May 2012

d-i-y instant color block tablecloths

On Ikea’s impossible-to-translate blog, Livet Hemma, we found this image of the two-toned fabrics European Ikeas are selling. We’re not crazy about the color scheme but love the idea: why not overlap vividly-colored tablecloths or large swathes of cotton or linen to make a color block table? Unhemmed ends are CHIC.

05.03.12 | comments | in copy this!, d-i-y, elements, entertaining, inspiration blogs + sites, materials, solutions, textiles |

one mid-century desk interpreted by two owners

photo: sally schneider

Last year, I posted a mid-century modern folding desk that I’d used for many years, and had decided to sell. Maria Robledo bought it for her 13 + year-old daughter Isabel. Recently, I was thrilled to see Isabel’s take on the desk: full of color and pattern, and a completely different style than my ascetically minimalist one.

Same desk; different view altogether. read more…

05.02.12 | comments | in furniture, inside, working |

the possibilities of folded paper

The great DVDP devised a gif out of origami artist Jun Mitani’s flickr photostream: a lovely reminder of the possibilities inherent in simple sheets of paper…

…which reminded us of Between the Folds, a wondrous video clip we posted about origami’s cosmic potential.

05.02.12 | comments | in art, materials, people, playing, projects + play, resources |

colorful d-i-y shipping pallet planters (w safe paints info)

colorful planters made of shipping pallets

photo: stacy k floral

Innovative uses for shipping pallets continue: here a play on shipping pallet gardens, painted bright colors and hung on a wall. In a post we wrote about how-to transform a shipping pallet into a vertical, layered garden, some readers brought up the question of food-safe paints for pallets that will house herbs, greens, nasturtiums and other edible plants. Kate Payne of Hip Girl’s Home (whose book we’re featuring in a giveaway) took the initiative and emailed the Old Fashioned Milk Paint folks, who make a completely non-toxic, zero VOC paint and sealant. Wrote Kate: “…air quality matters here, but so does sustained exposure to moisture and possible leaching, this is a great question!”

Here’s what she found out: read more…

05.02.12 | comments | in copy this!, d-i-y, garden, materials, outside |

how do you know when to take the leap?

photo: Wallace G. Levison

It’s well known that one of our favorite visual themes is people leaping – an obvious metaphor for “taking a leap” into new territory, work, projects, endeavors that we might have thought fearful…life.

We came across an interesting trove recently on Retronaut, of New Yorkers in the 1890′s. Although there are some spectacular leaps… read more…

05.01.12 | comments (2) | in art, leaping + flying, outside, paths + processes, people, principles |

diagram your life with diagram.ly

There are a lot of online drawing tools, but most of them feel too complicated to be of much use to us. Diagram.ly, on the other hand, couldn’t be easier. If you’ve ever needed to throw together a quick diagram for a report and been stymied by the lack of options or user un-friendliness of Microsoft Word, you’ll find this to be a great (and free!) alternative. We’ve been using it to sketch out some storage space, but see its potential for many free-form design projects. For the more business-minded, the folks at alternativeTo point out that it would be great for organizational and work-flow charts. And certainly kids who just want to play around with shapes could have some fun with it too! It’s a perfect combo-platter: practical AND playful…

Via the always great Swiss Miss, again

05.01.12 | comments | in free + flea, how-to, resources blogs + sites, technology, tools |

making a table garden with cheap potted bulbs

cheap potted flowers placed in a bowl, opening

photo: sally schneider

We written a couple of times about the big transformation of pots of inexpensive potted bulbs when you tilt the whole root ball out of its plastic pot and into a wide ceramic bowl.

But we never showed what actually happens over the course of a week as the tightly-closed bulbs open and bloom. So we photographed the hyacinths that we’d plunked into a Smarta bowl from Ikea about 5 days ago. All we had to do was water them lightly every few days. Over days we watched the plants transform in front of our very eyes. We realized that we had actually created a tiny tabletop garden, whose subtle changes we could enjoy daily.

The key is to buy bulbs that are read more…

05.01.12 | comments (3) | in cheap + great, copy this!, elements, garden, how-to, resources, strategies |

May 2012

d-i-y instant color block tablecloths

one mid-century desk interpreted by two owners

the possibilities of folded paper

colorful d-i-y shipping pallet planters (w safe paints info)

how do you know when to take the leap?

diagram your life with diagram.ly

making a table garden with cheap potted bulbs

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