 Just to say, welcome to Game Changers, our brand new program of conversations with influential practitioners, thinkers, and industry leaders across all the disciplines of design. Really special thanks to IDEO and Tim Brown and the whole team at IDEO whose generosity and enthusiasm makes this series possible. Our next Game Changers was actually just confirmed today. It will be a conversation on Tuesday, November 17th with Bjarke Ingos, who is the founder of the architecture firm Big. So I hope to see all of you here on November 17th, if not before. Tonight, I'm truly thrilled, despite having my back to you, so I'm sorry, to welcome Irma Boom, designer of more than 300 books, including of course, Making Design, Cooper Hewitt's collection handbook. Irma is one of the world's foremost book designers. She's won thousands of awards, but amongst them include the prestigious Vermeer Award, the Dutch National Prize for the Arts in 2014, and she's the youngest person ever to receive the Gutenberg Prize. Books designed by Irma are often the result of several years of research and experimentation. She has compared her process to that of an architect, building the design of the book by hand. The result is an extraordinary object that pushes the boundaries of graphic design and defies all expectations. Boom-designed books, I love that, boom-designed books, have been scented with the smell of soup printed on coffee filter paper, hacked with a circular saw to emulate the frayed edges of a textile, and printed to glow in the dark, like Cooper Hewitt's book. As the creative force behind Making Design, Irma once again delivered something spectacular. Weighing in at a hefty 912 pages, and I don't know how many pounds, Making Design includes 1200 full color images of collection objects and 54 essays. Irma's brilliant splicing of text and image reflect her years of research into the breadth and scope of Cooper Hewitt's collection. Discussions for the book first began in 2010 when Irma toured our library with curatorial director, Cara McCarty, who introduced her to the full range of our collections and our distinct way of integrating the historic and the contemporary. In the end, believe it or not, Irma examined nearly 40,000 images of design objects in our collection. She turned the design process on its head by assuming the role of author and creating a visual narrative of its contents. As you page through Making Design, you'll see sequences of images that are provocative, lyrical, informative, unexpected, ravishing, somber, and exquisite. It's an experience that amplifies your connection to our more than 210,000 design objects and the entire design process itself and offers you, the reader, the keys to seeing Cooper Hewitt's holdings in new and inspiring ways that are entirely self-directed. In 2013, the summer of 2013, I visited Irma in her studio in Amsterdam and it was really amazing. She was completely immersed in the design process and for me, it was jubilation because I just saw the Cooper Hewitt collection on all the walls of the studio as these tiny little postage stamped thumbnail images. And what was really great was the joy that I witnessed in Irma. She was just completely deep into this project and creating poetry with the design of this book. It was really a one of a kind of experience to see this in process. Tonight, Irma is in conversation with Pamela Horne, our dynamic head of cross-platform publishing here at Cooper Hewitt. Irma, Pam, and the Cooper Hewitt team collaborated on Making Design for nearly two years before its publication and celebration of the museum's reopening just last December. After the talk, please join us in the shop where Irma will be signing books for all of you and please join me with a warm welcome for Irma and Pam. Thank you. Good evening. Thank you all for coming. We know Irma's books are distinguished by her experimental approach to her formats and the way she takes design risks. Irma relied on embossing an entire book rather than using ink. She's designed books with no pages, no page numbers or any obvious traditional narrative, although she writes her own narratives. She's got, as Caroline mentioned, over 50 of her titles are included in the permanent collection of the MoMA, in the collection of the Center in Pompidou, in the Irma Boom archive at Special Collections in the University of Amsterdam. Her recent work, Beyond Books, includes her curtain design for the renovation of the North Delegates Lounge at the United Nations Headquarters, a textile collection produced by Noel. And last year, she rebranded a new logo and visual identity for the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. Irma Boom offers a printed object and Beyond. Her books communicate... This is the U.N. curtain. Oh, there's the U.N. curtain. Her books communicate with the audience on many levels and they're conceptual and provocative. She designs her books with a very atypical process closer to architecture. She builds her books. Then sometimes graphic design and her books generate what is known as energetic criticism. They give pause, they make us argue and very importantly they make us think. So we're just gonna have a chat about our process. I know a lot of people are very curious and how it's evolved and continues to evolve and hopefully we'll find out some untold reasons why Irma Boom and the phrase Game Changer are often intertwined. So welcome. Thank you. So I'm gonna start at school. I know that I have read tons of interviews and history about Irma but I'm not sure how much everybody knows. So Irma attended Academy of Art and Industry in Enschede. Enschede. Initially you were studying painting for three years and then you stumbled on a class on book design. What happened? Well, so I went to art school because I really wanted to become a painter and the whole idea of book design, I didn't even know that it existed. But anyway, I didn't succeed. I thought I was another good painter and I couldn't add anything to the profession and I had this romantic idea of painting only me alone in a studio and it didn't work at all and I realized that I need a question. I need somebody to trigger me. And so when I visited, I was wondering, I went to this very liberal art school in Enschede so it's called Aki. And so after three and a half years, I decided it's not going to happen with painting and it was really a big step for me to leave this department. And I was wandering around in school. I went to architecture to freshen. But then there was this guy, this man, showing books. Basically what I'm doing today but then he didn't use a camera. We were sitting around the table and he would bring books and explain why books are poetry