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The Arambillet Building (1912) in Praza de Lugo (near FNAC and the Mercado). Designed by Antonio Lopez Hernandez and Julio Galan y Gonzalez Carvajal, Chief Architect for the province of La Coruña.

Casa Rey (1911) by Julio Galan, in the Crystal City on the Avenida Marina. These glassed-in balconies used to be the backs of the buildings. The glass also traps heat, very useful on cold winters. Eyebrows flew when an apartment in the building was recently sold for one million euro. I don’t know what it looks like inside, but if I had a million euro I sure would.

The RTVE office rising like a stately cake in the Mendez Nuñez Gardens near the port. There are patches of green all over the city, which has no more room to expand so older buildings are constantly renovated (but their facades are protected).

They couldn’t just leave a facade alone, they had to embellish embellish embellish. The bourgeoisie, flush with cash from their overseas ventures, wanted to show off.

The Wonenburger foundry opened in town and produced wrought-iron balconies for the early 20th century high-rises. La Coruna is surrounded by the sea so metal rusts quickly. The solution: layers of paint.

This is just the front door of Casa Tomas Da Torre (near Zara)

Easy to miss the imposing facade of 22 Calle Real in the middle of the shopping district unless you make it a habit to look up. It’s okay because the people are polite and will not bump into you.

11 San Nicolas reminds me of a hot guy who acts like he has no idea how hot he is, which makes him even hotter.

Thanks to my extremely knowledgeable guide, Margarita Parada, for pointing out the architectural beauties I would’ve missed by looking straight ahead.

I love traditional hand-made fabrics because they’re beautiful, distinctive, and locally-produced, and because there’s little probability that you will run into someone wearing or carrying the exact same thing. Over the years I’ve come to know the Ilokano textiles called inabel through the BLB—I have a whole bunch of abel blankets, and tote bags that are so sturdy, I also use them as cat carriers.

Last year I was introduced to textiles from Maguindanao. They’re very colorful, with intricate patterns and motifs. In the picture above, Saffy is sitting on a batik malong (You can wear it over your jeans if you’re bored with your wardrobe), next to a pair of zippered pouches made of bunga sama.

Find out more about the textiles and crafts of Mindanao at Mataid Mindanao. “Mataid” means beautiful.

I kept hearing about how Poblacion is the place to be, so when I met my first workshop group I suggested we eat at Bucky’s then cross the equator to El Chupacabra. You can feel your ears pop. The difference between the two sides is a subject for an anthropological paper.

Afterwards I was waiting along the street for the car when a skinny man came up to me holding a small sculpture made of recycled beercans. I was more interested in the large silver cockroach, also recycled from a beercan, that he was selling.

“You can put it on your shirt and take a selfie!” he said.

I said that I was more interested in its earring possibilities. “Can you make two small cockroaches that I can use for earrings? Just make them, I’ll attach the hooks and rings.”

We traded emails and I got them a few days later. They’re delicate but impressively detailed. Clearly Mika, the can art guy, had spent a lot of time observing cockroaches.

He can also make Edward Scissorhands thingies that you can attach to gloves, which means he could make Wolverine claws. You can find him on Felipe Street off Burgos, Makati every night. I’ve commissioned beercan cats for earrings and he’s working on them.

The Imperial Hotel is in a gorgeous Art Deco/Czech Cubist building in Praha 1. It was built on the site of a pub dating back to the 1700s. The hotel opened in 1914, and in recent years it was completely renovated according to its original plans.

This is an elevator.

Going home would be the high point of the day, even if you just went out to the pharmacy.

You would have breakfast every day at the Imperial Cafe.

Look at this staircase, Wes Anderson would plotz. Amazingly, no movies have been filmed at the Imperial, not for lack of interest, but because it is usually full.

