TANK No. 107 - Summer 2026

This summer, we found our annual Summer Reader leaning coyly toward an unexpected theme: romance. From canonical to disreputable via bonkbusters and the Booker Prize, we explore the literature of love in all its forms and what our readerly appetites reveal about contemporary anxieties and desires.

As usual, we’ve provided an extensive reading list spanning contemporary fiction, holy texts and forgotten favourites for the airport, beach and beyond. Wayne Koestenbaum and Nate Lippens talk rabbinic fantasies, Amelia McGarvey plunges into commercial erotica and a dozen or so friends discuss the sexiest book they’ve ever read. Daniel Blumberg considers the link between illustration and soundtracking, Yoko Tawada muses on fascist symbolism and we speak to Roddy Doyle on the pram in the hall. We publish excerpts from Yang Shuang-zi’s Booker Prize-winning Taiwan Travelogue and Jack Parlett’s cultural history of Flamboyance, and speak to Rose Wylie on her acclaimed Royal Academy retrospective.

For our cover shoot, Matthieu Blazy’s sophomore collection for Chanel stands out from the crowd, and we interview the head of the Lesage atelier tasked with creating new tweeds under Blazy’s vision for Métiers d’art. We choose the best summer bags to hold onto, go to the Italian seaside with Scholl as they celebrate 70 years of the Pescura and Sara Zanoni shoots the updated Clash collection from Cartier as a dream journey. At the V&A East Storehouse, Tamar Clarke-Brown, Anmol Ahuja and Ingrid Schroder take us on an object lesson with Akoni (check out their videos on tank.tv), and Aitor Laspiur takes us to the plush foothills of the Basque Country, inspired by Bernardo Atxaga’s novel Obabakoak.

Plus, we talk to Fcukers on the pleasure of pills, Anton Jäger on hyperpolitics, Cristine Brache on how to memorialise a Playboy Bunny and M.I.C on the end of the world.