Visiting LƯU CHỮ, Vietnam's Graphic & Type Archive
LƯU CHỮ was the highlight of my trip to Vietnam this year! I have been their observer from afar, aka internet stalker, for quite some time.
In general, a type/graphic design archive (apart from a few) usually has a website that I imagine as being very traditional and old-school, where it is difficult to find or read anything. You have to be nerd enough to know what you’re looking for, needless to say you have to know the “name”, “range of year” of the design you're looking for. For whoever is not a local, such a website might be intimidating.
To me, LƯU CHỮ is giving a different feeling. The LƯU CHỮ website looks modern and well-designed, it is easy to navigate. Even though the website is not fully translated to English yet, it is easy to browse through their image collection.
I visited Vietnam early this year. I had been following the work of Đức (@ducxcao) for a while, so I randomly texted him to ask if he would like to meet up. At that time, I had not considered a visit to the LƯU CHỮ archive – I didn't want to make it like a work-related trip. And first of all, I’d never met Đức before – I didn’t want to take much of his time on his workday or weekend. However, I wanted to connect with other Southeast Asian type designers, my tropical people. Đức told me he's currently based in Ho Chi Minh City and also helped us plan our trip by suggesting places to visit to complete our itinerary.
On the day of our meeting, Đức and I agreed on Saturday at 9 am at LƯU CHỮ. I was excited; as mentioned earlier, LƯU CHỮ was not originally in my plans. However, I am genuinely grateful for his open suggestion. I was not the one who set the time, and I would like to confirm with you all again that this was a casual meetup. Let me explain more from my observation, 9 am might seem like an "early" Saturday — it might sound like a formal meetup appointment.
But if you're in Vietnam, you will understand that everything here operates very early — the fish market operates from 2-3 am, and all cafes and Pho restaurants are entirely operated by 7-8. Consequently, everything closes relatively early, like 9 - 10 pm (just my observation). However, I would say I genuinely love an early start. People are vibing here. And I don't mind this 9 am meetup time on Saturday at all.
I snapped some images from their shared space. Please let me make another note here that we visited during the time that LƯU CHỮ, their actual space, was still in private operations. Now that it's open to the public, the setting might have already changed.
LƯU CHỮ is a graphic design archive run by Lê Quốc Huy, Cao Xuân Đức and Hà Mai Thy. It is located behind a school building. It is a small shared space between architects, graphic designers, and type designers. There are no more than 3 separate rooms in the apartment at my first glance. On that day, we met Đức and Lê Quốc (not Hà Mai Thy, who is currently based in Australia).
From their short introduction, Lê Quốc Huy focused on graphic archiving as one of his final projects in his BA. After working for a design agency for some years, he decided to quit and follow his passion for graphic archiving. With the help of Cao Xuân Đức and Hà Mai Thy, LƯU CHỮ has now grown to be an independent graphic design and type archive. The LƯU CHỮ space is also open to the public. You can make an appointment for a visit through their website in advance.
Photos by Frank Grießhammer
They're not only collecting visually stunning prints, but they also have more everyday items (aka ephemera) like a traffic sign instruction poster. I would say that they're an ideal archiver. They've also been collecting variations on the same design, which is quite interesting. Lastly, we cannot go without talking about the type specimens.
Photos by Frank Grießhammer
Design variations
Quốc and Đức were showing us their archive. Photos by Frank Grießhammer and I
Some of the Vietnamese type specimens Photos by Frank Grießhammer
It's now rare to find the usage of the traditional Chinese script in the Vietnamese context. And this is even the original drawing! I assumed that this piece of drawing was very old. Photos by Frank Grießhammer
They're showing us their first scanner!
They're explaining to me some of the articles that I was curious about. Photos by Frank Grießhammer
We had a chill time sitting and talking about our Southeast Asian context and how we can find ways to operate such a niche project. It's truly a challenge because we don’t have governmental support, especially in subjects like graphic design—let alone type design. There is no comparison to the kinds of archives I have visited in the Western world.
LƯU CHỮ's people spend their time doing other jobs to make a living, such as illustration and graphic design. And in their weekends — they're spending time archiving. I have all the respect for them – they're an inspiring group of people.
From an outside view archiving stuff sounds like a simple idea – everyone can have it. However, the one who actually starts doing and keeps on with it (and more importantly, is happy to share it with others) is truly special.
I cannot emphasize enough that no matter what the graphic/type design trends currently are, the ability to look back at to the design in the past is extremely valuable. Designs created by the older generations of craftspeople always enrich my current practice.
I hope whoever reads until here had a nice visual meal of the day! After looking back through all of my “Visual Ontbijt” pictures taken during this trip (and especially taken in this archive), I can say: even though Vietnamese letters share the same Latin base construction, they are genuinely full of life, or in my terms: they are full of tropical energy!
