We spent a number of Halloween’s outfitting ourselves in improvised costumes, usually at the last minute, and LOVED suddenly taking on a whole other persona for one magic night. If you haven’t gotten your Halloween act together yet, and want some inspiration, here’s a compendium of forage-able ideas from artists and designers…Salvador Dali offers loads of…
Read MoreWorkspace: A Cheap Stylish File Cabinet Strategy
While planning the office portion of the Laboratory’s renovation, I had to be lean and efficient, having spent some serious money on a sliding wall to make it all disappear. I happily used a strategy that had served me (and about a million designers) for years: a desk made of pedestal file cabinets and a…
Read MoreMore Signs + Blessings on Ephemeral Walls
We were walking by an empty storefront on Manhattan’s Upper East Side when we noticed that someone had written intriguing, inspiring, philosophical signs on the blank walls that were, no doubt, destined for renovation. Who had taken their marker and, with such bold strokes, written signs all over the place? We pressed our nose against…
Read MorePowerful Teeny Gifts Wrapped in Found Scraps of… Magic
Our friend Virginia del Giudice recently sent us another of her wonderful teeny gifts: a little colorfully wrapped bonbon of some sort. Only an inch across, it is an example of the power that even small gift can have in making the recipient feel appreciated, considered, cared for. We wondered what was in the mysterious cloth wrapping…
Read MoreHow to Avoid Writing (+ Then Get Yourself to Do It or ANYTHING)
Improvised Life part-time assistant editor Mira Keras wrote this spot-on description of a writer procrastinating…as a way of procrastinating herself. But she discovered something essential in the process.
Read MoreRe-envisioned Chairs We Could Make Ourselves
Over the past months, we’ve been collecting an illuminating array of chair images over at the great site Aqqindex. Each one has made us think, look into its structure, opened our mind to the many possibility of “chair”. All are so startlingly simple, it makes us think we could make them ourself:
Read MoreLego’s Questionable Values Denies Ai Weiwei Art Materials
(Video link here.) We just heard the astonishing news that Lego, a company whose product we have featured numerous times as a symbol of possibility, has refused to fill a large order of its plastic bricks — an art material — for Chinese artist’s Ai Weiwei upcoming exhibition at in Australia. Their reason: They don’t provide bricks…
Read MoreSigns and Blessings Hidden In Floors or Walls
When you look at the image of the bathroom in Improvised Life’s budget renovation, you’d never guess what lies hidden under the tumbled marble floor tiles the contractor generously donated. While I was choosing just the right mix of tiles —marble itself is so varied, each tile was different — I thought of a slight addition I’d…
Read MoreMartha Antidote: Visit Alexander Calder in His Studio
(Video link here.) After we wrote about artist Tom Sachs’ practice of knolling, simple, incredibly effective steps he takes to neaten is very busy work space, we got an interesting comment from Kevin Neff, the engineer who helped us reason-out some of our vibrating bed experiments ages ago. He wrote: So interesting. I had been wrongly…
Read MoreBernie Sanders Plays the Congas + Nails It about ART
(Video link here.) In this season of unlikely presidential candidates, we like to imagine what a real, deconstructed, unarmored, groovey president might look like. The Huffington Post gave us a joyous taste with their brilliant edit of the Democratic Presidential Debate that has Bernie Sanders playing conga drums. It’s like they all took off their girdles. Whew. Sanders, after all, is the…
Read MoreA Brilliant Idea Found in a Second Hand Book
Whenever someone we know has a baby, we go on the hunt for our favorite kid’s book, the enduringly great, zennish, out-of-print, A Hole Is to Dig by Ruth Krauss with illustrations by Maurice Sendak. We buy used copies, doing our best to find clean ones, but we never really know what we’ll get. Recently, we found…
Read MoreA Machine that Wakes You Up and Gets You Dressed
(Video link here.) At the consistently wonderful The Kids Should See This, we found kinetic artist Joseph Herscher‘s machine for getting himself out of bed and dressed on a sleepy morning. The chain-reaction is astonishing for its creativity, imagination and mesmerizing practicality, everything that Rube Goldberg‘s own inventions embodied. We love (and share) Herscher’s view of the world,
Read MoreIrregularly Shaped Mirrors to DIY or Buy
As soon as we saw Mc&Co’s irregularly shaped mirrors we thought WANT. We’ve been thinking for some time that our very angular Laboratory could use some organic forms to soften it, and have been mulling how we might do that with mirrors. Mc&Co’s mirrors look like portals into other rooms. Swell! Although we’ve written about irregularly…
Read MoreYoko Ono: Mend an Object and Your Heart
Every morning, we’ve been reading a page from Yoko Ono’s tiny book of instructions, Acorn. We have been moved by many of the “instructions” we’ve come across. We find this one, which advices a practice of mending, both physical and emotional, especially compelling.
Read MoreHow to Neaten Up Stuff via Sachs’ Practice of Knolling
(Video link here.) At Things Organized Neatly, a website about exactly THAT, we found this terrific except from Ten Bullets, artist Tom Sachs‘ essential principles — “his code” — for employees working in his studio. Here he outlines something he called “knolling”, an action we’ve always done but never had a word for. Sachs’ interpretation is…
Read MoreWhat happens If You Try and Fail?
I spend a lot of time trying things and…failing. Hmmm. Is failing even the right word? I spend a lot of times trying things and having them not go as expected.
Read MoreInexpensive Urban Shelters Solve a Housing Crisis
As apartments in urban areas become prohibitively expensive, young people in Oakland, California have been developing innovative, grassroots strategies to provide homes for themselves, and for homeless people in their communities. The New York Times recently article and slideshow samples new ways of thinking about “home”, “a social experiment in stripping down to the basics.”
Read MoreMorning Poem: Walt Whitman Read to You + Animated
(Video link here.) London-based animator Sophie Koko Gate’s chose the 2nd stanza of Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself to animate in her cool 2 minute video. You can read along below. What we like best about the little video is having the poem read to us, with a jazzy beat and its wonderful last two lines.
Read MoreImprovised Life’s Community IS Gold
I’ve been bowled over by raft of new Friends with Benefits subscriptions and the most astonishing, deeply-heartening praise from readers in response to my writing about Improvised Life’s Illusory Wealth. Well, not completely illusory. I should have qualified it.
Read MoreRoasted Okra or Delicata Squash with Curry or Garam Masala
It’s the tail end of okra season, and I came across some beauties — tender, bright green, and not too big – on the very day I saw Kitchen Repertoire’s latest: Simple Dal with Roast Okra. Being both lazy and busy, I opted to make just the okra, which is dead-simple and totally delish, with some…
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