Featured Projects

First Look: Wondermark 2016 Calendar

The 2016 Wondermark Calendar is now available for pre-order! UPDATE: It is now sold out!

We expect them to start shipping in mid-December. Here’s a first look at the (not final) cover…

looking good there buddy

Un-Named Beasts of the Forgotten Wilds; And, The Names I Gave Them

From the Personal Diaries of Dr Priscilla Dustbin, duly recorded on her many travels to the Shadowy Corners of the Globe;

Subsequently mislabeled in the Bodleian Library, and only recently rediscovered by Quite Surprised Researchers seeking Quite Different Things;

Presented here Whole and Entire, unexpurgated, unabridged, without redaction in Any Instance;

Even when it might have been wise to Do So, for the Safety and Well-being of the Reading Public;

All entries assumed True, or, at least, Honest Observations by the Doctor of what she Thought she Saw;

Further judgment Reserved.

As in previous years, the calendar rides through the year on a special backboard, which you may re-use from previous editions if you already have one.

New for this year, every order will ship with a miniature commemorative plaque. This ‘Cast Card’ will feature a portrait of one of the calendar’s characters, along with a full list of their vital statistics. It’s sort of like a baseball card, except not about baseball, and made of wood.

This Cast Card is unique in design to the calendar offering, and one will be included free with all orders. (For those keeping track, it is Cast Card release #2. We have also done one for the Multi-Purpose Cards Kickstarter, which is shipping to backers now!)

And another thing! The very first Wondermark calendar was released December 2007. If this will be your fifth calendar (or more), we consider you a Calendar Ace! If this describes you, then you qualify for a second unique Cast Card, celebrating your achievement. It is a free gift from us, to say thank you!

looking sharp!!!

I’m big on commemorative plaques this season, friends.

More details on the calendar soon… Until then, you may feel free to reserve your copy now! As always, these are strictly limited, and they sell out every year. UPDATE: THEY HAVE

A Preview of the 2015 Calendar

CAAAALENDAR

It is well-known that on a certain evening in Hamburg, a summer night in 18__, a concert was held which permanently afflicted all in attendance gravely and irreversibly. No one knows—or will tell—how such a collection of instruments were made to play in harmony; no one knows—or will tell—how such dumb constructs of wood, brass, and bone came to possess such powers as they had.

CALENDAAAAR

Some whisper that the Devil himself was the conductor that night; others say no, it was merely a man (Herr Manfred Fleigruben, of the Hamburg Academy, according to the programme) who somehow picked up Charon’s baton instead of his own. No person who attended the concert could ever shake the shadow of despair from their shoulders henceforth, and many became wretches from that evening till the grave.

CALENDARRRRR

In the years since the incident, no full account has been made of the particulars. Contemporaneous articles speak vaguely of the concert’s ‘effect’, or allude cryptically to its ‘consequence’. The sole surviving copy of the programme in the Royal Library has now faded into illegibility, presumably due to poor paper-storage protocols in that darkest sub-basement of the Reference Archive.

CALENNNNNDAR

It is said that all attendees of the concert died childless—even those who had already had children. The concert hall itself burned to the ground within a month; Germany was at war with France within the year.

Yet tales remain. Forensic analysis of surviving roof-beams (long since up-cycled into Frankfurt dining-tables) have revealed minute vibrational impressions left in the soft Bavarian wood. Eight years ago, a stack of copper photogravures from that night was unearthed in a Helsinki flea-market, labelled simply as ‘ihmisiä musiikilla’. And time-travelling tourists have left no end of oblique references to the event in various classified advertisements throughout the decades.

CALEEEEENDAR

Like many of the marvels from before the age of film and electronics, the concert exists as a ghostly impression upon history, an ill-remembered, fading scar on humanity’s craggy, lumpen corpus. We shall spend one year opening that wound to see what jewels it may contain.

Here, for the first and only time, is what was heard on that evening, a night black, without any stars.

CALENDAR

They’re here. They’re beautiful. Shipping now.

32 copies remain.

Our store closes for the year after Friday, December 19.

Some Images From the 2015 Calendar

cal15-pages

The 2015 calendar is off to print! I’m really proud of it!! (Click these images for a closer look) UPDATE: It’s sold out!

cal15-green

I drew 29 pictures of weird orchestra members, and my regular collaborator Max Shepard has painted them. They look pretty sweet. And of course there is a story too — the terrible, forgotten legend of the Concert of Conscience.

cal-draw2

If you’re not familiar, the annual calendar is a tradition around here. It started way back in December 2007 when I decided I wanted to make a calendar, and because calendars are only really useful for a short time, I figured I’d make it limited-edition (and thus SUPER FANCY).

cal-draw1

The 2008-2012 calendars were hand-screenprinted; then, for the 2013 edition, I changed over to the hook-based, two-cards-up “progressive” design, and a watercolor aesthetic.

cal15-dudes

As of this writing, only 82 calendars remain (of the limited run of 250). All calendars are individually signed & numbered. We expect to start shipping them within 7 days. Get yours now!

Over at my TopatoCo store I’ve got a bunch of rad stuff too, including this new mug:

topatoco-wm

won-marooned-mug

Based, of course, on this classic comic about drug addiction.

TopatoCo has a million packages a minute moving through their hands, so they have set up a series of very precise shipping deadlines worth taking a look at!

Over at my in-house store (where we sell the greeting cards and calendars and stuff), we’ll be accepting orders through December 19 before shutting down for the holidays.

I can’t personally 100% guarantee anything will arrive before Christmas because the post office is bananas, but we are definitely shipping as fast as we can and hoping for the best!

I hope we got some stuff you want

The 2015 Wondermark Calendar.

get it

It is well-known that on a certain evening in Hamburg, a summer night in 18__, a concert was held which permanently afflicted all in attendance gravely and irreversibly. No one knows—or will tell—how such a collection of instruments were made to play in harmony; no one knows—or will tell—how such dumb constructs of wood, brass, and bone came to possess such power.

Within, for the first and only time, is what was heard on that evening, a night black, without stars…

Now pre-ordering. Only 250 will be made. We sell out every year. Update: They are sold out.

UNRELATED BUT ALSO GOOD: The Machine of Death Artbook.

…Over 100 interviews in which the writers and illustrators explain what went into the creation of their work — thoughts on technique, developing story ideas, early sketches, the creative process, and lots of other neat behind-the-scenes stuff! If you like the MOD series, there’s a lot of really cool insight here from the folks whose work made the books so great.

Available now in print or PDF.

also good.