An unusual book collection
Yet for all the curios on display, the true heart of VVG Something is its books. A long-time bookworm, once she starts talking about books it can be hard to get Wang to stop. While these days consumers are all about ebooks and reading online, she still feels there’s something irreplaceable about physical books.
“It’s an amazing feeling picking up a book, getting the smell of the paper and seeing its design,” she says. The paper, the printing, the font, the layout... everything about a book is a design choice; “Physical books engage all five senses, which is something ebooks just can’t do.”
VVG Something also has books that are hard, if not impossible, to find in regular bookstores in Taiwan. For instance, there is a French cookbook that, by using ingredient-themed bookmarks, helps readers find both recipes and inspiration quickly and creatively, and groups those recipes by main ingredient into convenient mini-books.
Or Japanese collectibles magazine Naturela, which each issue covers carefully selected products, like handcrafted enamel kettles, considered must-haves for any coffee lover.
“Books can inspire people and spark ideas,” says Wang. She encourages her restaurant staff to visit the store and read a few books, hoping this will ignite creative ideas for their cooking.
She has recently been planning to bring in the latest issue of Visionaire, a fashion and art magazine from the UK which is published three times a year in limited quantities, includes work from famous designers around the world, and is released in distinctive designs each issue.
VVG Something already has several previous issues of the magazine, including one that is a collection of photographs packaged in a wooden box, and one made to look like a child’s book-bag, complete with two leather carrying straps. It is truly an unusual sight. The latest issue is a collector’s edition 180 centimeters long, compared with the 100-cm-long regular edition, which makes it the world’s largest magazine. Because of its size, the company Wang usually works with to bring magazines into Taiwan has refused, and she is currently working hard to find a way to make it part of the VVG Something collection.
While most of the store’s books are in foreign languages, there are also a small number of very distinctive Chinese-language books on design, printing, and bookbinding, all carefully selected by Wang.
For example, there is Taiwanese designer Ho Chia-hsing’s The Heart Sutra, From the Heart: A Modern, Artistic Sutra. Taking the writings of two Buddhist masters, Ho has designed a book that uses a semi-transparent rice-paper cover and colored kishu-paper pages to create a physical representation of this spiritual text. On top of this, by working with a calligrapher, he uses the flowing nature of Chinese calligraphy to bring new attention to this old work.
As Wang says, books are about more than just words and pictures—through good design and layout, they can bring ancient texts back to vibrant life.
The eye-catching merchandise, sitting around all kinds of other books and pieces, creates an atmosphere where customers can completely lose themselves.