GOOD MORNING FROM Phnom Penh. Quiet reflection, at DK World HQ, here at the turn of the year. Three issues of our ‘A Philosophy of the Moment’ collection for Winter 2018-19 are ‘done and dusted,’ as we used to say in print. Except these are digital. So ‘done and filed’, I suppose. And much more […]
First editorial meeting today, for S P A C E | Phnom Penh, ‘Angle of Incidence.’ Discovering, sourcing, planning, sharing, connecting, interconnecting and framing. That’s what it is. To start. Getting the team together. Organizing the pages without overthinking or over designing. Leaving room for stuff to develop, other stuff to emerge. Being okay with […]
New photography by Dipika Kohli, in mostly black and white. All from the Atelier S P A C E series in Finland, and inspired by the amazing guests in DK’s concurrent online programme, ‘Slow Moment.’ That twelve-week sequence designed for people to connect and converge in S P A C E was about: slowing down […]
NEW THINGS. Starting again. In S P A C E. In very small circles. Trusting the process and enjoying the adventure, creating the design for hosting and engaging some of us, some of us who are still curious, still open to the possibility of being changed by what we hear, and still ready to learn, […]
By invitation only.
KATSOTAAN. ‘Let’s see.’ That’s Finnish, ‘katsotaan.’ Not sure why, but it sure seemed to come up a lot in conversations. And maybe that’s why the next word I learned was ‘maybe.’ Things are always, it seems, in a kind of flux. You just have no idea what’s going to happen. You live in a countryside […]
TODAY I AM CONTINUING to think about the creative process. It’s a follow-up from two things: Yesterday’s post about the creative process. (Will people leave comments there? I hope so. But let’s see.) ‘Sharpen and heighten,’ one of our favorite Q&A interviews, with science podcaster Jai Ranganathan. Exploring without knowing THE CREATIVE PROCESS itself was the […]
LOOKING BACK, it must have been at the conversation salon ‘The State of Publishing’ that I got the first inkling of what the thing is that today I call S P A C E. In which new and different others gather for a unique, once-off, real-life moment for remarkable connexion. This is me, at that […]
LET’S TALK ABOUT IT. Neurosis. In more than 50 conversations to date with people on the bus, on the street, in cafes, at pubs, passing through the town, looking left, discovering something, sitting still, not speaking, in libraries, distancing themselves, and telling me in some form or fashion that DK’s comics about this place remind […]
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STAMMTISCH is MONDAY. Guest artist Mike Dynamo will talk with us about music and writing. More below. Ticket registration page is here. Salons: What are they? Design Kompany hosts conversation salons. This is what it looks like. Pictured, from left: ‘The State of Publishing’ in Durham NC with Mercury Studio, MAKE at Fishmongers Durham NC, […]
IT IS INCREDIBLE. The road. How it teaches. You just have no idea where you are going to go, and then, there you are. Writing today from a small unexpectedly well-connected wifi place. Fast. Lucky. Reflecting lately on the journeys, typing and sharing the gems in S P A C E. Enjoying offline random conversations. So many! A few intriguing […]
TODAY AND TOMORROW, we are in Cameron Highlands hosting a popup salon-workshop. The theme this time is photography, and travel in general. Never thought that I would start writing and blogging and conversing about #travel, you know, with the hashtags and everything. It seems so overdone, these days. It seems like people all over the […]
Join DK and very small handful of others at this new, and different, style of conversation salon. Our theme is ‘The Prospect of Beauty’. Discover the parlor games ‘Art of Not Knowing’ and ‘Excerpts of Note,’ as shared in similar small scale salons in Tokyo, London, New York and Hanoi. Welcoming the very curious and […]
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NEXT MONTH IN SINGAPORE, DK are going to be hosting a popup, weekend zinemaking salon, Atelier S P A C E || Singapore. It’s not quite what, I think, fits into the usual programme of ‘writer event, go to the library,’ and ‘design event, go to a conference,’ and ‘open space, that’s some kind of […]
NEXT STOP, Singapore. Talking with people in design, publishing, writing, photography, illustration, networking as much as I can right now (online) before I get there (early November) to *make it happen*. I’m really looking forward to making a go of this, it’s been a long time in the works trying to discover how to get […]
WHEN DESIGN KOMPANY landed in Phnom Penh in March 2014, something incredibly magical took hold of me. I still remember the photo: I’m on a tuk-tuk, looking out at what was the Independence Monument, though I didn’t know it at the time. We’re rounding the circle, I’m staring. I’ve got one hand clutching the open-air […]
‘THIS ISN’T A BOOK. This is an experience.’ Experience it. Details by email, for those who pre-order. Pre-order here: Nostalgia Cà Phê.
AFTER HOSTING THE JUNE SERIES OF EVENTS in Hanoi, DK are back in Phnom Penh as a team and curious to discover new people who might be newly arriving here. We just reset all our mailing lists, but there’s a new conversation salon that is getting underway and some of us are in Phnom […]
IT MIGHT BE A LITTLE PREMATURE to start blogging about the next ‘N’ already, but it is here, in my heart, as soon as the last one finishes. There is, of course, the thank-you not that I am still writing. For those who joined us at ‘N’ in Hanoi… wow, just last month. At the […]
Thank you for your interest in THE VILLAGE. Next invitation will be made for a 12 September start. To get the invitation, subscribe to S P A C E…
ORIGIN: ‘What is fromness?’ is inspired by ‘Ask me where I’m local’ by Taiye Selasi: ‘When someone asks you where you’re from … do you sometimes not know how to answer?’ Selasi speaks for “multi-local” people. In other words, people who feel at home in the town where they grew up, the city they live […]
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TODAY I AM GOING TO UPDATE the page that tells the story of ‘where is N’ now? The story is happening. There are conversations going on. This is really exciting now, there is momentum, let’s talk about momentum! Gumption gumption gumption. And magic. Flow. And what’s even better than all of that? Guests. So happy […]
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GOING THROUGH THE EMAIL. Doing the work. ‘N’ work, that is. I have got a new list of invitees to reach out to, an old one to follow up with, and the rest. Got to talk to more than 100 people if I can find 16 to say ‘yes’ to ‘N’. (Learned this from ‘N’ […]
Frygt og Lykke. A short essay by Aske Pedersen
I VIRKELIGHEDEN HANDLER det ikke om at skrive, men om at åbne mig op for andre mennesker. Og for mig selv. For at gøre dette, er jeg nødt til at smide min facade, mit uigennemtrængelige skjold af forsvarsmekanismer, og hvad sker der, hvis modparten ikke kan lide det den ser? Noget af det mest uhyggelige er at gøre sig sårbar, blot for at blive såret.
ARE YOU THINKING of moving abroad? Meet others who also want to try out life on the road, or at a distance, with a couple of belongings and good wifi connections.