Shannon Mattern
@shannonmattern.bsky.social
director of creative research @ the metro ny library council; recently resigned 😱 full professor of media studies, art history + anthropology
architecture, archives, 🎨, cities, 🐕, infrastructure, libraries, 🗺️, sound++
nyc + upstate
wordsinspace.net
architecture, archives, 🎨, cities, 🐕, infrastructure, libraries, 🗺️, sound++
nyc + upstate
wordsinspace.net
This week in Misfits, we head the Bklyn Public Library's Info Commons to discuss "wayward classification" (the politics of organization, alternative / speculative classification schemes, etc) + meet w/ Kameelah Janan Rasheed, who'll share her work + lead us through a "scoring the stacks" exercise 🤗
November 10, 2025 at 3:05 PM
This week in Misfits, we head the Bklyn Public Library's Info Commons to discuss "wayward classification" (the politics of organization, alternative / speculative classification schemes, etc) + meet w/ Kameelah Janan Rasheed, who'll share her work + lead us through a "scoring the stacks" exercise 🤗
I lost my 📦 of my cords + adapters in the move, so we came up to the Apple Store @ Crossroads mall in Albany — wow, this is the most vibrant mall I’ve seen in decades! They’ve got an Orange Julius! It’s evoking Benetton + Esprit nostalgia 💕
(I assume you’ve been here, @langealexandra.bsky.social?)
(I assume you’ve been here, @langealexandra.bsky.social?)
November 9, 2025 at 4:48 PM
I lost my 📦 of my cords + adapters in the move, so we came up to the Apple Store @ Crossroads mall in Albany — wow, this is the most vibrant mall I’ve seen in decades! They’ve got an Orange Julius! It’s evoking Benetton + Esprit nostalgia 💕
(I assume you’ve been here, @langealexandra.bsky.social?)
(I assume you’ve been here, @langealexandra.bsky.social?)
Beautiful pre-sunrise over Queens
November 7, 2025 at 10:50 AM
Beautiful pre-sunrise over Queens
We made boxes with Maria Pisano!
November 6, 2025 at 10:22 PM
We made boxes with Maria Pisano!
This week we talk about containment (Wardian cases, card catalogs, archival boxes, storage architectures, 📦-based pubs like Aspen, kiribako, etc), and materials + ideas that defy it — and we take part in a box-making workshop @ the Ctr for Book Arts!
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...
November 6, 2025 at 4:48 AM
This week we talk about containment (Wardian cases, card catalogs, archival boxes, storage architectures, 📦-based pubs like Aspen, kiribako, etc), and materials + ideas that defy it — and we take part in a box-making workshop @ the Ctr for Book Arts!
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...
First commute into the city since our move back upstate, a gorgeous sunset over the Hudson, and a moving conversation w/ a mom who’s come to the city to be with her daughter as she initiates a divorce. I shared some of my own experience.
Sometimes I feel like I’m right where I’m supposed to be 🙏
Sometimes I feel like I’m right where I’m supposed to be 🙏
November 5, 2025 at 10:23 PM
First commute into the city since our move back upstate, a gorgeous sunset over the Hudson, and a moving conversation w/ a mom who’s come to the city to be with her daughter as she initiates a divorce. I shared some of my own experience.
Sometimes I feel like I’m right where I’m supposed to be 🙏
Sometimes I feel like I’m right where I’m supposed to be 🙏
Ha! I ended up giving those away to a New School friend. So many bookshelf losses in recent years 😢
November 3, 2025 at 10:27 PM
Ha! I ended up giving those away to a New School friend. So many bookshelf losses in recent years 😢
Among the things I hate to leave behind are these bookshelves. We worked with Philadephia Woodworking (woot!) to create adjustable shelves and bottom panels to allow access to wires. ✨ Scribing to the wavy walls of a 200yo house is no joke!
November 3, 2025 at 8:44 PM
Among the things I hate to leave behind are these bookshelves. We worked with Philadephia Woodworking (woot!) to create adjustable shelves and bottom panels to allow access to wires. ✨ Scribing to the wavy walls of a 200yo house is no joke!
Today’s our last day in Philly, and I stole away from packing for a final visit with Phoebe. I had hoped to see her off to her new home before we left, but alas 🥺 If someone wants a sweet, beautiful 4mo pit puppy — found as a weeks-old stray — she’s at Doggie Style on 16th and Spruce 💕
November 3, 2025 at 7:16 PM
Today’s our last day in Philly, and I stole away from packing for a final visit with Phoebe. I had hoped to see her off to her new home before we left, but alas 🥺 If someone wants a sweet, beautiful 4mo pit puppy — found as a weeks-old stray — she’s at Doggie Style on 16th and Spruce 💕
We’re moving back to NY Mon and Tues. I’m eager to watch Inge discover her new favorite sunny spots in the new house :)
November 1, 2025 at 2:22 PM
We’re moving back to NY Mon and Tues. I’m eager to watch Inge discover her new favorite sunny spots in the new house :)
I love that this photography studio is floating in the river!
October 31, 2025 at 11:41 AM
I love that this photography studio is floating in the river!
Oh, yeah! Thanks!
October 31, 2025 at 12:49 AM
Oh, yeah! Thanks!
This was so fun! We waded through the deluge to get there, and Printed Matter mopped up a little flood to accommodate us!
People like learning and making analog things together — even, and perhaps especially, without being compelled to do so!
People like learning and making analog things together — even, and perhaps especially, without being compelled to do so!
