Just a few stops west of Shibuya in western Tokyo, the neighbourhood of Koenji feels like a different world. While the capitals famous entertainment districts are defined by neon lights and constant…
Inspired by the Signs of Saigon project by Steffi Neukirchen, I set out on my first trip to Ho Chi Minh City in December 2019 with the expectation of encountering a wealth of historic lettering.
As…
Her articles have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, The Japan Times, and the South China Morning Post. Given the breadth of her work, the author Manami Okazaki can justifiably be…
Hallstatt was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997. In recent years, the village has come to exemplify the phenomenon of overtourism: despite a resident population of approximately 750,…
Before Hideji Terada began his artistic career in 2022, he was a highly regarded graphic designer whose work had been featured, among other places, in the Tokyo issue of Slanted Magazine. In recent…
A November morning at the Albert Cuyp Market in Amsterdam. The distinctive style of the price signs at many stalls immediately catches the eye. Responsible for them is the market signwriter Henry van…
Vienna-based graphic designer Tom Koch teamed up with Better Letters to produce the second in their series of biopics about veteran sign painters. This short film celebrates the life and times of…
In April 2026, a new NIKE flagship store opened on the east side of Shinjuku Station. In an environment that all but overwhelms the viewer with advertising messages, the creative team led by the…
In the second half of the nineteenth century, Europe fell under the spell of Japonisme. The visual language of a country that had only recently opened its doors to the West transformed painting,…
In December 2017, I travelled to Hong Kong to document the remaining neon signs. My explorations took me across all parts of the city; night after night, I followed the glow of this distinctive…