In Pursuit of Elegance: Why the Best Ideas Have Something Missing


Matthew E. May - 2009
    May examines the elusive element behind so many innovative breakthroughs in fields ranging from physics and marketing to design and popular culture. Combining unusual simplicity and surprising power, elegance is characterized by four key elements—seduction, subtraction, symmetry, and sustainability. In a compelling, story-driven narrative that sheds light on the need for elegance in design, engineering, art, urban planning, sports, and work, May offers surprising evidence that what’s “not there” often trumps what is.In the bestselling tradition of The Tipping Point, Made to Stick, and The Black Swan, In Pursuit of Elegance will change the way you think about the world.

DOODLE ART HANDBOOK: The Non-Artist's Guide in Creative Drawing


Lana Karr - 2015
     With the help of this precious book, Doodle Art Handbook, we will guide you to the place of creative drawing and help finding your inspiration. You don't have to be an artist to be able to draw and create your own masterpieces. The book contains: 25 original tangle patterns and many variations, divided into 5 section: from beginners to expert level. Various step by step lessons on how to start drawing while having little or no experience. Numerous original art works from Doodle Art collaborators. Step by step guidance on how to draw animals, flowers, trees and other objects in doodle art style. Some detailed instructions and advanced techniques for using shading, depth and drawing 3d objects. Ways to relieve stress and meditate with doodle art. The Doodle Art Handbook will be useful for all levels of artists. It gives easy and detailed instructions with many examples for beginners. It shares a lot of wonderful art works to bring more inspiration to experienced artists. And it provides results of detailed research of the history of doodle art and its modern trends. We are really glad to present the book after many months of collecting and processing of everything related to Doodle Art. Please enjoy!

Billy Hazelnuts


Tony Millionaire - 2006
    Billy Hazelnuts transmutes nursery rhymes and the golem myth into a storybook about Becky, girl scientist, her friend Billy Hazelnuts (who was created from cooking ingredients by tailless mice), and their journey to find the missing moon while battling an evil steam-driven alligator with a seeing-eye skunk.Millionaire fuses the darker spirit of older fairy tales with an absurdist adventure story, throws gender politics into the mix, and brings it to life with his dementedly charming and meticulous drawing style that is utterly transporting. Billy Hazelnuts features all-new characters, a first for Millionaire after building a tremendous following for his Sock Monkey and Maakies characters, which is sure to delight existing fans as well as introduce an entirely new audience to his breathtaking line and imagination.

The One Plus One: Free Ebook Sampler


Jojo Moyes - 2013
    But it's hard on your own. And sometimes you take risks you shouldn't. Because you have to . . . One chaotic family Jess's gifted, quirky daughter Tanzie is brilliant with numbers, but without a helping hand she'll never get the chance to shine. And Nicky, Jess's teenage stepson, can't fight the bullies alone. Sometimes Jess feels like they're sinking . . . One handsome stranger Into their lives comes Ed Nicholls, a man whose life is in chaos, and who is running from a deeply uncertain future. But he has time on his hands. He knows what it's like to be lonely. And he wants to help . . . One unexpected love story The One Plus One is a captivating and unconventional romance from Jojo Moyes about two lost souls meeting in the most unlikely circumstances. Praise for Jojo Moyes: 'Majestic, utterly compelling, tremendous. A heart-stopping read' Independent on Sunday'Truly beautiful. Made us laugh, smile and sob like a baby - you simply have to read it' Closer'A triumph. Packs such an emotional punch, you'll need a box of tissues' ElleJojo Moyes is a novelist and a journalist. She worked at the Independent for ten years before leaving to write full time. Her previous novels have all been critically acclaimed and include The Ship of Brides, Foreign Fruit, The Last Letter From Your Lover, winner of Spring 2012's most popular Richard and Judy Book Club title Me Before You and most recently The Girl you Left Behind. She lives in Essex with her husband and their three children.

