Another book with ‘provisional’ finishing and staples to keep the cover and outer section together. In this case the panel thought this playing with visible construction and unfinished appearance was a quality that closely identified it with the author’s work. Elisa van Joolen researches the systems and values of the fashion industry, and challenges her readers to think about other ways of producing and using its products. For her project 11”x 17” she asked famous high-street and high-end fashion brands to donate sweaters and other garments, from which she cut tabloid-sized (i.e. 11” x 17” or 27.9 x 43.2 cm) pieces which she then combined with second-hand clothes and expensive fashions.

The innermost part of the book shows the various ways in which these elements can be combined, crisply photographed by Blommers / Schumm. The colour section has been carefully inserted as slick product photography; the monochrome section is grainy, half-tone, and in style documentary. Surrounding the book block is a section of 32 pages of newsprint (16 on each side) showing diagrams of the various combinations, the donors, and the networks that arise from them, and offering space for five reflective texts about van Joolen’s approach. The sewn book block has been glued to an extra cardboard wraparound in the Swiss manner; this is stapled to the outer section and the cover – by hand and by the publisher. The panel were full of admiration for the way in which construction and deconstruction have here been taken to extremes.