books or dictionaries and he would read from those books and I stayed there. I thought it was so fascinating. I thought maybe this is it and then I started. So going through school, you then after school you went to the Hague. You worked for the government. So the most dull place you can ever work as a designer is really it was horrible. Nobody would work there because it's the state so the government, I'm here at the government institution. I realized that. But the government printing and publishing house was terrible. So did you see this as an opportunity to shake it up or you had licensed to do what you wanted? How did you get so rogue at what you did? Yeah. I mean you were designing advertisements for stamp books. Yeah but first I must say when I did my diploma, so my now you would say bachelor in the Netherlands was on paper. So I did as a graphic designer, I made an exhibition on paper. I was totally into paper and at that time digital media was not there at all. I'm talking about 84, so way back. So I was the only person who did a show at that time. I didn't do my show in my degree in May. Like everybody did but I did it in December. And for some reason there were many people coming to my show and I got many, many offers to work. And from all the offers I got, I thought let's go to the most dullest place. Don't ask me why but that's what I thought and I wanted to learn things because at the art school I went to, you learned to develop yourself and it was not about learning how to make a book that it always had to be a multiplication of eight pages or whatever. It was all about the concept, very abstract all. So very good. I think the more I think of my education, the better it becomes. And so I thought I have to go to a place where I can learn the skills. So I know that you've brought some of the books from 87, 88. This was the first book that you were asked to design. Not really. Oh wait, I thought, well why don't you tell us. Okay, I would tell you. It's the first book that I, the editor and I made the whole concept but I started working at this dull place in 85. And you really must imagine there were people working, I always say with beards and dandruff everywhere. It was all these untasty people there. So I got all the jobs which they didn't want. And I must say I also did the jobs under the radar because I didn't know anything. I didn't know anything. So I thought let me do whatever all the other people reject, I do. Okay. So I did all the stuff, nobody else did. But so nobody cared whatever I did. If it was crazy or I could experiment, it was always good. And I always started at 10 o'clock and left the office at 12. So what was the assignment for this? And then, so I did all these ads. That's what you're revering to. And so because it was a publishing house and I did the ads nobody wanted to do. And so I was always experimenting. And so I also did the ads for the so-called stamp books and the stamp books were books because you know in Holland we have very famous policy from the Royal PTT to give commissions to make stamps. And I think if you talk about Dutch design, this was Dutch design. Now Dutch design is product design. But Dutch design, the whole idea of that word was graphic design, especially the policy of the PTT and so the Royal Postal Service. And so Oksanao, who made our wonderful money with the sunflower and the lighthouse, he saw all these crazy ads I made. But he did not, I made it. But he said whoever made these crazy ads for the stamp books because they were published by the government printing office, they were also government. And he said whoever made it, this person should make the next stamp books which was a very prestigious commission. That's, so when you thought of this yourself, you came up with your design and you said, I'm gonna make it in exactly the way that they haven't been made before. Yeah, so if you may get the commission to make the so-called stamp books, they were behind, I had to make two. So 87 and 88. And as a designer, or yeah, I could come up with an essay. You had to think of a sort of essay before the book starts. And I wanted to do a book about inspiration sources. So for me, yeah, I'm always thinking where do things come from? And I also realized that everything, you think you're original, everything has already been done. And it's really also the Dutch want to be very original. But if you know your classics and if you know your history, everything has been done. There's nothing new. But I wanted to see what is possible. If you have a Da Vinci, the last supper, and you see Andy Warhol, is it inspiration? Was he inspired? Is it copyright? Is it, what is it? What is he copying Da Vinci or not? So it's all about being creative, basically. And that's what I want to show with all these images I was collecting. And so the specs were very different, right? You used a binding that was different. The paper, the way you kept the paper bound on one side, you had a Japanese binding. I think that... You see the page numbers? The page numbers are inside and Roman numbers. And you don't see them at all. You're a little bit, so it's crazy. And then I think that I've looked through it the way you block the text. The text looks very kind of geometric as opposed. I mean... I was totally into Malevich. Malevich was my hero. So I thought whatever happens, and this is, I hear, I quote Massimo Vignelli, who recently died, as you know. He said, you have books designed BC and AC, so before computer and after computer. This is definitely before computer. So I didn't have a Mac, there was not at all in the office at, no. It was all with, how do you say that you used, how do you call these people who do the typesetting for you? And there were these big typeset offices. And I wanted to have it in a square, in a perfect square because I thought it should, yeah. I was inspired by, inspired by Malevich. It had to be no hyphenation, no punctuation. And you put process images in between the pages rather than showing the final product. I mean, you must have turned this place on their heads, right? You mean the government, yeah, what did they do? Yeah, so now, when I made these books, I had to make them in three months. So two books with lots of information and I had to do all the, so the image research. I wanted to make, I can do it, I think. I thought that the stamps issued in these books were not that great. So I thought, we're so famous about it, but I thought, well, it's not, so, let's look at how the stamps came to a being. That's more interesting than the final result. Absolutely. And that's what I showed here, and I also wanted to have this thin paper so the less interesting designs are inside