CHECK THIS OUT // Loose Leaf: Hybrid Publication and Personal Art Gallery

"Looking at a beautiful work of photography or art at 500 pixels width doesn't really satisfy someone like me," says Tom Crabtree, the founder and creative director of San Francisco design studio Manual. "I like to live with images, not just scroll past them."

That desire led to Loose Leaf, a project that's mighty difficult to describe in a single word. In the words of Crabtree: "It’s a hybrid of periodical, poster, collectible archive and personal art gallery."

Each edition of Loose Leaf features a series of large-format, unbound prints. Unlike your typical art periodical or exhibition catalog, it's meant to adorn your wall rather than join that stack of magazines in the corner of your room. It even comes with handy aluminum push pins and pre-punched holes for easy mounting, a clever and simple system inspired by Crabtree's own aspirations to collect and display work in his home and studio. "Posters, photography, screen prints, drawings... all of which cost a small fortune to frame," he says. "I thought it would be neat to design a publication that allows the user to instantly hang it on their wall in a way that is very intentional."

More on Loose Leaf, including a gallery photos, after the jump.

Like its composition, Loose Leaf's editions are shaped by broad ideas rather than strict themes. The first edition features an array of prints tied to the San Francisco Bay area, including contributions from artist and designer Jeff Canham, photographer Michelle McCarron, painter Jake Longstreth and author, editor and artist Dave Eggers.

Crabtree founded Manual after working at studios like Spin and MadeThough in London and Apple in the U.S., where he designed packaging for the iPhone. "Throughout the years I've worked with some great people; photographers, illustrators, industrial designers, architects—largely on client related projects," he says.

"Loose Leaf is a great opportunity to keep working and collaborating with other creative practitioners whose work I admire, but in a freer way. While there's an element of curation and art direction in the way Loose Leaf takes shape, it's really just a case of us asking people to inspire us with what they do. At the end of the day that's what Loose Leaf is about. Inspiration."

Crabtree says that Manual plans to publish the second edition of Loose Leaf early next year. Order the first edition now from the Loose Leaf website.

Jeff Canham

Dave Eggers

Jake Longstreth

-- John Ruscher