EDIBLE BOOKS

HOW LONG DOES IT TAKE YOU TO READ A BOOK? HOW FAST DO YOU WISH TO BE DONE WITH IT? HOW HUNGRY FOR KNOWLEDGE ARE YOU?

Edible books is a speculative design project addressing the current fruition and use of books’ content. Haste and voracity tend to prevail, weakening the power of books and giving space to faster, simpler and more immediate ways of reading. Not only books, but also bookshops are affected by this tendency: none of them would be able to survive with the only turnover of books. The omnipresence of the Net has turned bookshops into environments where the experience is more important than the content transmitted. And food is often consumed in that occasion: it is the book’s twin of emotions. Edible books exaggerates this condition by making any book potentially edible. Once a title has been chosen, the content of the book is analysed by an algorithm. Based on a system of categories, it translates them into food. The composition of the resulting book is given by a series of elements that are joined together regardless of taste, aesthetics or consistency. This process reduces and compresses content, by giving consumers the possibility to live a new experience.