We love this crazy hauling bike and wish we knew the story behind it. We spotted it on Dargelos‘ blog in a post called ‘the mailman’s fahrrad’ (‘fahrrad’ means bicycle in German). Dargelos is an onliine store that sells great, intelligent biking gear, like the illuminating vest we posted awhile back. We have their Transporter knapsack, which we couldn’t live without: it’s light and holds a lot without looking bulky or feeling heavy: perfect for our long days wandering around town. read more…
2 or 3 things i know
We recently stumpled upon a wonderful post from 2 or 3 Things I Know that we bookmarked AGES AGO (1/3/09!); it is a divinely minimalist place setting with a philosphy to boot:
The key is to not turn to
magazines for design
advice. buy buyIt’s all about
the placement of
(just a few) objects.and resourcing
cheap, found, basic
elements /materials
Cerre gives a little how-to and her favorite sources for creating a setting like this. read more…
What do you get when you put ephemera, a typewriter, and Tyler Knott Gregson together? Amazing, improvisational bits of insight. Gregson’s “Typewriter Series” is written on found bits of paper: a Delta barf bag, a receipt, a page from a book. The idea feels a lot like an adaptation of what Vonnegut did with Hocus Pocus, a novel written entirely on bits of paper and later strung together. Gregson is a hopeless romantic, and that shows in his work, frequently about a lover.
We see old typewriters in secondhand stores all the time for pennies. We love read more…
Vincent Mentzel 1988/Hollandse Hoogte/Redux
Wednesday would have been the late avant-garde composer John Cage‘s 100 birthday, and he’s had SUCH an big influence in our lives, we wanted to commemorate the day. To describe his work is practically impossible, since it broke down definitions of “music” like crazy and was really performance of endlessly varied kinds – involving chance or planning, silence or unexpected sound – which all ultimately made you think expansively about life. read more…
turkishtowelstore.com
Harriet Bell alerted us to a great find: cotton Turkish towels (we love testamonials from people we trust). She wrote:
I bought two of these about six weeks ago and I’m going to buy more. They are great bath towels, lightweight and wash/dry beautifully. No more terrycloth for me.
No wrinkles. They are incredibly absorbent. Take up little space. I bought red and white ones and the colors have stayed, too! So far we’ve just used them as bath towels, but they’d be great to take a nap on in Central Park or take to the beach. Even use as a wrap/shawl! Our terrycloth towels are lonely in the linen closet.
We imagine they’d make a great sarong, table cloth, curtain… read more…
(Video link here.) We always thought Harpo Marx’s desperately improvised harp from a smashed piano in A Day at the Races as the penultimate piano improv UNTIL we saw this video: piano-as-an-endless-array-of-instruments. Beautiful. and a fine reminder of the possibilities in everyday things. Just look closer, imagine HARDER…
With big thanks to Charlie Allenson.
Related posts: movie break: harpo’s artful improvisation
pianist derek paravacini: ‘good comes out of bad’
music to work by: bach’s goldberg variations (free)
‘self-taught’ lessons about learning and creativity
thelonious monk’s notes on life and musicx
photo: beatriz da costa
In case you haven’t been able to get away enough this summer, here’s a couple of lovely little slices of it, of being truly AWAY:
The first via Beatriz da Costa from her vacation in Brittany. The second, via Logcabineer: ”A light summer rain”, brings sitting on a porch at twilight right to your door. read more…