and the more interesting are on the outside. So what did the government agencies say when you produced those? They didn't say anything because they had no idea what I was doing, no idea. And now I have my hair like this, but I was always working behind my hair and it was always here. I was so immense, shy. I was so shy, I didn't even ask help. I did this all on my own and it was sort of, nobody knew what I, but at some point, somebody from the PTT got invoices from the lithography. That's now you would scan things, but then it was called lithography and they said, what is this woman doing? We get all these scans or this cost for repro and then they suddenly they woke up that I was making a book instead of, it was, the estimate was 96, so 69 pages and of course, to volume, that was clear, but I made a book of 700 pages. Oh. It's basically what I did for making these. But I was so far in the process and at some point, the people from PTT, so from Oxner's office and from my director of the printing house came to me and we had to have a meeting I think for 20 people, a little bit like the board yesterday, all these people around the table and basically what they asked me to do was to make another design. And it was I think a month before the release of the books and my boss said, well, he took me out of this meeting and he said, well, you better change the design because we really have a problem. You ruin this very prestigious project, it finally comes to this, our dull office and then you really fuck it up. So we know that this rogue nature is very much a part of your being. I mean, you know what I- But at that time, I was naive. I only had one goal, make that book. But you put yourself- It was not a strategy or nothing. It was just who I am. So that it obviously turned into a strategy. You turned- It's not a strategy. Making books on their head. You started building mini books, right? When it this time, yes. You started building your mini books and if you wanna talk a little bit about that process and what the mini book is for, why did you build the mini book? But I will say that, but in that meeting, so my boss took me out of that. I really want to tell that because it's good for students who are here. You really forced me to make another design. And he said, you have to go into that meeting and you tell them you will make a simple design. I didn't say anything, but we went into that room and then my boss said she has something to say. And then I said, well, I will design this book as it is now and I will finish it. Everybody was quiet. It was a Friday afternoon. Nobody said anything. And there was also the director of the print shop. He was so the boss who had to decide if I could continue. He didn't say anything. But I went, I was a sort of civil servant because like you are here. Like we are? Yeah. And I always worked in the weekend. And when I came in the weekend, my desk, the director of the print shop wrote a letter to me. He said, well, Ms. Boomey, you can continue what you were doing and I wish you a lot of success. So that's why the books are there. He gave me carte blanche to finish it. So be stubborn. That's what I want to say. So be stubborn. That's what I was getting at. I know our audience. I know they want to know where, why are you a game changer? But how are you a game changer? You persist in the way you made making design. You didn't use a template and a layout. The Sheila Hicks book. The Sheila Hicks book, exactly. I don't know if everybody knows the Sheila Hicks book here. Maybe you want to show, maybe everybody does know the Sheila Hicks book here. The first thing I wondered was, coming from a trade book background, how in the world did you get a cover with no images or anything on it, past the sales and marketing? How did you get it past? I see somebody smiling in the audience. Well, it was a big thing. This whole book was a big issue. Like all, for me, successful books are a big issue. Every book which I really love is a torture. And it's a torture because I can blame myself. Maybe I cannot tell what I have in mind. And like the Sheila Hicks book is this white book with, it has this embossing on the, it's a sort of graphic interpretation of her work on the cover. It has these edges, which is a secret. The circle saw is fine. If you call it a circle saw, let's keep it that way. It's not, but anyway. So it's an image Ryan with her work. And but it was for me and also for my commissioner here in the audience. Not your client, your commissioner. No, I don't have clients. I have people who commissioned me. And the word client is another relationship to the designer. So I'm being commissioned. And I feel much welcome. I like that it's collaborative. It's collaborative and on an equal level. That's for me very important. I cannot stand authority. I really go away if somebody, and maybe that's also that I'm from the Netherlands. I don't know. Or that I'm child number nine and always got the last cookie. Maybe that's it, there's something to that. But anyway, I really, I have something in my mind and I want to get it done. Right. That's the only thing I will have it. It has to be done. Well, you're persistent, you. Even if people fire me on a job. I can't see you. So what about, what about if somebody says to you? Nina? But I really want to say Nina fired me on this Sheila Hicks job. And I really, I'm very grateful to Nina because she made me more sharp than ever. I really wanted to end this book in the very, very best way. So I was sharp, but she made me sharper. And I can thank you in this audience. Yeah. It was very important to me to really get this extra thing. There's something, I mean, I feel as if, as an editor and a publisher, I am one of the luckiest people, Nina, you may feel the same. Having been able to experience this process, you. Were you never angry? Okay, that's it. It's a very good question. Well, would you? We're waiting for something. I have the timeline. You really want to know the timeline of how long we were waiting. But if somebody says, if somebody says we have a schedule or you must use this spec for a book or we must, I know that it's not in your vernacular. I don't read it. Right. No, I think it's paralyzing. It's really, if people say you have to use this. When I worked at this government printing office, everything was 120 gram machine coated and the size was 70 by 24. Everything, everything. So for me to escape that became an attitude. So I think that you're commissioner, the people who you work on with commission now. Yes. Get that. I think that when you collaborate with somebody, they are working with you to get a certain type of book, an Irma Boone book. Would you say that you