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Concrete Wonders: 13 Brutalist Buildings in the USA & Britain

26 Oct

[ By Steph in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

brutalism US brunel 2

While the most theatrical Brutalist buildings remain in the former USSR, there are plenty more of these controversial concrete complexes around the world, and they draw both admiration and ire in Britain and the United States. While Prince Charles of Wales likes to call them ‘monstrous carbuncles,’ and sloppy Brutalist blunders certainly exist, many modernist concrete structures built between the 1950s and ‘80s are striking in their minimalism and solidity.

Geisel Library, San Diego, California

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The Geisel Library at the University of California, San Diego (named for the author best known as Dr. Seuss) was made of reinforced concrete to save money, which enabled a more sculptural design. The 8-story structure by William Pereira has two subterranean levels and was “deliberately designed to be subordinated to the strong, geometrical form of the existing library” on the campus.

Tricorn Center, Portsmouth, England

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This weird building called the Tricorn Center was a retail, nightclub and parking garage complex completed in the mid-1960s and so named because it resembles a tricorn hat from above. It was voted the third ugliest building in the UK in the ‘80s, and demolished in 2004. Charles, Prince of Wales famously called it “a mildewed lump of elephant droppings.”

Barbican Estate, London, England

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This residential complex built in the ‘60s and ’70s stands right in the financial district of London, one of the few examples of British brutalist architecture that’s still mostly intact. There are three tower blocks and 13 terrace blocks positioned around a lake and green squares; the towers are each 404 feet tall.

Brunel University, London, England

brutalism US brunel

brutalism US brunel 2

Built in the ‘60s and designed by Richard Sheppard, Robson & Partners, the Brunel University Lecture Center was one of two ‘high Brutalist’ structures prominently featured in Stanley Kubrick’s film A Clockwork Orange.

Brownfield Estate, East London

Balfron Tower at the Brownfield Estate, an area of social housing in East London, is often considered the sister building of Trellick Tower. Designed by Erno Goldfinger in 1963, it contains 146 residences and features a separate elevator shaft with skybridge connections on every third floor.

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Concrete Wonders 13 Brutalist Buildings In The Usa Britain

[ By Steph in Architecture & Public & Institutional. ]

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Audiovisual Trikes: Portable Projections Animate City Streets

26 Oct

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

audiovisual tricycle performance art

Lighting up streets and sidewalks of Rio de Janeiro, these mobile animation units utilize the movement of tricycles and available city surfaces to create amazing and interactive works of art.

interactive wall installation projection

The so-called Suaveciclos were designed by artists Ygor Marotta and Ceci Soloaga of VJ Suave from São Paulo, combining batteries, laptops, projectors and speakers to create a multimedia experience.

portable programmable light art

portable projection wall art

While some of the works are projected up high, those aimed at human-accessible surfaces (roads, sidewalks or low walls) are remarkably engaging, sparking children to start playing with the live projections.

portable light art demo

portable swimming mermaid wall

The versatility of these stop-and-go projection systems (tweakable to context) make it easy for the artists to react to crowds, stopping where popular or pressing on when their work at one site has run its course. They have pedaled their act in cities in Russia, Luxembourg, Slovakia Germany and Switzerland as well.

portable vj sound and light

portable speakers projectors

portable public art

From the artists: “small narratives with characters and poetry can travel open spaces, lighting walls on a large scale. The projections illuminate walls, trees, lakes, sidewalks and propose a playful interactivity with the public. With the video manipulated in real time, Suaveciclos bring art to all audiences and create unique moments between the city and the viewer.
In their playful universe, vjsuave deals with current themes with ambient sound accompanying the performance” (h/t Colossal and Prosthetic Knowledge).

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

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Baker’s Doesn’t: 13 Sweet Abandoned Donut Shops

26 Oct

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

abandoned-mister-donut-mug-centralia
Sorry Homer (and countless men in blue), these closed and abandoned donut shops have served their last sprinkled, frosted and/or creme-filled delicacy. DOH!

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An abandoned donut shop in Crown Heights? That ain’t kosher… and maybe that was the problem. Flickr user Anthony Fine (pop archaeologist) snapped the sad state of this boarded-up former Dunkin Donuts store on May 19th, 2014. At least a tree grows in Brooklyn; donut shops, not so much.

