Talk Paper Scissors

Talk Paper Scissors

Join host, Diana Varma, as she explores the wonderful world of design and printing, typography and branding, books and publishing. Diana loves nothing more than getting creative with Creatives about all things creative. Ready to have some fun? Let's Talk Paper Scissors!

Episodes

December 8, 2025 37 mins

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Today’s conversation is with Alanna Munro of Arcane Type Foundry. She is a certified letter nerd, designer, and educator. In this conversation you’ll hear about Alanna’s creative process for designing type, the importance of squinting, and common misconceptions about independent foundries. You’ll also hear helpful, actionable advice about font licensing. And for all students here: listen up! Alanna lets type design st...

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Today I’m joined by Andrew Huot, who is book making royalty: a book artist, bookbinder, printer, and conservator whose artists’ books are in collections across the US, from the Art Institute of Chicago to Yale University.

In this conversation, you’ll hear what the term “book arts” means. You’ll learn what a typical day in Andrew’s studio looks like, including his most necessary tools: from bone, to surgical scalpels, t...

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Meet emerging typeface designers, Ivana Vukmirovic and Mahrukh Saeed! Ivana designed a typeface called Lindworm and Mahrukh designed a typeface called Khabartoon. In the following conversation, you'll get to hear about each typeface, their perfect type pairings, sensory descriptions of each, as well as what each of these emerging typeface designers plans to do next in the world of letterforms. Let the type geeker...

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Down the rabbit hole we go! Each conversation in this series connects in unexpected ways; each new episode spurring a new line of inquiry, like a tunnel turning off in a different direction, each with an origin that’s traced back to episode 273.

This episode features George Wylesol who is an artist and author based in Baltimore, Maryland. In this conversation, you’ll hear about George’s grown-up choose-your-own-adventu...

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Today’s guest and her team’s most recent book project is truly emotional and inspiring. In this conversation, you’ll hear from Rachel Arthur, Founder and Editor of boom saloon, “an independent publisher dedicated to democratizing creativity for good”. You’ll hear about their most recent publication (and deeply personal project) that humanizes the experiences of dementia, called “4,4,4&2”.

You’ll hear about the proc...

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October 30, 2025 35 mins

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This episode features Maria Bowler, author of ‘Making Time: A New Vision for Crafting a Life Beyond Productivity’. In this conversation, Maria clarifies the way we orient to the world, either as “the producer” or “the maker”. She dives deep into the problematic ideas around productivity, the ways in which these ideas reinforce colonial systems, and how to re-imagine time, questioning the typical options laid out befor...

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In this conversation, you’ll hear from Amanda Breeze, a cannabis writer based out of Toronto, Canada, who documents international cannabis culture and explores new smells. This year she launched Tripper Magazine, an adventure travel guide to the world’s cannabis friendly destinations. 

In this conversation, you’ll learn about the process of making a magazine from the seedling of an idea, through to distribution all aro...

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Julian Brown is an independent motion designer and augmented-reality artist. In this conversation, you'll hear how Julian and his wife, Amy Shackleton, work together to merge the worlds of fine art and digital media to create interactive installations. You'll also hear how the design space and the fine art space differ in terms of how and when creatives are compensated for their work.

You'll hear Julian’...

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Welcome to the Brave Creative Humans series! This is the final episodes in the series featuring some of the many past Talk Paper Scissors guests who exemplify brave creative living: Allison MacKenzie, Kevin Shaw, Vincent Wanga, Meg Lewis, Emad Saedi, and Justine Abigail Yu.

In this episode, the 6 answer this question: “In your opinion, what does living life as a ‘Brave Creative Human’ mean to you?” 

This series is inspi...

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Welcome to the Brave Creative Humans series! This is the fifth of 6 episodes featuring some of the many past Talk Paper Scissors guests who exemplify brave creative living: Allison MacKenzie, Kevin Shaw, Vincent Wanga, Meg Lewis, Emad Saedi, and Justine Abigail Yu.

In this episode, the 6 answer this question: “How do you ‘colour outside of the lines’ in your creative work; in other words, how are you living a creative ...

