From Anthony Giglio:“Was in Atlantic City this weekend having dinner at Buddakhan. They gave us chopsticks but nowhere to rest them! Then I saw my friend had used the paper wrapper to make an improv one. Thought of you. Not earth shattering… but fun.”
We have a friend who makes elaborately folded origami-like chopstick rests that we can never duplicate and find ourselves improvising strangely shaped ones that more often than not don’t work very well. We like this simple A-frame. Fold the paper in thirds crosswise, then in half lengthwise to make a V.
We also love the wonderful picture made by some cool phone app…just like that…in the moment, sitting in a restaurant…
For many years, I’ve enjoyed this amazingly-designed mid-century folding desk. The desk unit looks like a normal small wardrobe but when you open it, closed cabinet swings open on both sides to reveal pull-out desk. It has many any moveable shelves, a large drawer with pencil/pen holder, large slide out shelf and a even a moveable light that works. It is made of very hardwood, teak perhaps…possibly beech and walnut. The fittings are brass.
You can store a lot of stuff and paperwork in it and “disappear” everything in two movements. It is a 1950’s copy of the-desk-in-a box designed by Mummenthaler (you can see lots of pictures at this site.) Versions of this desk have been displayed at Nicole Fahri and Urban Outfitters. My life is changing and now it’s time to pass it on.
The desk is in excellent shape for its age with a near perfect work surface and top. read more…
On a recent Selby visit, we spotted this fabric-draped sofa in the wonderful home of Hitoshi Uchida-san – owner of J’Antiques Tokyo (check out the full story). The beauty of it is that the sofa is covered with a really big swath of fabric that can bunch and drape luxuriously. The fabric is wide enough to go from the floor in front of the sofa, over the seat, up the back and hang over by a couple of feet – not something the usual 54-inch width of fabric can do. But where do you find affordable fabric like this? read more…
(Video link here.) When Amy Schoening told us about her friend and teacher Alonso King, founder of Lines Ballet, we went right to a video she made about him. King is clearly a transformative teacher, the kind of person we’d love to have as a mentor. His teachings about dance and movement are really teachings about life…its essential principles: being honest, generous, fearless in expressing your true self.
King sees his mission as a teacher as “waking up the sleeping artist in the student. The dancer is listening to his own internal teacher, and that’s what you want to wake up.”
As you may have noticed, we have a thing for images of people flying and leaping, free falling and sailing through the air – to where? – with no constraints. (Because it’s what we want to do). Today we found a delicious trove on John Foster’s Accidental Mysteries column on Design Observer...
We have a fondness for rusted and/or corroded bits of steel, aged into a patina that no artist could produce (well…maybe Richard Serra). We find them lying in the street, along railroad trestles, near construction sites. They are sculptures unto themselves that often have great uses, like this stunning vintage nail – a railroad tie perhaps – used as a paperweight, spotted in a from recent photo-story from the Selby.
Our favorite rusted treasure is a three-sided box we found in the street (below, left); read more…
(Video link here; start at 4:50) We had a non-stop day, working on a big project, then racing back to write a post many hours late…wondering if we might write about lateness, or busyness or not-living-up-to-our-obligationness, which so many people we know are trying to figure out. We were poking around the files, half-written posts, and bookmarked bits when we STOPPED to watch a video clip Cara de Silva sent us this morning with these words:
“This is a segment of a TED talk that I found profoundly moving because of the images and the speaker and the narrative. Somehow all together they go beyond the subject.”