have a brand, like a type of brand look? See, I know that I am so proud of these books, but I'm as proud of the content as I am of the design, as I am of the process. And that's a huge thing to say. You redefined it for me. I never worked with a designer who was an author, who was the author. I mean, I think that you really turned the whole book making process around. Do people come to you and they give you free rein? What happened with Chanel? Well, it's, I don't have a brand, I think. I have an attitude. And I think that's where, and if I make something, I always have an argument. And that's a little bit maybe what I learned from working with architects. It's not about taste. For me, it's not about beauty, not at all. I work from the content or I create the content or I collaborate with people who make the content. And so for me, it's always, if there's, I try to divine what is interesting for me. I'm very egoistic. I really want to tell that. I really want to do something what I like. And I think, because I spent my life, my time, a time I think is the most precious we have. So how can you be only, I'm not a service industry. I think Rem Kohl has mentioned that somewhere in this little book. He said Irma is not a service industry. And I totally agree with him because that's not what my commissioners want. They want something else from me. And that something else is not answering the question as they ask. They want, they ask, they want something new. They want something specific. And I think what I do, if you see all my books on the table, they're all different. And if you think of Chanel, when they came to me, so this is a book about Chanel number five and it's my ultimate book. So the Sheila Hicks book is my manifesto for the book because I think an extreme simple book, extremely simple and very effective for all four women involved. So Nina here, the publisher in New York, Sheila Hicks in Paris, I mean in Amsterdam, for all of us a torture to work on, but for all of us an enormous success. And so, and I think that's what counts. And what Chanel came to me, and I think that's how it should be, total freedom and trust. They said, Irma, we have a show in Palais de Tokyo about Chanel number five and you make something for us. They didn't say anything, make something. And that's of course very difficult. So I create my own limits because as a designer you need limits. How long did it take to do this? From beginning to end, I think nine months or so. How many books do you work on at a time? But what is interesting, this is why it's an ultimate book. So it's Chanel number five, so it's about the perfume. And if you have a perfume, you can smell it, but you don't see it. And that's exactly what this book is. So if you have it in your hand, you can feel that there is this really embossing. But basically, if you make a PDF out of this book, you don't see anything. And so for me, that's really the most interesting. I'm a paper book designer. I'm not an e-book designer. I love the book as an object, as a three-dimensional piece. That's why for me, making design had to be this piece. That's how it quiet grew, yeah. Absolutely. But when I showed this to Chanel, they only said, c'est génial? And they said, why didn't we think of it? Because this is the ultimate book for Chanel number five. But Darin is the trust and the respect because what you bring to that, I mean, when you came back with our designs, when you came back to Chanel, they trust that you live this. This is, you grasp the content and reinterpret it. What do you tell your students about? Shall I do this? I mean, sure, absolutely. You know, when your student says to you, I can't assert myself in that way. What do you tell them? Tell if they, if I talk about books, if we, so what I'm surprised if people work on a book, even my assistants, they work on the screen. They look at this dead screen and they are looking at the screen and thinking and waiting for answers. I always tell them, and that's how I design, I design in an actual size. So Irma sent us this as our, or brought this to us. Uprooted, uprooted. As our, as our, her concept. That was our, those were our sample pages and our concept. So I design a book in a book. That's for me the most important because what a book is, the book is all about the sequence and turning the pages. And the, and what I want is to invite the reader to turn the pages and that there is something to see. And the, like the book I did for the Swiss Museum, the Design Museum, this one, the collection book for them. It's all about looking. For me it's important like, yeah, shall we do this? Sure. Otherwise we don't have, didn't look at it at all. So for me it's all about looking. And that you as a, as a reader, see things for yourself. So I don't want to tell you that you have to see image rhymes or specific things. I think it's for you as, as, if you turn the pages and if you look in this book, I think it's, it's magical. It is. I think that's for me important that there is a reason to turn the pages. And subconsciously you, you see yourself. It's all about this. It's about trees or it's not. So if there's something sad when you turn and enchanting and sexy and, and I have to say, there, it is so funny. We, we, we got this book. We got the pages and your, your, your files. And we were looking through and we would start laughing. At the, I remember sitting at Cara and Caroline and we just start cracking up at your associations and then we'd all be quiet because that's your narrative came out. I mean, it, it's really. And for me, it's also important that it's not always obvious. So that it's, sometimes it's about color. Sometimes it's about form or shape. How important is humor? Very important. Yeah. If, if you don't have humor and if you don't have pleasure in what you're doing, stop it. Immediately stop it. Yeah. Why, why wasting time on something you don't like. And I think it's, and for me, it's also very important in general that, that you do what you like. And I only want to do what I like because then you get the best. And, and, and if you give a designer trust and freedom, then you get the best. If you don't, and if I don't give what I have, what I have to offer, then I don't like it. Then I should not do it. So I'm very picky on what I'm doing, what commissions I'm doing. That's how you, yes. Okay. And it's, is each book a, definitely a new challenge each time? Or do you feel that you repeat certain things or look for something? I hate repeating. Okay. But, but the, this book of course, I know that Kara knew this book, which I did for the, for the design museum in Zurich and that she liked it so much. But here you only see one image on the