motion of the "shaggy, red grass" & the result can be rather dramatic. The polyester film flutters & rustles when you expand it from the compressed, half an inch form to its full 18-inch potential. Being from the Midwest, I've experienced this "running" & it is a magical experience that I think Hanmer & Cather is capturing. The book comes off as playful, memorable, & nostalgic.