October 30, 2025 at 10:29 PM
This was so fun! We waded through the deluge to get there, and Printed Matter mopped up a little flood to accommodate us!
People like learning and making analog things together — even, and perhaps especially, without being compelled to do so!
People like learning and making analog things together — even, and perhaps especially, without being compelled to do so!
Another thing I will miss about Philly: the pet shop on our corner that partners with a local rescue by housing dogs that are up for adoption, and which neighbors (like me!) can volunteer to walk. I’ve met so many wonderful pups en route to stable homes ❤️
This is Phoebe, a 4-month-old stray 🥹
This is Phoebe, a 4-month-old stray 🥹
October 27, 2025 at 10:38 PM
Another thing I will miss about Philly: the pet shop on our corner that partners with a local rescue by housing dogs that are up for adoption, and which neighbors (like me!) can volunteer to walk. I’ve met so many wonderful pups en route to stable homes ❤️
This is Phoebe, a 4-month-old stray 🥹
This is Phoebe, a 4-month-old stray 🥹
Reading Margaret Mead + Paul Byers’s 1968 The Small Conference: An Innovation in Communication, I’m most charmed by the design — esp that orange cover, and Byers’s photographic studies of proxemics, gesture, expression, etc :)
October 27, 2025 at 3:20 AM
Reading Margaret Mead + Paul Byers’s 1968 The Small Conference: An Innovation in Communication, I’m most charmed by the design — esp that orange cover, and Byers’s photographic studies of proxemics, gesture, expression, etc :)
When we moved to Philly 3yrs ago, we chose a 🏡 based on the assumption that I’d have a nice office on campus like those I saw during my recruitment. That never happened, so I haven’t had access to most of my 📚 + none of my zines, which I’m now rediscovering as we pack *again* for next wk’s move 🧳🔎🤗
October 26, 2025 at 4:14 PM
When we moved to Philly 3yrs ago, we chose a 🏡 based on the assumption that I’d have a nice office on campus like those I saw during my recruitment. That never happened, so I haven’t had access to most of my 📚 + none of my zines, which I’m now rediscovering as we pack *again* for next wk’s move 🧳🔎🤗
It’s fascinating! The show included a great little exhibit about a “fireless kooker” that could be used in rural schools that couldn’t accommodate a full-fledged kitchen
October 24, 2025 at 9:06 PM
It’s fascinating! The show included a great little exhibit about a “fireless kooker” that could be used in rural schools that couldn’t accommodate a full-fledged kitchen
The school lunch show was sprawling and fascinating!, featuring everything from historical commercial kitchen appliances and systems diagrams to food packaging and regulatory documents
October 24, 2025 at 8:59 PM
The school lunch show was sprawling and fascinating!, featuring everything from historical commercial kitchen appliances and systems diagrams to food packaging and regulatory documents
The Earthly Matters show was very tiny, yet it posed some foundational questions about how people have understood rocks: Is it a metal? How hard is it? What color is it? Does it glow? Is it from Space?
October 24, 2025 at 8:51 PM
The Earthly Matters show was very tiny, yet it posed some foundational questions about how people have understood rocks: Is it a metal? How hard is it? What color is it? Does it glow? Is it from Space?
I need to learn more about the New England Kitchen!
October 24, 2025 at 8:39 PM
I need to learn more about the New England Kitchen!
I feel some small resonances here with Jeanne Gang’s addition to the American Museum of Natural History — which stand in pretty stark contrast to the Scandinavian-ness of everything else :-)
October 24, 2025 at 8:21 PM
I feel some small resonances here with Jeanne Gang’s addition to the American Museum of Natural History — which stand in pretty stark contrast to the Scandinavian-ness of everything else :-)
I forgot to note that we went to Calder Gardens a few weeks ago. It and the Barnes are now among my two favorite places in this city. Trying to supplant all the campus trauma :-)
October 24, 2025 at 8:10 PM
I forgot to note that we went to Calder Gardens a few weeks ago. It and the Barnes are now among my two favorite places in this city. Trying to supplant all the campus trauma :-)
One of the things I'll miss in Philly is the Art Dept @ the Free Library. Their acquisitions librarians are 🔥, and they use IG to highlight their new stuff. They host cool classes, too: mini sculptures, poems, quilts, collage! Today, a lutist played on the balcony www.instagram.com/p/DQInMYTjuD...
October 23, 2025 at 6:33 AM
One of the things I'll miss in Philly is the Art Dept @ the Free Library. Their acquisitions librarians are 🔥, and they use IG to highlight their new stuff. They host cool classes, too: mini sculptures, poems, quilts, collage! Today, a lutist played on the balcony www.instagram.com/p/DQInMYTjuD...
Really great student-curated Archigram magazine exhibition at Cooper Union. Give students a color printer, a bunch of bulletin boards, and a bucket of pushpins — and violà! Magic! Tactile learning!
October 22, 2025 at 10:11 PM
Really great student-curated Archigram magazine exhibition at Cooper Union. Give students a color printer, a bunch of bulletin boards, and a bucket of pushpins — and violà! Magic! Tactile learning!
This week in Misfits, we head to the New York Botanical Garden to explore the herbarium's cryptogamic collections and discuss specimen storage, and how wily species — both alive and dead, male and female — defy neat classification
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...
October 22, 2025 at 5:12 AM
This week in Misfits, we head to the New York Botanical Garden to explore the herbarium's cryptogamic collections and discuss specimen storage, and how wily species — both alive and dead, male and female — defy neat classification
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...
crossreference.wordsinspace.net/fall2025/por...