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September 25, 2025 32 mins

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Welcome to the Brave Creative Humans series! This is the fourth of 6 episodes featuring some of the many past Talk Paper Scissors guests who exemplify brave creative living: Allison MacKenzie, Kevin Shaw, Vincent Wanga, Meg Lewis, Emad Saedi, and Justine Abigail Yu.

In this episode, the 6 answer this question: “What is your approach to maintaining sanity and humanity in a hyper-connected world, particularly as it relat...

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September 18, 2025 30 mins

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Welcome to the Brave Creative Humans series! This is the second of 6 episodes featuring some of the many past Talk Paper Scissors guests who exemplify brave creative living: Allison MacKenzie, Kevin Shaw, Vincent Wanga, Meg Lewis, Emad Saedi, and Justine Abigail Yu.

In this episode, the 6 answer this questions: “When is a time when you failed, what did it mean to you and how did you move forward?”

This series is inspire...

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September 11, 2025 19 mins

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Welcome to the Brave Creative Humans series! This is the second of 6 episodes featuring some of the many past Talk Paper Scissors guests who exemplify brave creative living: Allison MacKenzie, Kevin Shaw, Vincent Wanga, Meg Lewis, Emad Saedi, and Justine Abigail Yu.

In this episode, the 6 answer this questions: “How do you sense failure: literally, how would you describe how you see it, feel it, hear it, smell it and e...

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September 4, 2025 24 mins

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Welcome to the Brave Creative Humans series! This is the first of 6 episodes featuring some of the many past Talk Paper Scissors guests who exemplify brave creative living: Allison MacKenzie, Kevin Shaw, Vincent Wanga, Meg Lewis, Emad Saedi, and Justine Abigail Yu.

In this episode, the 6 answer these questions: "What are your thoughts on perfectionism in creative work? Is perfect necessary or even possible?"

T...

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August 28, 2025 24 mins

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Surprise! Brave Creative Human is here one month early. In this episode, I share the serendipitous story behind the book, why it exists, and who it’s for. 

There's a special guest appearance by Creativity Professor and Drag Queen, Guy Anabella, who wrote the book’s foreword and joins me to talk about brave creative humanity. Themes include embracing failure, reframing imposter syndrome, and finding belonging in cr...

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It’s the final episode before Talk Paper Scissors takes a break until September and we have one of the best with us today, talking all about accessibility in digital publishing.

Laura Brady is an accessible publishing expert who works with eBound Canada, the Accessible Books Consortium, the International Publishers Association, and Adobe among other organizations. She teaches, she consults, and she advocates for access...

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June 30, 2025 13 mins

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Let’s make magic! 

In this episode you’ll hear about Diana’s latest collaborative making project (that could involve you!) called Making Magic; a collection of creativity kits that anyone can use to experience a bit of everyday joy and wonder.

You’ll hear about the first batch of kits ready to share (Upcycled Zine Kits), as well as the three alternative creative economies on which this project is built (no money need be...

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A home for zines!

From makers near and far, with small and large publications, you’ll hear about the exciting medium of zines where anything can happen at the intersection of art and independent publishing. This is the 4th and final episode in the series, featuring the Toronto Zine Library.

The Toronto Zine Library & Archive (TZL) is a physical library space run by a collective of zine readers, zine makers and libra...

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June 25, 2025 25 mins

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Yesssss zines! 

From makers near and far, with small and large publications, you’ll hear about the exciting medium of zines where anything can happen at the intersection of art and independent publishing. This is the 3rd of 4 episode in the series, featuring Sisley Mark.

Sisley is a Chicago-based artist and creative. She primarily works with acrylic or ink on canvas and paper. Her work is deeply rooted in the belief tha...

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Zines! Zines! Hooray for Zines! 

From makers near and far, with small and large publications, you’ll hear about the exciting medium of zines where anything can happen at the intersection of art and independent publishing. This is the 2nd of 4 episode in the series, featuring Hannah and Sarah of Feels Zine. 

In this episode, you’ll hear how Feels Zine came to be, as well as hear more about the interdisciplinary nature of...

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