pupilpeople.com
This evening marks the start of Chinese New Year – the Year of the Dragon. We think this poster from Singapore design firm pupilpeople would make a fine, fluid set of reminders for the year: glow-in-the-dark, too, for about $24. read more…
We discovered RydeSafe Reflective Bike Decals via Better Living Through Design and quickly pledged to the RydeSafe Kickstarter project. These great-looking decals were designed by Tonky, an artist from Brooklyn who was hit by car and set out to make something that would keep him and other bikers safe while riding at night. The stickers are made from a film that reflects light (called conspicuity film), and are made to fit bike rims and frames, as well as helmets and accessories. The effect is quite striking, and makes you impossible to miss.
We love the mix of design and safety, but also think that these would make a great gifts for kids. We’re imagining walls and toys and clothes read more…
photo: susan hochbaum
We love things that change our view. With the wind howling and the temperature cold, we found ourselves delighted with a little book that has taken us on an armchair trip through Paris, showing us the city through new eyes: the eyes of a pastry-o-phile. Pastry Paris: In Paris, Everything Looks Like Dessert
Hochbaum ate her way through the pastry worlds of Paris, seeing pastry everywhere she looked…
When we first read about Appree’s leaf-shaped sticky notes, we wrote them off as just another expensive and unnecessary take on a good simple, efficient design – the Post-It. THEN we saw them used to embellish a wall – not trying to be practical ‘post-its’ but rather, tiny little leaf sculptures…
….a-h-h-h there’s a sweet idea for decorating a room. read more…
We are big fans of impromptu business cards as well as interesting signs posted on public walls, or, well, anywhere. So we’re smitten with the possibilities inherent in Printery & Bindery’s compact, portable self-inking rubber stamp, with a ring to affix it to your key chain, for anywhere stamping. You could have it made up to print your essential info for instant business cards, OR design a sign you want to stamp around town…like CREATE! or JOY! or BE YES!. At $23, they’re a bargain (and a gift we’d want to get).
via Swiss-Miss
Related posts: report from tangier: 3d business cards
minimalist business cards (why not blank ones?)
business card stamp
out of work?: retrofit your business card!
our handmade business card
We’ve been so busy, we haven’t given all the gifts we’ve had in mind to give to friends and family. Our fridge is still stockpiled with mason jars of Prunes in Armagnac we plan to give friends we meet up with in the next few weeks. And our favorite gift for this year, the extraordinary book Tantra Song by Franck Andre Jamme, sold out of its first printing after we’d gotten to send only two copies out. So we’re going to wait a month or two until it’s back in stock, THEN we’ll give it as a Christmas – or anytime – gift. The book is a rare collection of powerful modernist Tantric paintings from Rajasthan, done on salvaged paper: “things of beauty used to awaken heightened states of consciousness.” The book, and the story behind it ia SO remarkable that it is a well-worth-waiting-for-bargain at around $25. (It will be available here
We’re just following our Philosophy of Late Celebrations: read more…
'set it free' by maryanne casasanta
We saw this image of a gift and thought “What a chic, minimalist gift-wrap”, and saved it to look at more closely later. When we did, we discovered it is actually an artwork called ‘set it free’ by maryanne casasanta.
