Liquid Treat

What do you get when you combine graphic design, the tarot, numerology and Gestalt psychology? Intùiti, a new approach to creativity that takes the form of a deck of 78 illustrated cards, each matched with its own inspiraional "tale" in an accompanying booklet. "There are no rules," says Milan-based writer, designer, and artist Matteo di Pascale, who is seeking backers for the project via Kickstarter through March 12. "It's a tool for creative thinking based on visual and imaginary associations, so you just have to shuffle the deck, pick a card and 'let it speak.'"

Spread the lettering love to design amateurs with Type Fun01, a quick and pretty online tutorial that introduces typography concepts, jargon, tips and techniques to the font-curious. "Type Fun01 was created to show the bare bone basics of typography in an intuitive and easy-to-digest way," says creator Will Ryan, a graphic design major at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. From a quick history the site moves on to a rundown of styles (know your slab serif!) and character anatomy before offering examples and a list of resources for further study.

Polaroid was the Apple of its day, promising "instant photography at the push of a button." In the wake of its bankruptcy and the sale of its brand to licensers, Christopher Bonanos brings into focus the company’s storied history -- and recent demise -- in Instant: The Story of Polaroid, recently published by the Princeton Architectural Press. Believe it or not, this is the first book-length history of Polaroid, which grew from garage-startup mode (in 1937) to a billion-dollar business and along the way attracted artist-fans such as Ansel Adams, Andy Warhol, and Outkast, whose lyrical enticement to "shake it like a Polaroid picture" lives on as a kind of cultural snapshot.

Tired of hunting through vast character sets or relying on the likes of Wingdings and Webdings to get the symbols you seek? Check out Symbolset, which uses plain-language keywords and Unicode instead of letter-mapping. So, for example, type "check" and the text instantly turns into a checkmark; "heart" becomes ♥ (just in time for Valentine's Day). The smart symbols are baked into the growing family of Symbolset fonts with OpenType, so they work in modern browsers. Among the newest is SS Social, a symbol font comprised of logos of Web-based services and products.

Here's your chance to brush up on Banksy. The highly secretive street art sensation and activist is the subject of a new book by reporter Will Ellsworth-Jones. Banksy: The Man Behind the Wall, out next week from St. Martin's Press, tries to piece together the story of Banksy, tracing his path from self-professed vandal to international art star and Oscar-nominated filmmaker, for the 2010 documentary Exit Through the Gift Shop. “Some people become cops because they want to make the world a better place," Banksy has said. "Some people become vandals because they want to make the world a better looking place."

Double letter score? Triple word score? The elusive "Z"? Everyone wins with this edible take on Scrabble. Andie's Specialty Sweets bakes up faux-woodgrain letter tiles and tile racks that are flavored with pure vanilla and real chocolate (a set is $115.99 on Etsy). Bring your own game board -- they also look great on cakes and make sweet placecards. So how do they T-A-S-T-E? Expect "kind of a mellow chocolate, with a punch of pure chocolate at the face of the letter," say the Dallas-based candymakers.