Hooray! LAB 02 is out. LAB continues to change and evolve. This issue is being published via MagCloud, a new print-on-demand service for magazines. Which means you can now subscribe (oh how patiently you’ve waited!). Derek Powazek does a great job of explaining MagCloud in this Magazineer post.

Also new this time around: the print version and web PDF are different lengths—58 pages and 100 pages, respectively. We condensed the print version to keep the cost of the issue down. The free web PDF is the full version of the issue, with extra features and extended versions of articles.

In keeping with LAB‘s spirt of Slow Making (see intro to last issue), aka crockpot design, we handlettered all titles & displays; scanned over 200 mac & cheese box covers; invited all interviewees to participate in the editing process (via shared Google docs); made from scratch all hummus and bread consumed during the process (wait, that’s Slow Food); created three custom hand-lettered custom typefaces (Handvetica, TacoTruck, and Multitudinous); and, to slow things down to a pace between that of a banana slug and a sloth, made the page markers by hand with watercolor brushes (yep, all 100).

Those fantastic cover photos are from Meena Kadri’s photo-essay on Indian street graphics. Her flickr photostream is chock full of vernacular goodness and powerful portraits.

In other news, we’re pleased as punch that all the contributors involved with the Traveling Librarian article have agreed to release it under a Creative Commons license. This means you can print it, distribute it, and even remix it, as long as attribution is provided and its usage is not for profit.

Finally, mucho thanks to Nate Beaty for fixing a slew of last-minute technical glitches.