[Alyson Kuhn] To say that The Society of Typographic Aficionados annual conference “took place” last week in Los Angeles is like saying the parting of the Red Sea “took place” in Egypt — not exactly the sort of rhetorical device we are known for. TypeCon 2010 was aptly subtitled Babel, but I will think of it as babbling in the best sense, like a brainy brook that occasionally overflows its banks … or its margins.

[Alyson Kuhn] Major excitement before breakfast: I’ve just been nominated as a kuhntestant in the 2010 Scotch Brand Most Gifted Wrapper Contest! As many of you know, I specialize in wrapping small — even tiny — regularly shaped packages … while the Scotch folks specialize in presenting their finalists with big, bulky, bonky objets like … a bike, or how about a grand piano?

[Alyson Kuhn] Oh, oh, oh, ogle these charmola cards. These are the nine happy faces in a new boxed set from Paper Culture. Faces of Stationery goes on sale at paperculture.com this fall. And it’s just won a Best of Show in Mohawk Show 11.

[Tom Biederbeck] Nancy Sharon Collins thinks the time has come to revive a useful asset for our letter library: mourning stationery. Collins, a designer, researcher and writer about paper and print, says mourning stationery was intended to help the bereaved adapt to a new role in society. I asked her about her interest, how mourning stationery functioned graphically, and how it might have relevance for our time.

[Alyson Kuhn] My friend Antonio Alcalá has a lot of A’s in his  name. His design firm — in Alexandria, Va. — is called Studio A. As you might imagine, Antonio has just the type of letter collection I adore. I recently asked him about the provenance of some of my fAves. His answers are assiduously anecdotal.