Gothic Lolita


Masayuki Yoshinaga - 2007
    Influenced by Western fashion trends from the mid 1980s, young teenagers, predominately adolescent girls, congregate in the urban centres of Harajuku, Akihabara and a number of underground clubs in and around Tokyo, dressed head-to-toe in gothic costumes and late-Victorian dress. The psychological characteristics of the average Japanese Goth is one of introversion and exclusivity. The majority of girls in the scene are teenagers and most usually stop dressing and behaving this way by the age of eighteen. The origin of the movement was in Osaka in the mid 1990s when young teenagers adopted Gothic fashion in response to the clothes worn and promoted by Japanese Gothic rock bands. In the ten years since the trend began it has expanded to a number of cities including Tokyo and now boasts many thousands of devotees who dedicate their lives to creating ever more flamboyant and bizarre variations on the Gothic theme.

Ideaspotting: How to Find Your Next Great Idea


Sam Harrison - 2006
    Sam Harrison offers ways to generate creative business ideas, inspires observation-fuelled exploration to ignite the creative process, accelerates the occurences of spontaneity, serendipity and synchronicity, and encourage open eyes and ears in new places and familiar surroundings.

Pan and the Nightmare


James Hillman - 1972
    G. Jung's famous saying: "The Gods have become our diseases." Chapters on nightmare panic, on masturbation, rape and nympholepsy, on instinct and synchronicity, and on Pan's female loves-echo, Syrinx, Selene, and the Muses-show the goat-God at work and play in the dark drives and creative passions of our lives. Hillman's insights present the archetypal figure in the depths of nature and archetypal psychology as a method of revelation.Pan and the Nightmare (which includes a full translation of Wilhelm Roscher's masterful 19th-century mythological-pathological treatise on Pan and the demons of the night) is the most radical study of this God ever undertaken.

Fracture: Life and Culture in the West, 1918-1938


Philipp Blom - 2014
    In "Fracture: Life and Culture in the West, 1918-1938", critically acclaimed historian Philipp Blom argues that, amid this uncertainty, Europeans and Americans directed their energies inwards toward aesthetic and intellectual self-discovery. Europe produced strange new brands of art, science, and spirituality—such as Surrealism and Art Deco—while flocking to exciting but dangerous new ideologies including communism and fascism. In America, the Harlem Renaissance marked the flourishing of black culture, and flappers sparked new thinking about the place of women in society. Yet undercurrents of racial and class conflict were pronounced, fueled by immigration quotas and the poverty of the Dust Bowl."Fracture: Life and Culture in the West, 1918-1938" is a sweeping evocation of the tumultuous interwar period, and the sublime cultural movements and terrifying ideologies it spawned.

Step Right Up!: I'm Gonna Scare The Pants Off America


William Castle - 1976
    Here are the outrageous memoirs of an American original whose life was every bit as outlandish as his movies. Photographs. Filmography.

QUILTING: ONE DAY QUILTING MASTERY: The Complete Beginner's Guide to Learn Quilting in Under One Day -10 Step by Step Quilt Projects That Inspire You - ... Needlecrafts Textile Crafts Hobbies & Home)


Ellen Warren - 2015
    The satisfaction of seeing your finished quilt spread out on your bead or draped over the back of your couch will make every hour of stitching worth it ten times over!! A well-made quilt can last for a life time, while serving to not only warm your bed at night, but to brighten up your home with colors, patterns, and beauty. In this book, you will learn how to create striking and unique quilting pieces. Making quilts is easy, fun, and maybe even addicting. Even the smallest patchwork idea can quickly to become a big, full, colorful projects Start making your own quilts today, and open up a world of color, creativity, and personal expression that you may not have even knew existed. Included in this book are 10 beautiful quilt projects, so you can kick-start the learning process! These projects include pictures and a detailed step by step method to assist beginner's in their quest to master the art! Here is a preview of what you will learn… The proper way to think through the quilting process, before starting a project The materials and tools needed to complete a quilting project How to combine colors and techniques to create beautiful patterns Finishing techniques that will make you look like a pro 10 original projects to practice all that is taught in this book Download your copy today!