Panned Out

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How good was the food at Peter Pan Donuts & Restaurant? Since the owners put “Donuts” before “Restaurant” on their sign, you can probably draw your own conclusions. We’re sure Spinal Tap felt the same way after getting second-billing to a Puppet Show. Nice sign, though. Flickr users Randy Fox (congoeels) and Scott (scottamus) captured the abandoned and deteriorating Cleveland, Ohio “landmark” on various occasions between 2009 and 2013.

The King Is Dead

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Winchell’s Donuts couldn’t make a go of it at this Norwalk, CA location so “Donut King Croissant – Muffin” took a stab at it… and saw history repeat. Don’t people learn from the mistakes of others? Mind you, offering the “wholesale” option was a stroke of genius. Mmmm, wholesale donuts. Flickr user ozfan22 snapped the deposed Donut King on March 29th of 2009.

Unhappy

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Flickr user Lindsay Blair Brown Instagram captured Happy Donuts in all its abandoned glory on May 6th, 2012. She didn’t say where the colorful shop was but maybe sharp-eyed readers can make an educated guess based on its offerings: kolaches, croissants, biscuits, and breakfast tacos. Serving up these delicacies 7 days a week, how could this place ever close?

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Bakers Doesnt 13 Sweet Abandoned Donut Shops

[ By Steve in Abandoned Places & Architecture. ]

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Space Architecture: Astronomers Sight Alien ‘Megastructures’

25 Oct

[ By WebUrbanist in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

space observatory seti

Scientists and alien life seekers alike are all looking to solve the mystery of a distant star, activity around which, according to astronomers including Jason Wright of Penn State University, suggests a “swarm of megastructures” (images via SETI).

allan telescope array

While no one has sighted little green men, the phenomenon is perplexing. “Aliens should always be the very last hypothesis you consider, but this looked like something you would expect an alien civilisation to build,” says Wright. The puzzle centers around a series of dimming events around a star to which no conventional scientific explanation (such as dust clouds or passing planets) seems to apply. The star is in the wrong stage of maturity to be flickering as it appears to be without some external factor yet to be discovered.

seti superearth

Wright is not alone, and we may not be either. The anomaly was first spotted by citizen volunteers (Planet Hunters) drafted to look for planets around stars through the Kepler Space Telescope, then subsequently confirmed by observing scientists. “We are looking at [KIC 8462852, near the Milky Way] with the Allen Telescope Array,” said Seth Shostak, a senior astronomer at the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute in Mountain View, California. “We’d never seen anything like this star,” says Tabetha Boyajian, a postdoc at Yale. “It was really weird. We thought it might be bad data or movement on the spacecraft, but everything checked out.”

One of the most fascinating things about this find is that this is all so difficult to visualize. We have no high-resolution imagery that would making the determination of ‘natural’ versus ‘artificial’ easy to make or the problem simpler to understand. Instead, we are left with theories and interpretations of data, which so far imply a non-natural space project that could be anything from an orbital solar array to a space colony under construction or even an outright attempt to reflect light in patterns in order to contact other civilizations. And while there are other possibilities, none of the current nature-centric suggestions hold up to scrutiny as yet. Given the history of such finds, one should expect to be disappointed, but for now the mystery remains a source of excitement for scientists and civilians alike.

[ By WebUrbanist in Conceptual & Futuristic & Technology. ]

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Light House: Translucent Dwellings in an Abandoned Parking Garage

24 Oct

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

light house 1

With their cavernous abandoned spaces, the hundreds of stalled skyscraper projects throughout tropical Asia could serve a purpose by hosting low-budget micro-dwellings aimed at ‘urban nomads.’ Economic conditions put many high-rise building projects on hold, while the global housing crisis is making it difficult to impossible for young people, the middle class and the urban poor to find affordable accommodations in desirable cities. A project called ‘Light House’ offers a temporary solution.

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light house 4

Designed especially for mild climates, these prototype housing units consist of perforated metal grid frames, plastic-laminated plywood floors and walls made of layered textiles. “The different degrees of perforation of the walls give variation to the space within by selective filtering of external elements,” say the creators, Bangkok design firm All(zone). There are shelves for personal items, a changing room with a closet, and a bed surrounded by mosquito net.

