when it comes to maps, i prefer mine on the antique side, with a focus on oceans. for some reason water maps always remind me of the days of pirates and wooden ships and a whole host of imagery i hold dear. this map doesn’t focus on water, but it does put a new spin on the idea of mapping. recent university of portsmouth grad jodie silby created this ‘portsmouth vernacular’ map by using words to create lines. the map looks at the geography of the city in relation to the dialect and language that is used and has evolved in and around the city. each map’s dialect is written as phonetically close to the actual pronunciation as possible, which allows the viewer to perceive the areas of derivation and consider the social aspect of the territory. in addition to an introduction to the portsmouth vernacular, the map also has an alphabetical index and translations for mapped dialect. i think it’s such a fun idea for a map (yes, i realize it won’t be the most practical map) as artwork i would love to see different cities’ spin on this. i can only imagine what a brooklyn map would look like. click here to check out jodie’s maps online.

also: i realize the images from yesterday seemed to have stopped loading last night. my lovely tech contact joel is working on the problem as we speak. thankfully i still had the images from the shop horne peek and nicolette camille on my desktop so those are now back up. will have them up asap, sorry for the inconvenience!