The Polar Embassy Story

We're a playful publishing house in Berlin that spotlights LGBTQIA+ artists and offers full supply chain transparency.

In 2020, designer Jon Derman Harris illustrated a deck of cards for his best friend. She suggested self-publishing it, and Polar Embassy was born.

With the help of a team of LGBTQIA+ artists and retailers across Europe, it has grown into an independent publishing house with a portfolio of card games, sex education materials, Tarot decks, puzzles, books, greeting cards, and more.

Photo credit © Gugler Kommunikationshaus / Jürgen Thoma 

Jon Derman Harris, blurred in the background, points to a Cradle to Cradle certification logo on the side of a box of playing cards.

Our Missions:

Make the games of queer paradise.
We celebrate LGBTQIA+ artists and their cheeky, inclusive, and sex-positive work.

Publish within planetary means.
We open-source our supply chain and spotlight local producers, particularly those Cradle to Cradle certified.

Photo credit © Gugler Kommunikationshaus / Jürgen Thoma 

More about our supply chain

Our Artists

Polar Embassy Media Kit

What we publish

We publish cheeky, sex-positive games and other content from queer and trans* artists. Let us introduce ourselves with our portfolio:

 Sex Education Content

Teens list parents as most important resource about sex and relationships. We're trying to make those conversations a little less awkard. 

Against a dark green background is a deck of question cards, in white with rainbow details. There is a stack of cards, an instruction sheet, and a box titled "A Little Less Peinlich". A Little Less Peinlich

 

Tarot

We're proud to celebrate BIPOC voices in the Tarot community to create space for ancestral healing.

Ancestral Healing Tarot Deck

 

Coloring Books with a second life

"Publishing within planetary means" means going further with less. We look for playful opportunities to design for multiple lifecycles. 

GIF showing how to cut apart Polar Embassy's Isomatic Berlin coloring book, and create one of the wall posters. Jon Derman Harris' hands cut the book with a mat knife, then tape 9 A4 pages together to create a wall poster, that he hangs on a wall at the end.Isomatic Berlin Coloring Book

 

Puzzles

In three cheeky motives: a trans*, inter*, non-binary duck pond (below), a UFO rescuing all the Earth's trans* people and their allies after the apocalypse, and Kreuzberg's Kottbusser Tor in all its chaotic glory.

Several pieces remain from a 1000-piece puzzle showing trans* inter* and non-binary ducks in a pond.TIN Ducks Jigsaw Puzzle



Kids' Games

Artist Clara Gilod wanted to play an old French game with her son - but none of the families in the original version looked like their family. So she created an inclusive that would show her son how normal their family really was. Played like quartett (or Go Fish), it's a celebration of rainbow families. 

A blue deck of cards for kids on a dark blue background. The top card on the pile shows a person in a dress playing the drums. An instruction card sticks out from below the pile.
Merry Families

 

Founder Bio

Photo credit © Gugler Kommunikationshaus / Jürgen Thoma 

Your Polar Ambassador is Jon Derman Harris, an Alaskan-born Berliner.

He fell in love with design by reading Braungart and McDonough’s Cradle to Cradle. After studying Product Design and East Asian Studies at Stanford, he designed dozens of sex toys for brands including Amorelie, and has spoken publicly about design research in the SexTech field.

Building and growing Polar Embassy is his dream come true - an opportunity to boost cheeky, sex-positive content, and make an impact as a supporter of low-waste production within Europe.

Awards & Recognition

Jon Derman Harris, wearing a blue dress, receives a trophy and certificate from Undersecretary Michael Kellner, wearing a blue suit.

Photo credit © William Veder

In 2023, Polar Embassy was one of 32 teams recognized as leaders of Cultural and Creative industries in Germany through the KreativPilot*in program.

Press Releases

November 2024: Somatic Memory: A Guided Somatic Practice with the Ancestral Healing Tarot Deck at Spore Initiative

October 2024: A Little Less Peinlich Launch party at Other Nature (DE version here)

Press Coverage

2024 
GamesMarkt

2023 
Missy Magazine’s 2023 Feminist Gift Guide
Tip Berlin's Familie in Berlin
Tipsiti’s Berlin Products list

2022 
iHeartBerlin

Visual Assets

For our friends in the press and media: please feel free to use these photos and brand assets.

Photo credit must accompany any use. 

Contact & Socials

Get in touch with our team via our Contact page.

Our social accounts:
Instagram / LinkedIn / YouTube