Once again, we’re stepping into the holiday season with our popular advent calendar and a big round number.

This year, iA turns twenty, and we’re marking the moment with 20 sets of wallpapers, each tied to a story that shaped us. Each set comes in versions that span the full day, calm during work hours, wild like dreams when the night drifts. One set unlocks every day. The last five review this year and hint at next year.

1st: iA launched in 2005 in Nishi Azabu, Tokyo. We’re starting this series with wallpapers that capture Tokyo at different times of day. You’ll find static versions for each moment, plus a dynamic macOS version that shifts as the day moves.

2nd: In 2006, in an big take that became widely quoted, we argued that web design is 95% typography. Today’s wallpaper is a universe of typography illustrating the article.

3rd: In 2007, we redesigned the weekly magazine DAS MAGAZIN using our 95 percent typography and 100E2R principles. Reading time rose by an order of magnitude, and visitors multiplied several times within a short period. It became our first major editorial project and led to further work for Tages-Anzeiger, Basler Zeitung, Berner Zeitung, DIE ZEIT, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Krone, Internazionale, Salzburger Nachrichten, The Guardian, and Nikkei, for whom we have shaped the core digital experience for more than a decade and continue to do so today.

4th: We sketched the first Web Trend Map in A2, 2008 we scaled it up to A0, in 2009 the third version became the cover image of TASCHEN’s bestseller Information Graphics, followed by the Big Bang edition. The web felt wide and open, with many paths and many players. Today it is owned by a a handful of corporations. This is why for the desktop background we went for The Matrix, digital rain made from Tokyo station names. Amber and green recall old school computer colors, and the rainbow version holds on to our hope for a more vivid Internet.