Kawaii!: Japan's Culture of Cute


Manami Okazaki - 2013
    From cute handwriting came manga, Hello Kitty, and Harajuku, and the kawaii aesthetic now affects every aspect of Japanese life. As colorful as its subject matter, this book contains numerous interviews with illustrators, artists, fashion designers, and scholars. It traces the roots of the movement from sociological and anthropological perspectives and looks at kawaii's darker side as it morphs into gothic and gloomy iterations. Best of all, it includes hundreds of colorful photographs that capture kawaii's ubiquity: on the streets and inside homes, on lunchboxes and airplanes, in haute couture and street fashion, in cafes, museums, and hotels.

Henry Darger: Art and Selected Writings


Henry Darger - 2000
    This book provides the first comprehensive survey of Darger's art and writings. Included are reproductions of approximately 114 of Darger's collage drawings and fifteen selections from his writings, focusing on his life's work. "In the Realms of the Unreal," which is an account of a cosmic struggle against child slavery unfolding on a planet vastly larger than our own. This battle between the forces of good--led by the intrepid Vivian sisters--and the evil Glandelinian nations, was illustrated and extended in Darger's art, including the mural-size watercolor drawings that represent his mature achievement as an artist. Michael Bonesteel, a Chicago-based art critic and authority on outsider art, provides an introduction to Darger's work and narrates the Dickensian circumstances of his childhood which, along with his profound religious faith and doubt, shaped his extraordinary sensibility. A true American original, Henry Darger combined an unquestionable innocence with a dark and sometimes deeply disturbing vision to create a body of work of originality and lasting impact.

Learn Tunisian Crochet: Beginner Stitch Guide & 6 Easy Potholder Patterns (Tiger Road Crafts Book 2)


Tara Cousins - 2014
    The "Getting Started" section will give you a great overview and help explain some things for the very beginner. Next, learn some easy stitch patterns in the section "Basic Stitches." When you're ready to try your first project, take a look at the "Potholder Patterns" section, but make sure to read the "Pattern Information & Notes" first for some important stuff that pertains to all the patterns. The ebook is also filled with photos to help you along your way.Why Potholders?Potholders are a great project to work with Tunisian crochet because:• The back/wrong side is hidden between the two layers• Tunisian crochet makes a very thick final product• Working square shapes is easy for the beginnerHave fun, and happy hooking to you!

Bass Culture: When Reggae Was King


Lloyd Bradley - 2000
    And if UB 40 get a mention, I missed it. Isn`t that recommendation enough for you?' Mojo'Switches between informed analysis and intoxicating aural history...With epic contributions from major players such as PrinceBuster, Horace Andy, Bunny Lee and Dennis Bovell' GQ'Fascinating...written with passion, style and gusto. This is a book many musicians would benefit from reading' Jah Wobble, Independent on Sunday'A compelling social and musical history running from Fifties soundsystem roots to contemporary dancehall...filled to the brim with anecdotes to keep the most hardened music-head happy' Face'A classic...Hilarious in places, peppered with social and historical comment in others, this is a fascinating account detailing how reggae evolved in Jamaica and became a global phenomenon' New Nation

Hiroshige


Adele Schlombs - 2007
    Literally meaning "pictures of the floating world", ukiyo-e refers to the famous Japanese woodblock print genre that originated in the 17th century and is practically synonymous with the Western worlds visual characterization of Japan. Though Hiroshige captured a variety of subjects, his greatest talent was in creating landscapes of his native Edo (modern-day Tokyo) and his most famous work was a series known as "100 Famous Views of Edo" (1856-1858). This book provides an introduction to his work and an overview of his career.About the Series: Every book in TASCHEN's Basic Art Series features:a detailed chronological summary of the artist's life and work, covering the cultural and historical importance of the artist approximately 100 color illustrations with explanatory captions a concise biography