What’s the reason behind you wanted it to be a tangible, physical book?It’s important for us to formalize this project and make it a tangible thing, otherwise, it remains a digital thing that anybody can do. I think it only becomes relevant when it becomes a book, because of its being a tangible project. There’s a beginning and an end to the prop of this project. The book is the frame around the context. If it’s a website, it’s never ending. A book is different: you need to pay to produce it and decide on the number of pages and the formats. All of this gives the whole project a frame. There’s a lot of reasons why we made a book. But it’s not just a book for us, it’s almost like a business card that we never had. It’s a way for us to connect with people and to start the conversation with them. I don’t think that will be possible without the book. I think the project will be very different without it.
Can you talk about the A.D.D.P.M.P. in relation to General Index?It’s a bit confusing because it’s kind of the same thing. Three years ago, we decided to start a project called General Index. We said, “it’s time to share our research because it’s super important and maybe more important than the projects themselves.” When we thought it was the right time, we decided to put everything under the name General Index, which is the name of the page you get in the encyclopedia. It’s the platform to showcase all the sources or inspirations that we use in our work and ranges from what we read, watch to what we eat and listen to. When Slam Jam from Milan contacted us, we thought, “let’s not do a capsule collection. Instead let’s do a project around that idea of research.” And the collaboration with Slam Jam became General Index. Initially General Index was our research project but since we launched the A.D.D.P.M.P., it became bigger. And they’re blending into the same thing now.
People know it comes from us anyway, so whatever the label written on it, it’s not that important. The A.D.D.P.M.P. comes from the same vision. We could write something else on the cover or we could write a fake name, and it will be the same thing.