Ben Jacks' Book Now Available

Culicidae Architectural Press is pleased to announce the release of Ben Jacks’ new book The Architect’s Tour:Notes for the Design Traveler. 

If you want to be an effective designer, set aside the glossy magazines, turn off your computer, and seek out first-hand encounters with good design. When it comes to cities, buildings, and art, actual experience is almost always better than the virtual kind. No image can replicate Le Corbusier’s Ronchamp when the light is just right, or capture the silent speech one hears on a stroll through Ian Hamilton Finlay’s Little Sparta or explain hours dissolving in Peter Zumthor’s baths at Vals. That is the reason for this book: to encourage you to actively pursue direct aesthetic experience in the built environment, and to reflect upon the best reasons and ways to be a dedicated design traveler.
Traveling to learn is an integral part of the education of student architects and designers. In the age of overwhelming digital information a contemporary Grand Tour devoted primarily to exploring the built environment in all of its richness affirms that learning about design depends on experiencing places and buildings in their complete physical reality. Although this book consists of words and photographs once removed from their subject, it presupposes a philosophy of architecture in which senses such as sound, temperature, time, and touch are at least as important as the visual sense. Design travel is a particularly focused way to bring together experience, narrative, and image for greater understanding of the designed environment.

The photographs in this book focus mainly on Modern and contemporary architecture in Europe. Europe is compact, it boasts an extensive public transportation network, and its post-World- War- II built environment has been shaped by well-developed public policy that values design. For these reasons, it is a model destination for the design pilgrim. It is of course possible and desirable to pursue a rigorous program of design touring both close to home and further afield on any of the world’s continents. The photographs here are not meant to imply a canon or a prescriptive itinerary, rather they offer a personal collection—one example of a stepping off point for approaching, understanding, and benefiting from the experience of design travel. One of the central premises of this book is that beautiful design can be found just about anywhere if you work at it and look.

Ben Jacks, a designer, architect, writer, and teacher, holds degrees from the University of Chicago, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Stonecoast MFA Program in Creative Writing at the University of Southern Maine. When not looking at buildings and making photographs, he teaches at Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, including courses in beginning design, human behavior, design detailing, and understanding architecture through drawing.

In 1991 Ben walked the Appalachian Trail 2000 miles from Georgia to his home in Maine. This half-year experience of walking and living outdoors inspired and continues to inform his thinking and writing about architecture, aesthetics, landscape, and place, which has been published in Journal of Architectural Education, Places, and Landscape Journal.

As a designer Ben focuses on detail and craft, seeking to develop the potentially rich and intimate relationship between landscape, building, dwelling, and interior. He is currently at work designing and building a family home meant to last: a flexible- family-structure, aging-in-place, LEED Platinum, near net-zero Passive House in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Readers’ Responses
Pointed, focused, and meditative, this book exemplifies the traveling architect realizing built form.

John R. Stilgoe, Orchard Professor in the History of Landscape, Harvard University 

The message of The Architect’s Tour is an important one: whether conceived in the abstract realm of paper or a computer screen, architecture’s ultimate sphere of power is and always has been in the
real world. The laboratory and classroom of the student architect is ‘out there’: and it is stocked
with wonderful places to visit and awe-inspiring buildings to study. Ben Jacks insists you go out into the world and look...because he knows you will become a better and better architect by filling your imagination with memories of great architecture! He also helps...by providing handy pointers to planning your own architectural tours.
Interior: Full Color Bleed on White paper, 172 pages

Simon Unwin, author of Analysing Architecture 

Book Details

Paperback List Price: $32.50 in the US, £20.89 in the UK, €26.65 in countries of the European Union. Dimensions: 5.5” x 8.5” (13.97 x 21.59 cm)
Publisher: Culicidae Architectural Press, an Imprint of Culicidae Press, LLC ISBN-13: 978-1941892022

The Architect’s Tour is available now worldwide at culicidaepress.com, amazon.com and other retailers. 

