Having installed quite a few mirrors into ‘the improvised life’s’ new laboratory, we’ve witnessed first-hand how quickly they show fingerprints and smudges, along with a streaky glare acquired a week or so after being cleaned. We’ve also been experiencing how much “shows” on or white high gloss doors and walls – and they don’t come close to mirror-like.
So we took one look at Mikiya Kobayashi‘s mirrored Lacus credenza and thought: Are you CRAZY?!!! read more…
Into fog, through the fog
We rowed. Then:
The wide sea—so blue, so bright!
A favorite poem by Japanese poet Shiki, from one of our favorite morning reads Zen Art for Meditation
Can you see the blue?… read more…
We always have our eyes for ideas we could use at home, office, spaces we need to support us and lift our spirits. The right color can do that. Since we’re not being entirely comfortable picking colors on our own, we look to ways other people have done it for inspiration and guidance.
First we came across this deep pink wall…then we got this blast of acid yellow in Morocco. read more…
As we’ve mentioned, ‘the improvised life’s laboratory is something of an homage to plywood. We’ve used it for many things, from window sills to cabinets to floors. We love the stuff, and are constantly hatching plots in our head for furniture, housewares, endless inventions. So we are smitten with carpenter and author Philip Schmidt new book PlyDesign
Each project includes photographs, designs and lists of tools you’ll need. One of our favorites: Barnaby Gunning‘s 8 x 2 tables: read more…
(Video link here.) This stop-action video tracking 5 years of one man’s appearance makes us wonder how much how we look, and what our style is, affects our experience and identity…
…And the many choices we can make about our appearance.
Going through airport security checkpoint a couple of weeks ago, the TSA agent looked at Sally’s passport picture and said, “Why did you change your hair?” read more…
When we saw this image from Natural Style Outdoor Spaces on Style Files, we immediately thought: shipping pallets would make a perfect base. You’d hardly have to desconstruct them. Just clean them up (stack if desired) and place slip-covered foam cushions on them (here’s a how-to), for chic lounging pallets that would work inside or out.
It’s curious how inspiring shipping pallets have become…We find ourselves building with them in our heads like some sort of mental Tinkertoy…
What are your ideas?
Related posts: the scoop on safe shipping pallets (shipping pallets 101)
ps: some possible dangers of wood shipping pallets
led-illuminated shipping pallet bed
brilliant D-I-Y pallet desks, tables, stairs
D-I-Y: pallet chair (and stool and lamp)
(Video link here.) Richard Whitehead’s come-from-behind whirlwind completely defies the words ‘disabled”.
The race is breathtaking, and a big reminder of just what’s possible if you set your mind to it, and work and practice, and are willing to not have things be be perfect, until suddenly they become just that.
”I am living proof, that with enough desire and determination, any obstacle can be overcome.”
Check out more revelatory pictures from the paralympics at Big Picture.
via Kottke
Related posts: xcarpenter sentayehu teshale re-envisions ‘disability’
pianist derek paravacini: ‘good comes out of bad’
chuck close’s ‘note to self’ (eight perfect rules for living)
when ‘disaster’ gets interesting
carpenter sentayehu teshale re-envisions ‘disability’
‘nothing is impossible’ defies ‘disability’
signmark and the very loud message of deaf rap
We’re loving How to Be an Explorer of the World: Portable Life Museum, illustrator Keri Smith’s 59 ideas for how to creatively “shift” and wake your mind by engaging with your surroundings in new and interesting ways. As Brain Pickings noted recently: “…they’re potent training for what Buddhism would call “living from presence” and inhabiting your life more fully.”
We’ve long been fans of Smith’s work which is exemplified by the interactive drawing space she offers on her Home Page with a sign that says simply: ”right in front of you”. It yells: JUST DO YOUR THING…NOW!!!!!
(Video link here.) The latest video from cyclist Danny MacAskill has an added feature: insight into MacAskill’s thinking and interior approach to his challenging stunts and excursions: JOYRIDE.
Related posts: joy ride: practice makes wondrous perfection
danny macaskill’s joy ride
danny macaskill’s bike lesson (setbacks + difficulties + perseverance = mastery)
gifts + inspiration for bikers (and walkers)
weekend fun: new danny macaskill video
We LOVE gifs because they’re animated visions seem like magic. Among our favorite new gif-makers is 40licks. We can’t help seeing this lovely gif as a perfect image of improvisation: an open door to possibility.
Related posts: an evening gif: gratitude…
practice makes!
what have you been making today?
peep show gif: funny, risqué, slightly x-rated
color/pattern meditation break
gif-inspiration: devise, invent, create…try something new
photo: timmerman photography for blank studio
We’re crazy for rusted metal. We love the intentionally-rusted corton steel planters used at the High Line have amassed a strangely beautiful collection of pieces we’ve found in our wanderings, like the three-sided forms we use as book or artwork stands. So we were smitten when we saw images of this very modern house designed by Blank Studio, with its juxtaposition of rusted corrugated metal and plexiglass. It made us run to look up how to intentionally rust corrugated metal (which you can do using photo acid and other methods).
It gave us some ideas for the ancient garden chair we’ve set out on the terrace to see what would happen if we let it rust, intentionally. read more…
Interior space voyeurs, check out this satisfying tour of furniture designer Hubert Le Gall’s apartment from a 2002 Nest magazine. We especially love the ersatz fireplace, which appears to be made from molded plaster and paint, but would be still-swell just painted, (as the fire was for a mantle with no hearth we posted once). Check out Le Gall’s colorful sunburst bookshelf…
(Video link here.) Today in our inbox we found an email from Elizabeth Aquino, a long-time reader and an acute, avid commenter. She wrote to tell us of a video project she collaborated in making:
I am the parent of a child with severe disabilities, a job that calls for near constant improvisation. I asked parents of children with disabilities — some that I knew and most that I don’t know! — what they might have told themselves on the day their child was diagnosed and to write that down on a poster and pose with it for a photo. They sent me their photos, and we put them together in what, I think is an example of an improvised life –
It blew us away: big honest words for an incredibly difficult thing. Aquino’s parents’ messages apply to the many rough diagnoses and challenges that invariably strike us all, while providing insight into the valiant lives that people live improvise daily. Witness this series of posters: read more…