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Each one costs $ 1,200 to make and can be quickly assembled and disassembled, taken to a new location when the current ‘host’ is no longer available. The designers themselves lived in the prototype units to test them out. But would the average young city resident really want to live in a space like this?

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The need for affordable housing, adaptability and reclaiming vacant urban spaces is undeniable, but flimsy structures like these seem like just one shaky step above homelessness, and might be better suited to serving that population instead. The transparency of the walls could be seen as a statement on what it’s like to live in the streets, perhaps making an even more profound statement on the housing crisis than the creators intended.

[ By Steph in Architecture & Houses & Residential. ]

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Reading Railroad: Chicago Rolls Out Mobile Train Car Libraries

23 Oct

[ By WebUrbanist in Technology & Vehicles & Mods. ]

reading railroad

A project in Chicago is turning train cars in the city’s elevated rail network into moving libraries, providing free reads for travelers and commuters using the public transit system.

mobile library movement

mobile book library readin

The Books On the L lending project began as a concept pitched during Chicago Ideas Week and operates with a simple and effective lending policy for this novel type of mobile library: you can read as long as you ride.

books on the subway

The Chicago Transit Authority trains will be populating cars with volumes from hundreds of genres, and could potentially give access to thousands more if they implemented QR codes for ebook reading devices.

mobile reading chicago

The same idea has informally manifested itself in other cities as well, part of a larger Books on the Subway (or Underground) movement that ranges from ‘find a book, leave a book’ ideals to more organized endeavors in places including London, Washington D.C. and New York City. But readers beware: become too engrossed in your borrowed page-turner and you may miss your stop.

[ By WebUrbanist in Technology & Vehicles & Mods. ]

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Guerrilla Grafting: Public Trees Spliced to Bear Edible Fruit

23 Oct

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

guerilla fruit tree

A subversive urban agricultural group in San Francisco is turning ornamental trees into fruit-producing surprises for the local population but while technically breaking the law. A simple incision allows industrious grafters to add living branches to the mix; these scions heal in place then effectively become part of the existing tree.

guerilla branch grafts

A fresher form of guerilla gardening, traditionally carried out through seed bombs and other surreptitious planting techniques, this approach makes existing plants yield free produce.

A flowering apple tree in Oakland, Calif. with two successful grafts from an apple tree which bears fruit.

Founded by Tara Hui, Guerrilla Grafters leaves subtle hints in the form color-coded tape behind to mark their work, eschewing maps to avoid detection.

guerilla grafters group photo

While the city has over 10,000 apple, plum, pear and other fruit trees (and 100,000 public trees in total), these are intentionally rendered sterile to avoid making a public mess or attracting animals. The existence of these species makes guerrilla grafting interventions all the more difficult to spot, since they are simply added to extant greenery and take time to bear fruit.

guerilla gardening sf

The group’s novel form of civil disobedience begins to address issues of food scarcity and accessibility, and raise edible fruits as well as questions about whether it makes sense to strip decorative and shade-providing plants of another essential function they can just as easily provide.

guerilla grafting instruction manual

Their website also provides tips on ideal species combinations and grafting strategies, including the instruction manual shown above. The Guerrilla Grafters “graft fruit bearing branches onto non-fruit bearing, ornamental fruit trees. Over time, delicious, nutritious fruit is made available to urban residents through these grafts. We aim to prove that a culture of care can be cultivated from the ground up. We aim to turn city streets into food forests, and unravel civilization one branch at a time.”

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Installation & Sound. ]

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Pimp My Cardboard: Strangers’ Cars Customized Overnight

22 Oct

[ By Steph in Art & Sculpture & Craft. ]

cardboard customized car 1

Automobile owners in Amsterdam are waking up to find that their cars have been ‘customized’ overnight with cardboard and masking tape. Suddenly, their boring old sedans boast body fenders, spoilers, grilles and hood scoops. You’re welcome, says artist Max Sidentopf, creator of the ‘Slapdash Supercars’ project. Maybe the new additions won’t even survive a quick trip down the street, but that’s not really the point.

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“Individuality, self-expression, and status are more important than ever these days,” Sidentopf tells Vice. “But for some reason you see that things as ordinary as cars are getting personalized less and less, while it could be a strange but great form of self-expression. I thought I’d do people a favor by giving them a custom-made supercar.”

