Art of Play - Wonder by Design

This Book is a Planetarium

This Book is a Planetarium - Main image
$25 $50 In stock

Category: Architecture

In this unique interactive book, each turn of the page reveals a different, lo-fi-but-fully-functional paper gadget. You'll find a constellation-projecting planetarium, a strummable musical instrument, a geometric drawing generator, a perpetual calendar, a message encryptor/decoder, and a speaker that amplifies sound.

By reducing familiar devices down to just paper, this book shows that a lot can be done with very little. Because each pop-up contraption actually works (despite exhibiting no apparent technology), the book offers the reader a more intimate understanding of structures and functions that hide in plain sight in our digital world.

In addition to her brilliantly inventive use of paper-engineering, designer, Kelli Anderson, concisely explains how a material as humble as paper can come alive thanks to a little magic from universal scientific phenomena like sound, time and light.

Customer Reviews (4.4 / 5 · 5 reviews)

Zoe O. ★★★★★

It's rare that a book makes me actually stop and play with it, but this one had me messing with the paper instrument for a solid ten minutes before I even tried the planetarium. The gadgets are surprisingly sturdy for being made of paper, and the whole thing feels like a clever little engineering pr

Scarlett Q. ★★★★★

The constellation projector is what sold me, and it didn’t disappoint—dim the lights and stars scatter across the ceiling just like the description promises. My kids spent an hour taking turns with it, and the paper mechanics are sturdy enough to survive their excitement.

Madison H. ★★★★★

The strummable instrument page caught me completely off guard—I actually played a tune on paper. It’s the kind of book that makes you want to show every single page to someone else.