The idea is to die young as late as possible. — Ashley Montagu — Friday May 23rd — —

I love listening. It is one of the only spaces where you can be still and moved at the same time. — Nayyirah Waheed — Friday May 23rd — —

“What art does — maybe what it does most completely — is tell us, make us feel that what we think we know, we don’t. There are whole worlds around us that we’ve never glimpsed.” Greil Marcus — Friday May 23rd — —

Serrote Sky Chart

We like everything the lovely Portuguese company Serrote produces, from their special notebooks to the crate with a selection of blue and white products they released last year, and with their latest addition to their catalogue they have created yet again another elegant and beautiful product which we love. Last month Nuno Neves and Susana Viela of Serrote presented the truly beautiful Sky Chart. It is an interpretive map of the night sky, where you can find the constellations and major stars visible from the Northern Hemisphere, throughout the year. The star Polaris, in the constellation Ursa Minor, is in the center of the chart. As this star is aligned with the axis of rotation of the earth passing through the poles, it remains motionless in the sky during the night, while the other stars appear to rotate around it.

The Sky Chart was printed in three colors: dark blue; for the background – the stars emerge in white in their respective magnitudes and most important names, light blue; for the lines connecting the stars defining graphically the constellations and their respective latin names, and finally black; for the allegorical depictions of the constellations. All charts are spot-colour offset print on sturdy Munken Lynx 150g paper, and were all printed in Portugal as is the case with the production of all Serrote products.

Serrote was founded in 2004 in Lisbon, Portugal by Nuno Neves and Susana Vilela working  in letterpress projects and book publishing. We first noticed them through their amazing Blue Soap Notebook, but even before that they had been producing notebooks with which they honor iconic imagery of Portuguese culture like the pattern of traditional table cloths or the shape of distinct biscuits. They also collaborated with the Museu de Metrologia in 2012 which resulted in a limited edition notebook, which was sold at the museum. During the years they also published a small series of beautiful books and finally they like to stretch their horizon through, for instance the Crate Serrote which was a collaboration with several traditional Portuguese artisans who created something for the crate, and special print projects like the beautiful Sky Chart.

We can only hope that Serrote continues to produce elegant products like this for many years to come.

To order the Sky Chart online see here.