A sunflower — rendered with the quiet intensity of a Japanese botanical master — fills the canvas cover almost entirely: golden petals radiating from a densely patterned seed head, broad leaves anchoring the composition below. The work is by Zuigetsu Ikeda, the early 20th century Japanese artist known for his meticulous study of the natural world. Part of Slow's Libri Muti (Mute Books) series, this notebook is made entirely by hand in Florence using traditional printing and bookbinding techniques that Founders Roberto di Filitto and Nathalie Schneider have spent years researching and reviving.
The pages open flat and stay there, held by exposed coptic-stitch binding. The edges of the page block are hand-coloured in sunflower yellow — drawn directly from the painting itself. Pages are PEFC-certified and acid-free.
Cover: Girasole, Zuigetsu Ikeda — hand-coloured page edges: yellow
Bound notebook — canvas cover — 15×21cm — 320 pages
Blank soft white pages, 80 gsm — PEFC certified, acid-free
Exposed spine stitching, lay-flat construction, hand-coloured page edges
'Without words, without writing, and without books there would be no history, there could be no concept of humanity' — Hermann Hesse
ABOUT the MAKER
Slow Design Florence