It’s a photograph of a wrapped copy of ddddoomed, or, collectors & curators of the image – a brief future history of the image aggregator by r. gerald nelson. The image was published on tumblr for online distribution by artist, with this idea in mind: read more…
Keeping perspective during the holiday season’s flurry of buying can be difficult. While gift-giving is a lovely tradition, so many of us get caught up in the “keeping up with the Joneses”-style of shopping: buying the newest, neatest toy/appliance/Apple product to keep pace with our consumption-centric world. The shopping-cynic in us was thus delighted by “The 5 Best Toys of All Time” featured in Wired’s GeekDad column. They include:
Both funny and true, full of examples of the amazing things you can make out of these simple elements, the piece reminds us that the holiday shopping frenzy isn’t actually necessary. While we’re not suggesting anyone fill a Christmas stocking with dirt (although it would make a mean mud pie), it doesn’t take a fancy new toy to give someone a meaningful gift. This is why we love to give presents people can make things with or use, like. Here’s a list of 12 favorites, swell given singly or in combination: read more…
We wish our gift wrapping could do the boogie-woogie like this Gif Wrap by Fueled by Coffee. But barring that bit of magical brilliance, here’s our favorite strategies for impromptu gift wrapping. read more…
When I saw ‘the improvised life’s recent post about christopher niemann’s fab color-tiled bathrooms, I immediately thought of the Metro Wine Map of France, created by architectural historian and wine buff Dr. David Gissen, which was introduced this past summer by De Long, a favorite resource of mine for beautiful wine region maps and clever viticultural charts.
I love how it riffs on the classic city subway map, and neatly organizes the mind-numbing number French wine regions and their myriad subregions, shown clearly in their relative positions. It also features major grape varieties shown in context with their corresponding appellations (think: place names, i.e. Rhone, Condrieu, St-Joseph), as well as major geographical features and architectural landmarks, too. read more…
ellen silverman
We switched over to homemade food gifts for the holidays many, many years ago, and each year we find ourselves in the kitchen with the same tried-and-true recipes. But the repetition doesn’t come from a laziness or a lack of inspiration—over the years we’ve found that our friends and family look forward to these gifts, enjoying the tradition rather than hungering for something new. We’re getting ready to make this year’s batch, and hope some of these recipes and ideas serve you (and your loved ones) well, starting with our favorite: alt-malted milk balls (above)… read more…
photo: christopher hirsheimer
We’ve loved Canal House Cooking since it launched in 2009. Created and self-published by two home chefs, each book in this cookbook series is made with care, beautifully presented with unique (and do-able) recipes. We treasure our copies, but we also like to give subscriptions as gifts–new books are released three times a year, but every little book is full of enough surprises to last throughout the months in-between. (Single books can also be purchased on amazon
harry bertoia
“Sculptor and designer Harry Bertoia was just 15 when he moved from Italy to the United States. Two years later, struggling to assimilate in school, he made this list of personal attributes as part of a class project. After high school he attended the Cranbrook Academy of Art, in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, where, along with his neatness and accuracy, he developed a fluid sense of sculptural form that made him a leading designer of modern furniture.”
What quality would you add?
Related posts: mind bath: jackson pollock at work (by hans namuth)
messages from the future, written in the past
for amy winehouse
tool for improvising: defer judgment
tool for improvising: embrace mistakes
Over many years of sifting through flea-markets and junk stores, one of our happiest and most inexpensive finds have been single plates, bowls and cups of fine china. Drinking tea out of Limoge cup, with its perfect proportions and translucency, gave us pleasure during many years of writing. One chipped, shallow soup bowl of unknown origin became the fall-back dish at photo-shoots we worked on. A stack of mismatched dinner plates, each with its own beauty, became a charming way to serve a crowd.
Which is why we’ve found Dish, 813 Colorful, Wonderful Dinner Plates by Shax Riegler so unexpectedly helpful and illuminating. In addition to using it as a reference for plates we’ve collected or seen, we use it a guide to plates we’d like to find, keeping our eyes peeled for them in our wanderings, or setting up a “search” on Ebay to notify us when one is for sale.We’ve found the warning in it’s opening chapter to be true: THIS BOOK MAY INDUCE MANIA. read more…
The other day, we stumbled on Dargelos, an online store with stylish, thoughtfully-designed products for bicycle riders (some are great for NON bikers as well). We originally went to the site to check out their Lighting Vest, a hand-netted safety vest made from a specially-developed reflective 3M material that will make you highly visible to motorists (i.e. safe.) It is lightweight, can fit in your pocket and layer over just about anything you want to wear. It’s so great looking, we could imagine wearing it just for the hell of it.
While on Dargelos’ site, we discovered many other cool things… read more…
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