page. And it's also page Turner. And here I did the image research only, only knowing visual information. But here I did something else. There are more images on the page. So for me, I had to change something. And also here are many more images in the book. Yeah. When you, did you, you brought some of the little, the pieces that you piece together to make the book of this, right? Yeah, but maybe first this, because that's a whole pile. Yeah. How I designed, making design is cutting this all on, on the stamp size. And basically I also make books out of it, I forgot to bring this book. I really feel very ashamed. I mean, the little mini. I forgot to bring the mini book of this version. But anyway, I designed it on a table, so not in the computer, because it would be too slow. And it's much faster to, to make image, yeah, image rhyme and whatever, to do it like this on big tables. And that's for me the way how to do it. And make collections. So that's why it has all these paper clips. Then I saw images which maybe go together. And that's, if I have done that, then I start to make these mini books. But then you said with this book, you know, I, you said, this is the first pass. And then you say, oh wait, this is even better. And you must have gotten to what? Moving things around and, and adding new things and changing. But I can tell you, I was always making combinations. The whole way, even when I was teaching at Yale on the train, if there was nobody sitting in front of me, I was always like playing cards. I was always choosing images. You can basically say day and night because it's so labor intensive or time consuming. So it's really, you have to invest in, because otherwise it won't happen. And it's, and also you have to change and to change all the time and make better combinations. Because if it's a lousy combination, you immediately feel it and then it doesn't work. So it has to be perfect. And the perfection in the imperfection for me is very important. And so this, this I did for the whole time, the whole time. The whole time I was playing cards. When did you get the idea for glow in the dark game? Well, I thought there has to be something specific. And also what I, what is my, probably my very Dutch behavior is, I like clarity. So an Italian commissioner said to me recently, you're so Mondrian, you're so fucking Mondrian, he said. Why don't you do, but I said, I'm really, I love clarity. I really want that things are extremely, or like Alexandra Lang, she said that I have a sort of aggressively, aggressive simplicity, something like that. Because, and I really liked it very much that it's so simple that you think, how can she make something so simple? But for me, it's all about, I'll say if you look at this cover, it's more than, I say something about what you see in the collection. The collection has more than 2,010,000 objects. And I chose from, I think, 37,000, I finally made a choice of 1,100, so for me, that's really nothing. So, coming down from all this more and more and more, so I have a sort of appetite for a lot, and then reduce it to something extremely simple. And maybe it was also in the time that I was working on the Chanel book, I was working with these edges because I must say that my first, very first design was a white book with black edges, but then I thought if Chanel sees this book for the Coupe du Eau et Riche, looks like a Chanel package, it's impossible. They would kill me, and it's Chanel, and so I had to change it, and because Chanel was the Chanel bottle and the book and everything was always on my desk, and so it was totally into my system, so I wanted, yeah, I had to make something else. I remember. So the lines stay, but they got another thing. It looks a little, yeah, you're right, I never realized the relationship to the Chanel suit, exactly, and I did say to you, Irma, we can't do printing this on the turns because they'll crack, and you said, good. Yeah, well, then it cracks. Imagine if you have the floor on the fold and it cracks. It's beautiful. That's it. And that's the imperfection, what makes it so beautiful. That's what you cannot really... I do love how rugged and... And I know people complain about the spine, but you have to use a book, and if the spine cracks, who cares? That's, and I also see the Sheila Hickbook has a sort of crack, but that's what I like. I don't make books for bookshelves. I make books you have to use. Look at my own little red book. It's really, the logo is set, it's this, of course, it's the logo is gone, and I think it's really nice that it's a book which you use, and for me, that's really the essence of making books. Otherwise, use a PDF because it's always the same. I make things that really are different all the time. So at this point, we had started, I said, oh, we're gonna have 500 images in this book. It's gonna be, you know, 480 pages, and then I get an email that says, subject, Cooper Hewitt, extra images, 190. Do you think we can include the images below in the collection book? Parentheses, I don't dare to ask, but do it anyway, would be great. Best Irma, so what do you say to that? I said, of course, and I got another, I got another estimate and we figured it out and we spent lots of time sort of working through that. Yeah, but that's also what I have to compliment all my commissioners, so people who commission me and give me the trust and make it happen because I don't pay the printing I'm buying them. It's all the people who I work with, so I'm really very grateful to my clients, to my commissioners. So on December 30th, 2014, I got an email, pH, today I received the first copy of Making Design. It is beyond my dreams, it is beautiful. Thanks so much for the collaboration. Hope you like it too, happy 2015. And I truly heard surprise, like you really didn't think that this was gonna come out like it did, did you? Yeah, I never know, it's because you're so dependent on printers and binders, they can ruin and they can make it super. So you never know, and I was really happy that it's turned out so wonderfully. But it's the same with the Sheila Hicks book, the first copy, now it looks great, but the first copy, the binder ruined the binding. The book was fat like this, so it was bound very loosely and it has to be bound very tight. And so you never know what happened and this is made in China. It is. And all the books are made in the Netherlands. I know, I priced it out to print in the Netherlands. We have the best printers, printers and binders and I can oversee as a control freak. I knew you were gonna be there, yeah. I want to see the printer and the binder. I knew it was very out of your comfort zone. It's beyond my control, I don't know