The archive · Design & Visual · Product decision · 2024
Fabulatorio's Numbers lets children 0-6 count paper holes by touch
Numbers is a tactile counting book for ages 0-6: children count holes in the paper with their fingers and unfold pages into a space for play.
Fabulatorio
What it had to solve
Fabulatorio set out to publish a first book about numbers for children aged 0 to 6, an age that learns with its hands. The book had to introduce numbers playfully through touch and sight and turn reading into a shared family experience.
How it works
Numbers is a children's book for ages 0 to 6 that introduces the world of numbers through touch as much as sight. Fabulatorio's starting point was an age group that learns with its hands, so the book had to make counting a physical encounter and keep reading a shared family experience.
The book's mechanics are its idea. Children count the holes in the paper with their fingers, flip through the pages, and unfold them to create a space for play and surprise; a number becomes something counted on the page before it is read as a symbol.
The result is a reading object that turns early learning into physical play. It is preserved in the D&AD awards archive under Book Design, which records no sales figures.
Why it lands
- Toddlers learn through the hand, so making the paper itself countable turns an abstract symbol into something they can feel.
- Holes and unfolding pages make the book interactive without screens, keeping shared family reading at the centre.
- The device transfers to any early concept: if the reader can touch it, the lesson carries itself.
What it did
The book makes the number itself tangible: a digit is not only printed but felt, and reading becomes a game a family plays together. The work is preserved in the D&AD awards archive under Book Design; the page records no sales figures.
What you can take
For the youngest readers the medium is the lesson: when a child can touch the concept with their fingers, the book does not need to explain it.
Since then
Numbers is preserved in the D&AD awards archive under Book Design, which records no sales figures. The transferable idea is that a book for the youngest readers can make paper the teaching mechanism — counting holes and unfolding pages instead of pointing at printed digits.
Sources
spotted an error? The archive wants to know.
Your turn
You just read one. Describe the brief you are staring at, and see who has been given the same problem.
Free account · 3 free questions · no card