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DesignPhiladelphia, a local celebration of design here in our hometown, is currently in full swing. This year we're thrilled to team up with our good friends DrinkPhilly for a fun evening of book cover design on Friday, October 12th. 

Our talented team of designers (Doogie! Katie! Andie!) will showcase a gallery of alternative book covers, showing actual designs that didn't make the cut and totally new works inspired by older titles. Guests can look forward to interacting with our team and can expect a number of fun giveaways. Posters? Yup. Books? You bet. 

And thanks to our BFFs DrinkPhilly, books aren't the only thing ready to be consumed that night. There will be plenty of free nibbles and beverages at the DrinkPhilly HQ, and possibly some live music. Word on the street is the founder of DrinkPhilly plays a mean bass. 

The event is free and open to the public, running from 5pm to 9pm. 21+, as there will be alcohol. We've got a Facebook event listing, so feel free to RSVP and let us know you're coming. 

DesignPhiladelphia: Quirk Books Cover Gallery @ DrinkPhilly 
Friday, October 12th, 2012, 5PM – 9PM
www.facebook.com/events/333413393421587

In much of literature, love stories are about couples who have to overcome tremendous obstacles to be together – but sometimes the only obstacle to a happily ever after is the couple itself.

Two characters who spend most of a story arguing until a sudden realization and declaration of love is, of course, a romantic comedy staple, and not unique to the silver screen. Some of our favorite fictional pairs spend their books completely oblivious to the relationship that’s right in front of them.

Emma and Mr. Knightley in the 1996 film

Throughout the summer, I have done some Etsy loitering and have noticed an emerging trend in upcycle art: vintage book prints. From beautiful images impressed on torn Bible pages to absurd quotes imprinted on ripped-out chapters of Pride and Prejudice, this art form is on the rise.

The images atop the prints are almost always translucent, offering the idea that rekindling books as art can act as a unique publishing palimpsest. Many times, I’m interested in perusing book prints just because the descriptions are so romantic. The books are referred to as “rescued” and the yellow pages due to lignin concentration in paper pulp is a “golden finish of old age.”

While book artists emboss everything from hipster skulls to sweet squids (above), I have fallen in love with the practice of screening typographical quotes onto vintage pages, especially when the quotes make the least amount of sense. Sometimes, the quotes take on a confessional quality too, which is always good. Where better to announce that you’re a bibliophile than on an actual book?

Photo by David Trawin

Sometimes a bookshelf holds books. Sometimes a bookshelf holds other things. But, occasionally, a bookshelf holds something intangible. Sometimes the idea behind a bookshelf is much more interesting than the books it holds. I know, blasphemy right?!

Books are full of symbolism, metaphor, and concepts that reach out beyond the words and physical pages of the book. Why can’t a bookshelf be more like the books on it? Why can’t a bookshelf be more than just a receptacle for the heavy burden of stories, ideas, conspiracy, and knowledge?

In fact, a bookshelf can be much much more than it seems. Below, you’ll find five bookshelves that contain ideas just like the hunks of paper, words, and glue that sit upon them.

“I have love in me the likes of which you can scarcely imagine and rage the likes of which you would not believe. If I cannot satisfy the one, I will indulge the other.” – The Monster

August 30th is the birthday of one of the greatest horror fiction writers of all time, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley. I am a big fan of Frankenstein and I know that I am not alone. A simple look at pop culture will reveal Dr. Frankenstein and his Monster all over the place. The novel Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus, was written as part of a competition created by Mary, her husband Percy, Lord John Byron and John Polidori.

It is interesting to consider that a simple competition produced a novel which has permeated nearly every aspect of American culture.

Eudora Welty. You’ll want to read her Collected Stories.

Utter the term “Southern Literature” and most people immediately imagine all those depressing Southern white dudes they were made to read in high school or college. William Faulkner? Yawn. Tennessee Williams? I can get drunk and feel lonely on my own, thanks.

But the literary scene of the American South, past and present, has more going for it than a few guys with bleak worldviews. Here’s a list of six unexpected (or at least, less expected) Southern reading recommendations. I suggest enjoying them when the summer heat is at its worst, for a real Southern experience no matter what region of country you’re currently in.