anything. You see the proofs, you see all the letters. I didn't see anything. It was, you did take a big risk, I know, and I appreciate that, absolutely. It's horrible. But hey, look what we got. No, but for me, can you imagine? No, I knew it was. Not being able to press, not going to the printer. Were you ever angry when you did this? Of course. I thought, why going to China? Why, why, why, why? I said, support your own printing and binding business. You're a governmental institute. Have the money spent here. I think you really, really should do that. I really, really do that in the Netherlands. We have a lot of subsidized books. I really want to have it printed in the Netherlands. And even if the Moderna Museum, Stockholm comes to me, they say, oh, you have to come and see the binding. So, well, let's print it in the Netherlands. And in the end, they say, well, yeah, it's easier. Because then I do the production. So, but I felt qualified to oversee the production. You did a great job. Thank you. We have responsibilities to a wide range of things here, budget-wise. So there was a lot of thought that went into that. But printing and binding is culture. I think it's really an essential part of culture. And if a binder or a printer is gone, it will never come back. We also do invest in our national culture and the handwork of other. We don't send everything to China. I'm happy to hear that. It's about balance. I would write. But here, I had to trust you. Well, thank you. And you didn't disappoint me at all. Look at here. There are five books in five different colors, even one completely glow-in-the-dark. It's really amazing. Yeah, it was a wonderful journey. And I think it very much represents, you know, Cooper Hewett, and you really owned that. You dove into the content. And, you know, I can't wait to work on the next book with you. Yeah, let's do it. Shall we print it in the Netherlands? We are. We definitely will talk about that. So I know that I want to thank you for sharing all of your process with us, for giving us an insight into what really makes you a game changer. I don't think that there was ever a question whether or not you were. We just wanted to know how you got there. And I think you've given us a lot to think about. Yeah, but making books is a collaborative effort. So if there's not a will on the other side, so the commissioner, it won't happen. Absolutely. So that's what makes, how I get it to happen is that I come with an argument. I think that's the clue to get the books done, what I have in my mind, is really to convince people why. And I think that's also, yeah, that's a sort of key thing in my practice that I really, and I believe in it myself intensely, of course. Otherwise, I cannot convince people. That's why the assignment is the solution. Yeah. And that makes so much sense after hearing you talk. Because you already know before page one that you have bought into this concept, this assignment, and therefore, you'll get to that solution. And you have dug your heels in, and you know where you're going with it. I think that it's a great thing to apply to. Obviously, you're so successful in what you do. So it's relative. It's very relative. Like the Stamp books, I got so much hate mail. So I'm talking about 88. So if email existed, I think I would have thousands of people hated that book. How about Twitter? Yes. And I thought when the Stamp books came out, so it is, of course, a book for designers and for the Stamp collectors, et cetera, I got so much terrible letters. And it was really horrible. I thought I could never walk on the street anymore. So much people didn't like those books. And on the other hand, of course, I got all the prizes in the world. But I want to say it's relative. So a football player is a successful or a famous. But you make a good point about saying it's for the Stamp collectors. I think that this book, I think your Sheila Hicks book, I think all of your books are not just for designers. No, but I think this book specifically, I think if there was an image of a weaving on the cover, let's take an image. Then it was for a selective group of people. Then it was only for textile-interested people. And I think Sheila Hicks is such an interesting lady. She needed a larger audience. That was my argument for this crazy white book is no title. We were so much discussing the cover that there had to be an image on the cover that the title is not there. So weaving as metaphor is missing. How did the publisher let this book through? I think it's the commissioner here who gave the final. And Sheila, they gave the final. Well, thank you, Irma, for sharing. I know that there is an audience that will probably want to ask you some questions. Please, Annie. So we're going to open that up. Stan. Hi. First of all, thank you so much for doing what you do. You spoke a little bit at length about how image and form inspire or relate to the final outcome of the book. And I was wondering if you just talk about the relationship of typography and how that influences your designs. Yeah, so I have a funny relationship with type. I have my own typeface, the NoiteSite SEB, so Irma Balm. And it's the typeface I basically use. And for me, type is more monumental. And I use it as, for example, but that's not my NoiteSite, but that's the plantain I also use a lot. So for me, type has to be monumental. I'm not a person who is really in this mini, mini typography stuff, and I don't really want to think about the typeface. So it's plantain. It's this typeface, or it is this typeface. So some people in the Netherlands don't dare to use the NoiteSite anymore, because I use it all the time. And a NoiteSite is really a funny typeface, because it only has book and heavy. There are no italics. And that's what I like. Very simple, extremely simple typography. And because I know NoiteSite so well, I know exactly what to do with it. And so the relationship to type is in a monumental way. Like for the Sheila book, the text of Artudanto, which Sheila gave to me when I met her the first time, was so intriguing for me. I thought, if anybody wants to appreciate the work of Sheila Hicks, then they should read Artudanto's text. So I made it big, and if you turn pages, it becomes smaller, and smaller, and smaller, and smaller. So that's how I use type. But I remember that the publisher said, we're an academic publisher, don't play with text. And I was very happy that Artudanto was still alive at that time. And I also said, is the author still alive? And yes, show it to him. Because sometimes people don't have assumptions that other people don't like it, or it's not allowed. But Artudanto said it was brilliant. It was the first time that his