The energy of the best magazines, the knowledge of the deepest insiders. Four books, four stories, four cities.

If you’ll pardon me a moment, a rather special project of mine has recently reached fruition. And I think you might like it.

We took four European cities, formed four editorial teams, found four designers and said to each of them: forget the word “guidebook”. Forget everything you think it means, forget the tourists, forget the famous sites. Find the words, find the photographers, find the illustrators, find the design that lets you share your love for the city. Take the time, share the secrets and do it in a way that should make someone excited enough to want to get on a plane tomorrow.

These are limited-edition love letters to the city, each one individual and specially created, with no template and no restrictions. Just as each city is different, so are the books – they don’t even share a structure. The only restrictions we placed on our teams: the books had to be useful, they had to share amazing experiences through passionate writing and design, and had to be out by this summer. Oh, and the name: A Weird and Wonderful Guide.

And so I spent nine months travelling between Amsterdam, Lisbon, London and Madrid, helping remarkable, talented people focus their passion in book form as they poured their love and skill onto the page. The secrets they uncovered are nothing short of remarkable, from Mexican wrestling in London to Cape Verdean nightclubs in Lisbon, from the Amsterdam students who live in shipping containers to the underground sex life of Madrid. And they illustrated them beautifully.

The designers, in alphabetical city order, were Lava (whose work includes the magazine Carp, the newspaper Dag and lots of clever books, posters, websites), Silva Designers (Mil Folhas magazine, Y, Pública and more), Jeremy Leslie / John Brown (MagCulture.com, multiple-garlanded magazines and books) and Murray Design (451, lots of work for Nike), all supported by over-talented local photographers and illustrators in each city.

There are a few distribution wrinkles currently being ironed out, so for now the books are currently only on sale here, where you’ll also find more about each tome, as well as the Barcelona book that I edited in 2006 (“The travel guide for the been-there, done-that set” — New York Times). If you enjoy the blog, if you like great design, and if you want to see these cities (and for that matter your own) in a completely fresh way, click on.

www.lecool.com/books