And the hotel is pet-friendly, so the cats and I would be very comfortable. My dream house has always been a luxury hotel. Whatever state you leave your rooms in, when you return, everything is orderly and gleaming. There is no need to cook or wash dishes, because there is room service. When you get tired of the decor, you could move to another good hotel. Hey hotels, what about a writer-in-residence program? All my stories would take place at the hotel.

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As soon as I wake up I’m going to watch Blade Runner 2049. I just checked the movie schedule and found out that the film adaptation of HHhH is also in local cinemas. It’s called The Man With The Iron Heart, with Jason Clarke as Heydrich and Jacks O’Connell and Reynor as Josef Gabcik and Jan Kubis. The dreaded Nazi Butcher of Prague was assassinated by young Czech fighters who parachuted into Prague, leading to a seven-hour standoff between a handful of Czechoslovak fighters and the German Army at the Church of Saints Cyril and Methodius. One of the most stirring episodes of resistance and courage in World War II–I hope the filmmakers did it justice. And will they render the smartassery of Binet’s novel on film?

I left the house under the guilt-inducing gaze of Drogon, who disapproves of any activities that do not involve him.

I was in Cebu from Friday afternoon to Sunday morning for two events organized by Hendri Go, who runs the Cebu Literary Festival. I like Cebu: One can still breathe, even if the traffic is getting heavy; there are enthusiastic creative enterprises like Happy Garaje the design studio and Anthill the fabric gallery; there are intense chocolate creations at The Chocolate Chamber and that cake at the coffee shop of Big Hotel; and the major malls have wider, taller spaces than the ones in Manila. Also, Avatar earrings and accessories and Sunburst fried chicken.

After a quick lunch and chocolate fix, I did a reading and Q&A at one of the Cebu LitFest venues, a rooftop amphitheatre at SM Seaside. Near the amphitheatre is a cafe staffed by fluffy, lazy cats.

I slept like a baby at the Marco Polo Plaza, where the lovely staff sent up midnight snacks: ensaymada and tea on the first night, chocolate chip cookies and a glass of milk on the second.

Before boot camp the next day I visited Anthill, a gallery and training center for producers of indigenous handwoven fabrics and accessories. I bought a reversible shawl that can be worn sixteen ways, which means I only have to bring a bunch of black T-shirts and jeans when I go to Tokyo this week.

Writing Boot Camp was held at the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf in the I.T. Park in Lahug. I talked about building the habit of writing, gave writing exercises, and interviewed each participant about what was keeping her/him from writing. Then we talked about the writing projects they will undertake, the first five pages of which are due on Saturday, 30 September.

En route to the airport I stopped by the Avatar showroom, where I stuck to my resolve to buy only two or three items. Lately I’ve felt that my things are closing in on me like the trash compactor in Star Wars, so I limit my purchases to stuff I need or really like. Hence, the slightly weird.

Thank you, Cebu! I’ll be back.

Penguin Bespoke Editions: Bruce Chatwin’s works wearing Burberry

Book covers looked very different a decade ago when the appearance of e-readers seemed to flummox a publishing industry reeling from the financial crisis and Amazon’s rampant colonisation of the market. Publishers responded to the threat of digitisation by making physical books that were as grey and forgettable as ebooks. It was an era of flimsy paperbacks and Photoshop covers, the publishers’ lack of confidence manifest in the shonkiness of the objects they were producing.

But after reaching a peak in 2014, sales of e-readers and ebooks have slowed and hardback sales have surged. The latest figures from the Publishing Association showed ebook sales falling 17% in 2016, with an 8% rise in their physical counterparts. At the same time, publishers’ production values have soared and bookshops have begun to fill up with books with covers of jewel-like beauty, often with gorgeously textured pages. As the great American cover designer Peter Mendelsund put it to me, books have “more cloth, more foil, more embossing, page staining, sewn bindings, deckled edges”.

Read the full article in The Guardian.

I prefer printed books because I like the smell of ink and paper, and because if I don’t like what I’m reading, I can throw it across the room with great force.