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For further press information about the book, or to schedule an interview or reading featuring Ben Jacks, please contact:

Culicidae Architectural Press
Mikesch Muecke, Publisher + Editor | editor@culicidaepress.com | +1 (352) 388 3848 Ben Jacks, Architect + Author | jacksbm@miamioh.edu | +1 (513) 658-0925 

For Writers

As a growing independent publisher we’re always looking for a few good writers. If you are interested in submitting a manuscript, please read our Author Guidelines and FAQ page.

Peer Review of Manuscript Submissions

Starting in 2014 any manuscripts that show up in our inbox will be blind peer-reviewed by at least two humans whose expertise matches that of the submission. 

In addition to our two main editors/reviewers—Mikesch Muecke and Miriam Zach—we now have University of Florida English Professor Emeritus Richard Brantley and Iowa State University English professor Steve Pett helping us with this important task.

Based on the subject matter of the book project, we may also send the manuscript out to other secret reviewers.

Review for Stefanie Golisch' poetry book "Fly and Fall"

Culicidae Press author Stefanie Golisch' latest book "Fly and Fall" was just reviewed by Dr. Klaus Martens, member of the P.E.N. Centrum in Deutschland, Modern Language Association, Canadian Comparative Literature Association, and Gesellschaft für Kanadastudien. More info about Martens can be found at http://www.klausmartens.com/ The review was published by FixPoetry at http://www.fixpoetry.com/feuilleton/kritiken/stefanie-golisch/fly-and-fall. We'll work on translating this into English for our English-only audience in the next few days. Happy reading!

Press Release for Frank Moe's "Sled Dogs to Saint Paul"

Wraparound cover for "Sled Dogs to Saint Paul"

Ames, Iowa, September 15, 2014.

Legislator and Wilderness Guide Frank Moe goes the Distance

Ames, IA – Culicidae Press is proud to announce the publication of a memoir by acclaimed adventurer and environmental educator Frank Moe. This moving personal narrative recounts his life as a musher and environmental citizen in the north country of Minnesota. The story culminates with a 350-mile dog-sled journey to Minnesota’s State Capitol of St. Paul, where Frank delivered a petition to the Governor signed by over 13,000, protesting proposed sulfide mines in the Lake Superior Watershed and on the edge of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.

What readers have said:

What a ride! Educator, legislator and wilderness guide Frank Moe takes us on a riveting journey from his patchy upbringing through his personal epiphany with mushing and onwards by sled to the steps of the state capitol. Lots of thrills and spills await you along the way. But what shines through this fine piece of wordsmithing is devotion: to his bride, to his friends, to his northwoods home and to his beloved sled dogs. Although sled dogs have taken me across Siberia, Greenland, Arctic Canada and to the North Pole, none of those adventures were as creative as the sled dog trek that took Frank deep into political action.

Paul Schurke, Polar Explorer, Founder and Director Wintergreen Dogsled Lodge, Ely, Minnesota

What an inspiring tale of dogs, loyalty and bravery! Frank Moe weaves together into a page-turner of a memoir the story of his love of sledding and his animal companions, with a powerful passion for the wild and beautiful landscape he calls home. An adventurous memoir that is also reflective and candid about Moe’s own personal demons, this is a book you won’t be able to put down. And if you didn’t love and admire dogs before reading this book, you will afterwards.

Sheryl St. Germain, author of Swamp Songs: the Making of an Unruly Woman

and Navigating Disaster: Sixteen Essays of Love and a Poem of Despair.

Sled Dogs to Saint Paul is a must-read for those who know the undying companionship of a canine as well as those who seek to protect our natural environment for future generations.