On flixxy.com, Cara had found the 4 minute video that filmmaker and TED speaker Louie Schwartzberg had used as an example of what his work as a cinematographer using time-lapse photography had taught him over the years: gratitude. You can watch the whole TED talk, above, or let the video load and jump right into Schwartzberg’s film at 4:50 mins. read more…
The northeast had a surprise snowstorm in late October which left a lot of people without power. Our good friend Pamela Hovland sent us pictures of her family’s improvised living arrangements: mattresses arranged around the fire place with an array of colorful quilts and pillows made for cozy, impressively stylish indoor camping. But best of all was Pamela’s makeshift refrigerator, tucked into the snow in her yard. read more…
(Video link here.) On TV last week, we caught a compelling video made by The Guardian about artist Vik Muniz’s recent work. Over three years he traveled to his native Brazil to photograph “catadores” – pickers of recyclable materials – who comb daily through Jardim Gramacho, the world’s largest garbage dump, located on the outskirts of Rio de Janeiro. Muniz’ plan was to make artworks of the catadores’ images using garbage from the dump itself, then photograph the works and sell them at auction, giving the proceeds back to the impoverished pickers.
In the course of the project, Muniz entered into a surprising collaboration with some of the pickers, read more…
(Video link here.) At Apple’s recent celebration of Steve Jobs’ life, Norah Jones sang Bob Dylan’s classic Forever Young, which he wrote in the early ’70′s. Although we’ve heard the song many times over the years, we never really focused on the lyrics until we watched the video of Jones’ performance and looked them up. We were surprised to see that Dylan had written what is, in effect, a blessing: wishing all good fortune, the highest of hopes.
Hidden within the last stanza are the perfect words for clinking glasses in a toast on Thanksgiving Day… read more…
A clear sign of our economic times, the Wall Street Journal recently published an article about the growing trend of folks who attempt home repairs before throwing out a broken appliance. The article cites notable increases in customer service calls for help with do-it-yourself home repairs, and increases in the sales of replacement parts.
We love that “fixing” is trend now, since we’re advocates for creative home repairs (you might recall our taped-up headphones, or the floss-mended sneakers). It also cools out the part of us that cringes at waste and the endless buying of more and more things.
But we also know that home fixes can be overwhelming, read more…
In October, 2010 I had just started graduate school and was in a bit of a panic about my choice. I was setting myself up for somewhat limited career options and would graduate with a sizeable chunk of student debt. So when I was asked, at a conference I attended that fall, to write myself a postcard that would be mailed to me three months later, I thought hard about the message I wanted to receive.
Of course I forgot all about the postcard. I came home three months later to find it waiting for me, declaring confidently: “Keep calm. You made the right decision.” And indeed, I had.
Sometimes there is nothing more comforting than our own reassurance or words of wisdom, but for whatever reason we’re often not able to hear ourselves clearly in the moment. That’s what makes FutureMe such a great idea: you can write yourself emails to be delivered at any point in the future. read more…
(Video link here.) When our mind starts running hot like a machine overworking – fast and full of ideas and writing and deadlines – we welcome ways to slow down. This little film does the work of meditating, chilling us out while connecting us to a broader view of the life we are living. (The lovely music is “Aerial” by Moby, who allows free use of his music for independent film makers at MobyGratis.com - yay Moby!).
“This is a year-long time-lapse study of the sky. A camera installed on the roof of the Exploratorium museum in San Francisco captured an image of the sky every 10 seconds. From these images, I created a mosaic of time-lapse movies, each showing a single day. The days are arranged in chronological order. My intent was to reveal the patterns of light and weather over the course of a year.”
Last week, we posted our best recipes for how to brine a turkey, make side dishes and freeform tarts, and some suggestions for wines to serve at the feast. If you’re having a crowd, now’s the time to figure out what to serve all this on, and where the guests will sit…
We went back into the Archive to dig out links for how to make big tables both round and rectangular, and a variety of makeshift seating options, including our favorite bench made of chairs. We’re posting it early, in case you need to stop by the lumber yard for plywood of planks.
The essential liberating rule of thumb: nothing needs to match…neither tableclothes, nor napkins, nor dishes, nor chairs…nor glasses… read more…
Last week, we posted our best recipes for how to brine a turkey, make side dishes and freeform tarts, and some suggestions for wines to serve at the feast. If you’re having a crowd, now’s the time to figure out what to serve all this on, and where the guests will sit…
