THE MELBOURNE DESIGN GUIDE 2009–2011
Edited by Viviane Stappmanns of Alphabet Press

The Paper People
Obsessed with books, paper or stationery? Aren't we all? But not all of us turn this obsession into a career path. Even fewer of us manage to create successful business or artistic practice on the back of a love for the printed matter. But they do exist. We've dug out a handful of the most attractive specimens.

hammer & daisy
An ill-equipped foray into a gardening business left bookbinders Gracia Haby and Louise Jennison with only a name, hammer & daisy. Choosing sore thumbs over green thumbs, the women abandoned the garden to produce a line of handmade, limited-edition artists' books, prints and zines, with a delicate collaboration of collage, drawing and painting complete with fantastical animals and childlike landscapes present in all their work. Having studied under Daniel E. Kelm at the Centro del bel Libro in Switzerland's Ascona (that's the Oxford of bookbinders), hammer & daisy keep traditional techniques modern. Their cute postcards, drawings, pin cushions and notebooks are available online.

Melbourne Design Guide 2009–2011

Turn the pages,
We are the paper people
Come together; assemble or accumulate.


Gracia Haby & Louise Jennison
In such a room no one could hear my sobs and it was for this reason alone that I stayed here for the duration of the summer
2008
from the artists' book And we stood alone in the nilent night