9/23/09

getting rid of shit 101

When graphic designer Megan Deal decided to move to Alabama, she also decided it was a hassle to move with more than one bag. So logically, she decided to sell everything she owned.
Looks like we missed the boat on buying her "assorted rectangle felt pieces." Ha!

clutter in gouache

Speaking of the constant battle against messy desks: the amazing Charlie Roberts renders desktops, inspiration boards and everything crowding around them in beautifully detailed gouache paint.
Oh yeah, that's why I was keeping those piles of paper around - because they look kind of great.



9/14/09

the new antiquarians

New York Times article "The New Antiquarians" documents the ol' fashioned tastes of a handful of young Brooklyn-dwellers and their "extremely previous lifestyles." Apparently some young people are fascinated by old shit, especially taxidermy. Who knew?

“It’s way more than anti-modernism, this sort of deep spelunking into the past,” said Valerie Steele, director of the Museum of the Fashion Institute of Technology. “It’s not aspirational and it’s not nostalgic. It’s a fantasy world that is almost entirely a visual collage. It’s a stitched-together, bricolage world, an alternative world."

She goes on to add that "it's too bad" the antique fascination will inevitably be commodified by marketers. Honey, it's too late.

But as it's just the nature of newspapers to be late-to-the-party about these things, let's just concentrate on the enviable interiors.Note the swans in flight.Ricocheting between loving curio cabinets and having anxiety attacks about having too much useless shitIS THAT A STUFFED DOG?

see the whole photo series on the n.y. times website

COOL

Let your guests know that Goosebumps is in the house.

9/12/09

cana-duh

All good Canadians should own a Hudson's Bay blanket.All good Ontarians should own an Ontario Hydro emergency blanket.And maybe all of us want to live in this cabin.

9/3/09

tasty typewriter

Vancouver store The Regional Assembly of Text is a special little place that sells beautiful handprinted stationery, buttons and the like. They also possess enviable collections of both typewriters and metal filing cabinets.
photos by heidi zutter
The store recently celebrated its fourth anniversary.I like the store and think the owners are living the dream and everything, but the real reason I mention it is because I'm really impressed by the cake they got to celebrate it.

creative workspace

You know the drill: it's 2am. You have a ginormous project you still haven't started. The deadline is 9am. You've been procrastinating by eating for the past four hours and are now too full to continue. You must find another way to not work.
So, naturally, you decide to reorganise your desk.the desk of illustrator victor kerlow

When I'm really under the gun, I inevitably choose my precious, highly limited time to render my surroundings more pleasing. I thought studying at the library would put a stop to it but, before I knew it, I was stacking and restacking my books and lining up my pens instead of writing a paper.the desk of photographer dan winters

Aside from finally pulling up my socks and acquiring some fucking work ethic, I see no solution to this aside from making sure my workspace is already so beautiful, it will stimulate rather than distract.the sewing table of australian costume designer tina kalivas, via the selby

Good luck, my partners in procrastination. May this new scholastic year usher in a renewed desire to pull oneself up by one's proverbial bootstraps.