text was so legible and so inviting. So that's my relation to text. So it's a big thing, not as any mini thing, but as a statement. I hope it answers your question. Anyone else have a question for Irma? Steve. Steve, there must be a question. You started talking a little bit about how sometimes you're not given limits by your commissioners. And so sometimes you have to create them yourselves. Can you talk a little bit about how you do that? I think that's the Chanel book, is the limitation. Because I'm not an artist. So otherwise, I also had this small book on the table. I really love very much. I think the Chanel book is where I thought it was problematic if you don't get limitations. So I had to create them myself. Because I thought, well, what can I do for Chanel? And so to create that limit of no ink and find a way to have an embossed book, that was basically the enormous limit I created for myself. Because it's impossible to make a book like this. But it's there. And for me, that was important also for myself to have a good argument why I do this. So it's not about that I like a white book with embossing. No, it's a book where really the content suits the design and the other way around. So when the Chanel company invited me to the South of France to see the rose fields, I'm not sure if it's really true. But anyway, to see the rose picking and et cetera, there the smell was so enormous. And when that experience then I knew I had an excuse to make a white book. Because I have to know why I do something. And in that sense, I think I'm a very bad designer. Because in Holland, you have a distinction between ontwerpen en vorm geven, so form giving and designing. And to give form, I'm really bad at. So I really need an idea. And that's my limitation, the idea. And I follow without any compromise that one idea. And so, but moving around, so making a magazine and moving around with text and images for me, very difficult. If you see all my books, they have a heavy structure and it's very clear what I'm doing. Because I have one idea. That's the limitation I work with. Any other questions? So first I want to start with a little personal anecdote. I loved your talking too about the use of Chinese printers. Are you a designer user? No, no, no, I'm a hobbyist. But a hobby that I enjoy very much started when I was a child, back in the late 70s. And it was a book that was published for a game that became very popular. Some of you might know it. It was the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Rule Books. And now there's something about these. They did not have a financial acumen when they made this game. They wanted to make a book that could last and they wanted to make a book that could be used by children. And so what they did was they had high quality paper. It was stapled and also sewn on the binding. Additionally, for some reason, they had not very good covers. Like the covers were a cheap cardboard with a paper with the illustrations over it and things like this. And it was a remarkable thing about this design that the imprint of the user became on it. And you could tell somebody who was skilled at the game or experienced in it by his book. He would be able to flip to a certain page that had charts that were relevant. And that would automatically fold to that page because of the use. And you were talking earlier about books are meant to be used. And additionally, the back binding would break. But because of the sewing and the stapling and the quality of the paper, it would never fall apart. And so these things would last. I actually have a collection of them. They show up at eBay now. And it's like I'm stowing a couple just to have in my old age. Because these books last forever. Even though they get distressed. And so my question, now I'm getting to the actual question. The question is, you talked earlier about the books meant to be used. It's nice that the binding breaks. Do you ever have to get it? Well, it happens. Well, can you tell me, has there ever been a book that you designed with a very long term life of use in mind? And how long? Like 20 years, 30 years? And what did you do in order to make a book like that? I didn't bring the book because it's a very heavy book. And this was another type of presentation. But I made this huge book for a company in the Netherlands called SHV. It's a trade company. It has 2,136 pages. And it's an extraordinary commissioner. The commission makes something unusual. And when we were working on the book and we is an art historian and me, he said, but it has to last for the next 500 years. It's a family owned company. And the book was to celebrate 100 anniversary. But we, John and I, researched 200 years of the family's business. But we had paper mates and special glue and binding, which is really, we hope. We cannot prove it, of course, but for the next 500 years. And even where the books are, it's a book which is not for sale. It's only for shareholders. And because it's its family owned company. And if you become 18, you get a book. And we calculated how many books we had to make for the coming 500 years. 4,000. And 500 in Chinese because of the Chinese business. So there's also a Chinese version. And it has a stainless steel spine. And that's why it later opened so beautifully. But the glue was really an issue to find glue which doesn't break. So you have to use cold melt, caudalem. And we really had to look at the chemical stuff. But the paper was really an issue to find it's cotton paper that not pesticides were used. And we really had to find very good paper. And we found it, actually. First in Japan, but then I think it took 14 years to make the paper because it was made from plants. And the plants simply didn't grow that fast. So we couldn't use the Japanese paper. And in the end, we used Dutch paper. But the ingredients come from all over the world where not pesticides were used. And it was really a big issue because for the next 500 years. I think this is the only book. And any more questions? We have one question. Time for one more question. Nina. Nina. I think this progression from the person by the heretic who worked with the stamp books and then becomes the main designer of the National Museum of Holland, the Rijksmuseum. So can you talk about that and what you do for them and how they function as your commissioner? Because of course everybody here is interested in bookmaking. And you do that for them. But what happens when you're practice is at such an extraordinary scale. How do you keep it small at the same time? I find that. That's a good point. I have a tiny office. It's really, hi, Miko. I have a tiny, tiny, tiny office. It's for a long time I worked on my