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Your Guide to Design and Pop Culture in Tokyo

This Week in Magazines

Casa BrutusEsquire

  • The July issue of TITLE features a cover topic that I can’t say I’m very much into: “We Love Cars.” Bah. On the other hand, I sure wouldn’t mind taking the Yamaha Electric Commuter EC-02 for a spin.
  • The world of manga gets another magazine cover with the June issue of GIRLIE, on a topic I touched upon earlier todayshojo manga. They examine a few popular titles (like Nana), and offer up a few recommendations. The current STUDIO VOICE is still the one to pick up though.
  • I forgot to mention it — it’s been out for a few weeks — but the latest issue of CASA BRUTUS (June) takes a look at the recovery work being done in the tsunami-affected regions of South-East Asia. They also have a piece on the memorial of Kenzo Tange, as well as a look at the city of Porto, Portugal from a design perspective (for more design thoughts on Porto, catch Momus’ latest radio entry).
  • The July ESQUIRE is a killer issue for design lovers — “Design as a Weapon.” They start with a big piece on one of the biggest proponents of the use of design as a tool for change, Bruce Mau, followed by a huge rundown of the big (and not so big) names in graphic design.

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PauseTalk

PauseTalk is a regular series of events that take place at Cafe Pause on the first Monday of every month, with a start time of 20:00. The idea is to create a forum where Tokyo-based creatives can get together and discuss their own projects, as well as cultural currents of the city. The next edition happens June 4.

We hereby define a new term, that of the magaziner, described as a person who exerts an unhealthy amount of love for all things magazine. The Magaziner is a site that mostly focuses on the intersection between magazines and the digital frontier, and what it means for the medium. This does not preclude the inclusion of a healthy amount of print love.

Codex is a weekly music podcast hosted by Jean Snow, recorded in Tokyo. Playlists for all episodes are posted on the site, and you can subscribe to RSS feeds of posts and episodes.

Jean Snow is a contributor to Arcade Mania, your guide to the arcade gaming scene in Japan (Amazon US/Amazon Japan). He also provided assistance on Tokyolife: Art and Design, a guide to Tokyo's cultural output of the past few years, covering the works of over 80 influential creatives.
He will be contributing to the upcoming fifth editions of The Rough Guide to Tokyo and The Rough Guide to Japan, due for release in 2011.
PechaKucha

Jean Snow is Executive Director of the PechaKucha organization. He also helps run the PechaKucha Night in Tokyo -- please get in touch if you are interested in presenting at a future event. For a more intimate salon-like discussion group, join him at his monthly PauseTalk event.

A longtime resident of Tokyo, he lives and breathes design, pop culture, and gaming, sustained by an unhealthy addiction to magazines and frequent visits to his favorites cafes. He has reported on these obsessions for various online/offline publications, including the following: Time, Inside (Australian Design Review), Gizmodo, Gridskipper, Kotaku, 1UP, Tokyo Q, Superfuture, OK Fred, Arthur Frommer's Budget Travel, I.D. (International Design), Metropolis, Azure, MoCo Loco, Kateigaho International Edition, Wired's Game|Life, PingMag, CNNGo, Phaidon, and The Japan Times.

You can subscribe to an RSS feed of this site, and also follow him on Twitter and Facebook, or get in touch by email.

 

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The "Jean Snow" logo is written using the free Kirimomi Swash typeface. The "M31" logo is by Ian Lynam, and is part of a series of 31 unique designs. The site's design is based on the Grid Focus WordPress theme by Derek Punsalan.

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