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The result is undeniably goofy, and the reaction of the owner is probably a test of both their sense of humor and how precious they are about their vehicles, since not everybody is crazy about the idea of strangers clambering all over their cars and leaving tape residue behind after the customizations have been removed.

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It’s a simple prank, and a funny way to remind people of the creative possibilities in each day, whether you have any desire to actually pimp your ride or not.

[ By Steph in Art & Sculpture & Craft. ]

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Bibliophile’s Dream: 13 of the World’s Most Beautiful Bookstores

21 Oct

[ By Steph in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

bookstores el ateneo

Bibliophiles can browse books inside a 19th-century theater filled with frescoes, a converted cathedral, a subterranean space with sci-fi vibes or an incredibly ornate space that helped inspire Hogwarts. From Los Angeles to Beijing, Buenos Aires to Romania, these 13 bookstores are among the world’s most beautiful and unique.

Converted Church: Selexyz Dominicanen, Maastricht, The Netherlands

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A dream bookstore in every respect, this location of the Selexyz chain in Maastricht occupies a 13th century Dominican church, inserting modern elements as a building-within-a-building to preserve the historic architecture. A cafe can be found within the area formerly occupied by the choir.

Livraria Lello, Porto, Portugal

bookstores livraria lello 2

bookstores livraria lello 1

Said to be among JK Rowling’s inspirations for Hogwarts, Portugal’s Livraria Lello features an incredible red staircase snaking through four stories of floor-to-ceiling stacked books in dark-stained cases. Ornate painted plaster ceilings, a stained glass skylight and bas-relief sculptures of Portuguese literary figures adorn the inspirational space.

Fang Suo Commune, Chengdu, China

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bookstores fang suo 1

Chinese book retailer Fang Suo Commune opened an incredible underground store in Chengdu with over 320 continuous feet of bookshelves lining the two long sides of the space. Measuring over 40,000 square feet of a subterranean mixed-use complex next to the ancient dace temple, the bookstore features 37 massive columns supporting a concrete canopy.

El Ateneo Grand Splendid Bookstore, Buenos Aires

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What was once the Teatro Gran Splendid, which opened in 1919, is now one of the world’s most stunning bookstores. The El Ateneo in Buenos Aires, Argentina once had a capacity for 1050 audience members, but now houses hundreds of thousands of books. Original details like the crimson stage curtains, ornate carvings and ceiling frescoes remain.

Cook & Book, Brussels

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Hungry bookworms in Brussels make their way to the Cook & Book, a combination bookstore and restaurant with a series of themed rooms divided by subject. There’s a modern train making loops around the kids’ area, an Airstream caravan in the travel section and British flags waving around the English Literature room. The cook book department even has your choices laid out on a salad bar, along with a host of edible treats.

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Bibliophiles Dream 13 Of The Worlds Most Beautiful Bookstores

[ By Steph in Destinations & Sights & Travel. ]

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Self-Censoring Font Automatically Redacts Fed Watchlist Words

21 Oct

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Graphics & Branding. ]

seen font security privacy

Simple called Seen, this font will frustrate you, redacting both expected and surprising things, as it checks what you type in realtime against a list of flagged words and phrases employed by the Department of Homeland Security.

seen font in action

Security, shooting, nuclear and outbreak are all fairly obvious, but drill, cloud, wave and sick seem so common as to be functionally useless for monitoring purposes, at least in isolation.

seen font blackouts

A London design student originally from Slovenia, Emil Kozole developed Project Seen as part of an awareness-raising campaign about security and privacy in and beyond the United States. He wants people to wonder why some words were included in the first place, and ask whether they should have to worry about self-censorship around broad (and in many cases bland) terms.

project seen examples

His custom Adobe OpenType font takes the aforementioned list, revealed originally through a Freedom of Information Act Request, and blacks them out just as you would expect to see in a top-secret document. While not intended to be practical, it is certainly an interesting exercise – try typing a few ordinary paragraphs and see for yourself the potentially surprising results.