own. And then with one assistant. And then the assistant was a trainee. And now I have two full-time assistants. And now even an intern, which is for me very special. I don't have that so often. But to make a logo. So this is the logo for the Rijksmuseum. And it's interesting that I lost, I must say. I was also invited to work on the logo for the Stadelijk Museum. But that was a competition. And I was second. A French guy won the competition. And the moment, the day I heard that I didn't win the competition, there was a party at the Rijksmuseum. I already worked for the Rijksmuseum when it was not open. It was only a part. It was partly opened. And then Wim Pabers, the director, who said, he asked me, hey, did you win the competition for the Stadelijk? I said, no, I was second. He said, OK, deal. You're designing our logo. No competition. I was anyway there designer. He said, well, you design it. And what was very good that it was not a competition, I think that I hate to do competitions. And for architects, it's a necessity. But for designers, I think it's much better that because it's another budget thing, it's better if you ask somebody. But I made this extremely simple logo for the museum. You guys cannot pronounce it. The Rijksmuseum. The Rijksmuseum? Rijksmuseum. See, nobody. So 80% of the visitors are foreign. So nobody can pronounce the word Rijks. Because that's the sound we have in the Netherlands. It's a combination of the I and the J. And it's only in the Dutch language where it's a sound. So nobody. It's like Stadelijk. Everybody always says, really, it's Stadelijk and Rijks. And so I thought I'd make a sort of image of the word Rijks. So the I and J becomes a sort of ligature. It becomes a new letter. And I made a sort of space between Rijks and museum. So that the word museum, which is a very generic word, everybody knows. It's the same here in the States or in the English language. It's also museum in Dutch. And I thought, well, but to distinguish it as a logo, I made this space, so Rijksmuseum. And for you guys, that's very normal to have space between words. But in Holland, we glue all the words together. So when this logo was presented, and we thought we, so it's the board of directors of the Rijksmuseum and us, we were very innocent. Who could complain about this logo? Maybe the I and the J, because it's really a weird letter, as you can see. At least for us, it's really new. But then suddenly there was this big thing happening. The logo was presented. And the same evening, it was on the 8 o'clock news. It was a big thing. We have a space police in the Netherlands. And the people, they check if space is used correctly or not in words. And it really changed meaning if there is a space or not. And I cannot mention examples because it wouldn't make sense here, but it's really an issue. And to have Rijksmuseum, which is one word, to put a space between it, it doesn't change any meaning. But it became an issue. I couldn't walk for two and a half weeks outside my door because the radio and television was in front of my door the whole time that I had to devent the space. And I thought, well, I made a logo. I always said, I made a logo. And if you make a logo, you have a sort of freedom. It's a creative freedom. And so I didn't say anything in the press. But the funny thing happened that people, a professor from Leiden who studied linguistics, and all these people who started to be on the, how do you say it, put letters in the newspaper, or they were on the commercial TV, actually, the director of the dictionary of the Netherlands, the Van Dalen. And they said, well, what do you think of the logo of the Rijksmuseum? It's a national museum. They should change the logo. Now everybody will write a Rijksmuseum. And it's a mistake. It's one word. And the museum stood behind you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But at some point, it took a while. They were almost, it should stop this whole commotion about this logo. And the guy from the director of the dictionary said, well, what do you think about progression in language? I think the designer has creative freedom. And what if Fondel, which is a very famous writer in the Netherlands, classic, what if he did not, was not creative with the way of language, then we would never have the language which we speak now. So it was this whole thing. But all these intellectual people were all behind me. But then there was, at some point, I thought I have to speak up. Because basically, when the museum was founded in 1885, this was the way the logo was made. It was Rijksmuseum. So what I basically did was dedicating it to when the museum was the first logo of the museum. But nobody knew anything. So everybody, that's what, it's a bit terrible about press. Everybody is, how do you say, copying the other person. But it was horrible that even people on the street, they thought, what do you think of the new Rijksmuseum logo? But on the other hand, it was, of course, fantastic. Because everybody knew immediately how the Rijksmuseum logo looked. So some people thought it was a campaign because we have a very clever director of the museum. Wim Peppers is really good with PR. So they thought they hired a very good ad agency to promote the logo. Because it was two weeks, two and a half weeks, everywhere. Everywhere. That's brilliant. Well, when it was happening, I thought, well, it was not. But anyway, I designed everything for the museum, from an invitation to books. Before, I never made a book for the Rijksmuseum, but now we're doing their collection books. And you do their maps, and you do their labels, and you do everything. Signage, you name it, everything. And it keeps three of us very busy, very busy. But I love it. I also do the labels myself. And my assistants don't like to do the labels because they think it's stupid. And I said, how? But for me, I think to do the tiny things. But I think the labels are there and hanging next to a Rembrandt or a Vermeer. So it should be really, really good. So I spent a year in developing the topography and how the labels look and how I can make them. I spent a year on it. And for me, it's very important. So I do all the 8,000 labels. I made myself. But that's the same as I never do. I never feel too good to do all that kind of work. But my assistants do. And I think it's really interesting. Well, that's why you're going to be doing this for years and years and years to come, because it's what you feel is your job. And you're a very big part of that. And I love it. Yeah. And that's a big message to all your students. Well, thank you so much. This was a wonderful evening. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. You can.