For the renovation of my 1,000-square-foot ‘Laboratory’ in New York City, my mission was to open up the space to the spectacular park view AND fluidly accomodate an open kitchen, workspace, dining area, and living area. To do this, I removed a small bedroom to dramatically expand the main room and built an office area along one 15′ wall…
Read Morethe power of introverts + their collaboration w extroverts
(Video link here.) There’s been a lot of buzz lately about Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking. Author Susan Cain shines a spotlight on introverts and reveals how over time our society has come to look to extroverts as leaders. Not suggesting that one is better than the other,…
Read Moregraphic stacked log fence = gorgous firewood storage
We’ve written about the unexpected stylishiness of stacked logs before but love this particularly charming and effective storage for firewood and fallen timber: a fence of stacked logs (snapped by Susan Jacobson as she drove by in her car). Related posts: storing firewood indoors = firewood as storage unit d-i-y stacked wood fireplace mantle woodpile…
Read Morevisionary hack: cargo bike with shopping cart + chainlink fence
Spotted on Claton Cubitt’s tumblr and worth checking out full size: “cargo bike incorporating a shopping cart and chain link fence, with a blood-red wrought-iron cowcatcher (and cup holder), New Orleans.” The awesomness of the human imagination! This practical AND aestheric considerations here are stunning… Related posts: clever shelving configured for bicycle storage bikes for hauling…
Read Moreimprovisation in the natural world
I’ve been thinking a lot about birds lately, about the mystery of their migrations; their unerring return each spring. Our Cooper’s hawk is back from the dry barrancas of Zapotecas, its familiar kek-kek-kek vying with argumentative crows and cooing mourning doves at dawn. Improvisatory arboreal architects are at work big time. Humingbird hangs its timid sac of…
Read Moretuna melt: domino-theory in a Rube-Goldberg universe…
(Video link here.) This is even more amazing with the sound OFF: traveling via the domino-theory through a kinetic Rube-Goldberg universe… …to make a tuna melt (we can relate) With thanks to Susan Dworski via The Browser Related posts: rube goldberg summer camp ok go channels rube goldberg: “having good ideas and making cool shit” “can…
Read More3 improvs: pilgrimage, kickstarter win, poetry practice
We are constantly knocked out by the wonderful endeavors our readers are involved in, committed to, CREATED out of nothing, improvised. Here are a few from the past week: David Downie and Alison Harris set out from their home in Paris to walk across France to the Pyrenees, the French portion of El Camino de…
Read Morediy chain link fence artistry: weave a sign or design
Recently, we noticed a spike in traffic to our 2009 post d-i-y lace chain link fence. Ho, are people trying to figure out how to make chain link fences look better at last? What we loved in that early post was that someone had brilliantly seen that the metal grid of a chainlink fence is really a loom for weaving…
Read Moree.b. white on how to plan your day
Dig this brilliance from E.B. White, author of the great Charlotte’s Web. He starts his day plan with a Principle — “…change the world and have one hell of a good time” — instead of a schedule, and knocks all the day-planning strategies and productivity experts on their heads. Yay! via French by Design what happens…
Read Morechris weyant’s perfect new yorker cartoon for boston
The New Yorker routinely assigns a cartoon artist to draw a cartoon based on the day’s events. Christopher Weyant managed to express what is in everyone’s hearts…in a CARTOON! Related posts: stephen colbert on boston’s fierce spirit and grit boston: spirit and bravery as antidote for boston (redux)
Read Morecool design: quad trivet…game…necklace (indiegogo)
We’re smitten with the Quad Trivet a cool Indegogo project. It consists of 16 wooden cubes — oiled walnut or maple — connected by a flexible, durable, heat-resistant silicone strip inserted in the underside of the cubes. This structure allows various configurations and different applications ranging from a compact squares and rectangles to a widespread circular…
Read Moresimple style: side-by-side ikea cabinets
White steel Ikea PS cabinets ($99 each) lined up side-by-side, and stacked high with books, become curiously chic. via Desire to Inspire; photo by Sabrina Rothe Related posts: xhackism: the infinite diy possibilities of ikea’s LÖBBO shadex 16 REALLY clever uses for binder clips found: frosta/alvar aalto stool knock-off!!! an artist hacks ikea’s ‘billy’ bookcase cool…
Read Moreobsessive wingsuit flight through a hole in a mountain
(Video link here.) Wingsuit pilot Alexander Polli saw a hole in a mountain’s rocky outcropping and just had to try flying through it. He practiced aiming and controlling his flight over and over until he just went ahead and…flew…right…..THROUGH… …at 155 miles per hour. Polli “hopes his success will inspire others not only to ‘climb…
Read Morecustom or ready-made wall murals to transform your space
When we saw this image featured under Bedrooms on a design blog, we instantly thought: what a great solution for jazzing up a place, like the drab walls of a rental studio a friend is struggling to make into a home, however temporary. We started looking into services that make wall murals, imagining cool images…
Read Morethe virtues of doubt (paul zelevansky)
(Video link here.) In the annals of self-helpism, doubt is considered something to overcome, to find ways around, to MASTER. We’ve discovered time and again that that is easier said than done. Doubt seems to come with territory of being creative, and most of the people we know just find ways to soldier through…or be…
Read Moreremembering richie havens + ‘follow’
We were very sorry to hear that singer Richie Havens passed away. He was born in Bedford Stuyvasant, Brooklyn and we used to see him in Greenwich Village in the old days, around the time his intense improvised opening of the Woodstock festival which made him famous (see video below). Here’s one of our favorite songs: Follow (Words…
Read Morefreehand half-painted wall and…ipad sleeve and…
When we first saw the yellow freehand painted two-tone wall at Style-Files (below), we were of two minds: good idea but something held us back. Then we came started to come across an iteration Remodelista found at the Norwegian company Lady Premium Paint & Colors blog that made us think it held lots of possibilities. Out-of-the-blue we spotted the freehand-by-brush…
Read MoreSister Corita Kent’s Enduring Rules for Making + Her Art
When we were first planning ‘the improvised life’, we were inspired by this now-famous set of rules by Sister Corita Kent, artist and renown educator. They speak directly to the process of creating…ANYTHING. Here are our favorite essential rules: Find a place you trust and then try trusting it for a while. Consider everything as…
Read Moreweekend: ricky jay, thomas keller, digital public library +
(Video link here.) Above, a trailer for Deceptive Practice, the new documentary about brilliant sleight-of-hand master Ricky Jay. For a totaly entertaining read, check out this 1993 New Yorker profile of Jay by Mark Singer. For those of us haunted by the instantaneous life changes that occurred to so many wounded in the Boston bombing, The Times’ heartening…
Read Morebungee cord chairs + furniture (rene herbst)
Recently we’ve been noodling around with the idea of with making a Murphy Bed with a lift-system of bungee cords. We haven’t heard of such a thing, but having seen the realm of industrial bungees available, thought it might be possible. Then, with the simultaneity we’ve come to expect when we have an idea, we…
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