360Photography

Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Concrete Wonders: 13 Brutalist Buildings in the USA & Britain

Geisel Library, San Diego, California

Tricorn Center, Portsmouth, England

Barbican Estate, London, England

Brunel University, London, England

Brownfield Estate, East London

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Concrete Wonders 13 Brutalist Buildings In The Usa Britain

Audiovisual Trikes: Portable Projections Animate City Streets

Baker’s Doesn’t: 13 Sweet Abandoned Donut Shops

Panned Out

The King Is Dead

Unhappy

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Bakers Doesnt 13 Sweet Abandoned Donut Shops

Space Architecture: Astronomers Sight Alien ‘Megastructures’

Light House: Translucent Dwellings in an Abandoned Parking Garage

Reading Railroad: Chicago Rolls Out Mobile Train Car Libraries

Guerrilla Grafting: Public Trees Spliced to Bear Edible Fruit

Pimp My Cardboard: Strangers’ Cars Customized Overnight

Bibliophile’s Dream: 13 of the World’s Most Beautiful Bookstores

Converted Church: Selexyz Dominicanen, Maastricht, The Netherlands

Livraria Lello, Porto, Portugal

Fang Suo Commune, Chengdu, China

El Ateneo Grand Splendid Bookstore, Buenos Aires

Cook & Book, Brussels

Next Page – Click Below to Read More:
Bibliophiles Dream 13 Of The Worlds Most Beautiful Bookstores

Self-Censoring Font Automatically Redacts Fed Watchlist Words

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Archives

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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Geisel Library, San Diego, California

Tricorn Center, Portsmouth, England

Barbican Estate, London, England

Brunel University, London, England

Brownfield Estate, East London

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Concrete Wonders 13 Brutalist Buildings In The Usa Britain

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Brutalist Playgrounds: Sharp Surfaces + Unforgiving Drops

Brutal London: Paper Miniatures of Concrete Architecture

Brutalist but Beautiful: 12 Spacey Sci-Fi Soviet Structures

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City-Sized Artwork: Huge Building Mural Spans 99 Structures

Urban Infill: Colorful Tile Mosaics Patch Potholed Streets

Interactive Museum: Play in Paintings, Become Part of the Art

Panned Out

The King Is Dead

Unhappy

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Red Ink: 10 Closed & Abandoned Tattoo Parlors, Studios & Shops

No Perking: 15 Drained Dry Abandoned Coffee Shops

Empty Chambers: 10 Closed & Abandoned Gun Stores & Shops

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Alien Architecture: Surreal Cities for Future Worlds

Fresh Spin: Rounded Space-Saving Clothes Drying Rack

Frying-Pan Planets? Dirty-Dish Art Photography

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SCADpads: Parking Garage Turned Tiny House Village

Skinny Portable House for Singles Takes Just 1 Day to Build

Low Cost House-in-a-House Made of 2 Shipping Containers

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Hybrid Library: QR Codes Access eBooks in Subway Station

Mobile Pop-Up Libraries: 12 Temporary & Traveling Book Lenders

Reading Revolution: 14 Marvelous Modern Urban Libraries

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Tree of 40 Fruit: Fresh Interview with Nature’s Master Grafter

Tree of 40 Fruit: Single Plant Grown with Dozens of Grafts

Guerrilla Upcycling: Public Furniture Made of Parisian Trash

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Transit Transformed: Metro Cars Turned Mobile Art Galleries

Out-of-the-Box Sculptures: 5 Amazing Cardboard Artists

Color-Coded Cars: Time-Collapse Film Reorders Rush Hour

Converted Church: Selexyz Dominicanen, Maastricht, The Netherlands

Livraria Lello, Porto, Portugal

Fang Suo Commune, Chengdu, China

El Ateneo Grand Splendid Bookstore, Buenos Aires

Cook & Book, Brussels

Next Page – Click Below to Read More: Bibliophiles Dream 13 Of The Worlds Most Beautiful Bookstores

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Word Worship: Church Converted to Awe-Inspiring Bookstore

Inception Park: Impossible Roller Coaster in Buenos Aires

Spiraling Tower of Babel Made of Books in Buenos Aires

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Cubicle Typography: Unique Desks as Office Furniture Font

Art of Words: 5 of the Best Banksy Quotes & Sound Bites

Winsome Words: 18 Examples of Typography in Web Design

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Concrete Wonders 13 Brutalist Buildings In The Usa Britain

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Bakers Doesnt 13 Sweet Abandoned Donut Shops

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Bibliophiles Dream 13 Of The Worlds Most Beautiful Bookstores