Why cassettes
If you ever rewound one with a pencil, this needs no explanation
For forty years the compact cassette was the only medium you could record yourself. That shaped an entire generation — and it is why these photographs land as more than a design curiosity.
The mixtape
Finger hovering over pause while the DJ kept talking. Ninety minutes you gave to somebody — with a hand-lettered inlay where the writing got cramped towards the end of every line.
The tech
Ferric, chrome, metal. Dolby B or C. Formulations people genuinely argued about, because you really could hear the difference on your own deck — or were entirely convinced you could.
The design
Sixty manufacturers, hundreds of series, each with its own visual language. Industrial design at pocket scale, never exhibited as such — which is precisely why it deserved an archive.
