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!!!!!
Smith urges people to make their own “portable life museums”: read more…
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…
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…
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 buy
It’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…
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…
Lush, fragrant summer strawberries are in their last week or two at farm stands. We bought some home and were inspired to serve them in the giant horn spoon Maria Robledo had given us, for an unexpected presentation. We ate them right off the stems, no powdered sugar necessary. It reminded us that there are all kinds of charming and unexpected vessels you could use for serving summer berries. We imagined an our collection of big odd serving spoons filled with berries and arrayed on the table.
If you decide to remove the hulls before serving the berries or cooking with them, don’t throw them away: they can make a great instant flavoring for balsamic vinegar. read more…
While we were away, we got a very succinct, very cool email from reader Gorden Ammermann, with photos of the wonderful shipping pallet bed he made:
hi,
maybe i´ve something for your site. be free to post it: my new diy-pallet-bed
greetz
gorden
We not only love the white painted bed, but the deliciously rumpled linens in a very simple room as well. You can get the gist of Ammermann’s creation from the other two photos he sent: read more…
Since it’s the last week of summer and most folks are off frolicking, and since we’re still not quite up-to-snuff, we’ll be posting once a day (or so) on ‘the improvised life’ through Labor Day.
I recently wrote that the first step in planning our renovation was to hang out in the space and dream. That’s not quite true. That step ran concurrently with friends coming over to give their 2-cents and help us explore how exactly the place was made. By explore I mean busting holes in ceiling and walls I thought about demolishing to actually see what lay hidden in them — elecrical wiring, support columns, pipes — in order to plot possibilities.
The first thing several friends noticed was how low the ceiling felt at 8’2″. (This proved to be largely due to the way the place was painted and the height of the doors). My friend Holton Rower decided that it was imperative that we see if there was any space above them hoping it might be possible to raise them. In lieu of a ladder, Holton rigged a platform with what was around: read more…
One of the people we miss most since we left our old digs is paper artist extraordinaire Matthew Sporzynski, also known as the Couturier de Carboard. (Check out the Pinterest Real Simple compiled of his wonderful paper constructions.) It seems that whenever we ran into him in the elevator or on the street, we’d learn something illuminating. Matthew is endlessly creative and generous and we’ve posted a number of times about him, especially the spontaneous, and always perfectly-timed gifts he’d leave outside our door: stealth gifting. So we were delighted when emailed this picture of his “boat bag workaround”, where he fashioned a leather belt into an adjustable shoulder strap to allow him to comfortable haul heavy gear in his canvas boat bag:
I was rather pleased with a last-minute improvisation I made last week. I was going to a photo shootat 23rd and 5th and needed to carry a big light box (two hands) and a boat bag full of heavy tools and supplies.I literally thought “what would The Improvised Life do?” read more…
When I finally got the space in Harlem - blessedly empty of the previous owner’s massive furniture – the first thing I did was haul up my trusty lightweight, reclinable French beach chair so I could hang out and just mull. I’d wander the rooms, feeling the space, able to envision its possibilities better now that the furniture was gone. The place was pretty bleak, the wear-and-tear showing on old carpeting and dingy walls. read more…
Artist Holton Rower, of 3,000,000+ YouTube hits fame, (not to mention inventor of fabulous leather door pulls) takes all his tools very seriously, including the camera on his phone. It has a lens that is precision, easily damagable glass, just like any other good camera. You wouldn’t put a camera in your bag without its lens cap on, so why do it with your phone? We hadn’t thought of this obvious fact; Holton did. He devised an insta-lens cap: a piece of blue masking tape, which leaves no residue, and be “opened” and “closed” many times before it need replacing.
Simple, efficient, smart!
(And if you don’t like Holton’s rough look, snip the tape cleanly across with a scissors to make a more graphical embellishment.)
(Video link here). Our recent balloon post about how wonderful it felt to let balloons go (and make a wish) created quite an uproar. It seems we hadn’t considered the environmental impact of balloons – especially the foil kind – on the environment, so we redacted it and tried to impart some semblence of fair-and-unbiased reporting into the mix. Even though we haven’t done deep enough research to know if latex balloons properly filled with helium and without ribbons pose a dire environmental risk, we’re stearing clear of sending balloons into the atmosphere, in case.
One reader had a suggestion: “tissue wishing papers that when lit on fire float into the air until they disappear into tiny bits of ash. My friends and I let the birthday person wish on one and send it soaring.” We googled “wishing papers” and came up with “sky lanterns“. They are purportedly biodegradable lanterns are made out of rice paper, non-toxic wax and bamboo. Their wax “fuel cell” is essentially a candle which when lit, creates air currents that cause the paper lantern to fly into the air, as much as a mile high.read more…
and did a lovely photo of the process. Since this year’s long cherry season is winding down, we thought we’d pass Sally’s original recipe along. You’ll find the ever-great 
so I could hang out and just mull. I’d wander the rooms, feeling the space, able to envision its possibilities better now that the furniture was gone. The place was pretty bleak, the wear-and-tear showing on old carpeting and dingy walls. 
. They are purportedly biodegradable lanterns are made out of rice paper, non-toxic wax and bamboo. Their wax “fuel cell” is essentially a candle which when lit, creates air currents that cause the paper lantern to fly into the air, as much as a mile high. 