Dave and Amy Freeman, Directors, Wilderness Classroom,

2014 National Geographic Adventurers of the Year

Once in a while a book comes along that speaks from Minnesota’s heart and helps us understand why we care so much about protecting our homeland. This year that book is Sled Dogs to Saint Paul, authored by Frank Moe. It’s the story of a man from northern Minnesota who becomes enchanted with the world of sled dogs and the gorgeous wilds in which they race. The book is no environmental manifesto but does link the sense of place that comes from living amidst the north’s beauty with the imperative to stop destructive mining proposals.

Dave Demsey, Minneapolis Star Tribune Conservation Minnesota Blog

About Culicidae Press

Culicidae Press serves creative writers and readers worldwide with exceptionally well designed books.

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Info and Contact

Sled Dogs to Saint Paul is available now worldwide through Amazon and other retailers. For more information about the book, or to schedule an interview or reading featuring Frank Moe, please call Mikesch Muecke at 352-388-3848 or send an email to editor@culicidaepress.com

Stefanie Golisch Book of Poems

Stefanie Golisch just published her latest book of poetry (in English and Italian) with us. Her book, Fly and Fall, is now available on Amazon all over the world.

Stefanie Golisch is a traveller between languages and cultures. Since 1988 she lives and works in Italy. In addition to writing in her German mother tongue, she explores through new poetic codes the inside of the human condition in her every-day Italian and in her elected English. Her poetry accompanies the daily ‘work of living’, showing the lightness and the gravity of the effort to become ‘who you are’.

Stefanie Golisch viaggia tra lingue e culture diverse. Dal 1988 vive e lavora in Italia. Scrive in tre lingue: la sua lingua madre, il Tedesco, la lingua di ogni giorno, l’Italiano, e la lingua eletta, l’Inglese. Ogni lingua ha una sua dinamica specifica che esplode i microcosmi dell’umano in sempre nuove cifre poetiche. La sua poesia accompagna il ‘mestiere di vivere’, mostrando la leggerezza e la pesantezza dell’impegno di diventare ‘ciò che si è’. 

Book Review

Stefanie Golisch’ poetry shows the ability of observation, irony, and sometimes bitchiness, but there is always a profound humanity in showing men and women in their unprotected nakedness, in their loneliness connected to the loneliness of others. 

Vi è nelle poesie di Stefanie Golisch la capacità di osservazione, ironia, causticità qualche volta, ma sempre una profonda umanità nel cogliere la donna o l’uomo nella sua nudità indifesa, nella sua solitudine connessa ad altre solitudini.

Beppe Mariano, italian poet

Review Copy of Frank Moe's Book Now Available

Minnesota-based author, outdoorsman, sled dog racer, and part time politician Frank Moe just published his gripping story Sled Dogs to Saint Paul with Culicidae Press. You can already get a review copy at Amazon, and soon at other fine brick-and-mortar stores around the world.

Shirley's Ride on the Magic Blanket

Coming this fall....In this children’s book, beautifully illustrated by Valerie Bouthyette, the author Tony Mawson tells the story of Shirley, a young girl who experiences an adventure while spending time with her parents back on the farm in Iowa during the summer. To say more would give away too much. You have to read it yourself.... For more information, go to

http://www.culicidaepress.com/cp/mawsonShirleysBlanket.html

Fern Kupfer and Joe Geha in Des Moines

On October 10 Culicidae Press author Fern Kupfer and her author husband Joe Geha read from their respective books in the Des Moines Central Library at 1000 Grand Avenue. For more information go to

https://www.downtowndesmoines.com/events/a-conversation-with-writers-fern-kupfer-joe-geha?event_date_id=3311

Fern Kupfer's Book "Leaving Long Island" is now live!

Fern Kupfer’s latest book, Leaving Long Island and other departures, was just released two days ago by Culicidae Press. If you want to be one of the first to read it, follow this link. There are three different version available: a paperback, a case wrap hardcover, and a hardcover with a traditional jacket. An eBook version will be available by next week for our readers in North America and most of Europe. You can also follow Fern Kupfer’s new blog at http://fernkupfer.blogspot.ca/