From Eloise by Kay Thompson (Drawing: Hilary Knight)
The other night a friend who was recuperating from an injury asked us to tell him a story as he fell asleep. A story, we wondered, h-mm-mm. Why not read a kid’s book for this exhausted, wounded grown-up. Looking through our library, an ancient copy of Kay Thompson’s Eloise 
Robert Blinn of Core 77 posted an extensive and very interesting review of Living with Complexity
In Norman’s view, Gore’s desk is the cluttered extension of an organized mind. Indeed, Norman interviewed many seemingly organized owners of messy workspaces and heard them repeatedly request, “Please don’t clean my desk.” The apparent disorder of the office was being carefully tracked in their minds. Norman explains that all of our desire for “simplicity” is a false hope because life is complex. Complexity, however, does not need to be confusing.
We find complexity amazingly interesting AND confusing; since starting ‘the improvised life’, we’ve have had to totally GET with our messy workspace, and it’s vast piles of ideas that we’ve found and can’t keep up with filing. We’re kind of obsessed with “messy” spaces of creative people, who clearly have their own unique mental filing systems. We find that so many people think they are somehow flawed for having an in-flux workspace, we love to post examples to antidote the notion. Here’s another favorite. read more…
Wondrous, dragonfly-like model planes can float for up to half an hour under the power of one single-wound rubber band. This trailer Float is a view into the passionate world of model plane builders; it is mesmerizing and curiously relaxing, a weekend retreat.
via BoingBoing
We are constantly amazed at the useful and stylish stuff that is available on Amazon – WAY beyond books, music and electronics. There are obvious design treasures like the fine bone china pitcher by Jasper Conran (a perfect wedding gift) or a cowhide rug
…like oddly-shaped glass laboratory vessels that we uses as flower vases; these Pyrex long-neck flasks
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The great, eccentric MondoBloggo has decided to celebrate sculptor Constantin Brancusi’s 135 birthday by posting 30 gorgeous (unattributed) photos of the amazing artist, his work and his studio. The studio is a space we covet and dream of; we wonder how differently we’d think if we lived in a space like that…and then…is it possible to build some of that sensibility into an ordinary urban space…? read more…
This picture on Wary Meyers’ site stopped us dead with desire. Writes Wary:
“All kinds of awesomeness from Molly and Norman McGrath’s incredible 1978 book on interiors for kids, Children’s Spaces: 50 Architects and Designers Create Environments for the Young
Without a doubt the best book ever published about children’s design.”
We see this fab paint-spattered floor as a fine playground for adults we well.
Related posts: fling and be flung (jackson pollock)
a painted (floor) rug
dept of painted floors: apple green
painted floors with a surprise
Yoshie Nishikawa
The Interventionist’s Toolkit, Mimi Zeiger’s long and illuminating essay in Design Observer, tracks the effect the recession has had on inspiring frugal, improvisational strategies for urban spaces around the world. When there’s no money for traditional architecture projects,” Provisional, Opportunistic, Ubiquitous, and Odd Tactics in Guerilla and DIY Practice and Urbanism” take root. We’ve excerpted the sections of Zeiger’s piece that are chock full of examples, with links to explore.
“These days vacant lots offer sites for urban farming, mini-golf, and dumpster pools. Trash recycles into a speculative housing prototype (see the Tiny Pallet House). Whether it’s The Living’s Amphibious Architecture or Mark Shepard’s Serendipitor, the built environment speaks through mobile devices. Retail spaces hit by the recession are fodder for reinvention, as the art organization No Longer Empty transforms unleased storefronts into temporary galleries. Even the street itself is reclaimed. REBAR’s annual initiative, Park(ing) Day, urges global participants to use a pranksters wit to turn parking spaces into pocket parks, one quarter at a time. (If you don’t feel like reading much, just click on the links, or scroll down for our favorites…) read more…
Objectified cinematographer Luke Geissbühler and his 5-year-old son Max made a homemade spacecraft out of a Thai food takeout container and a weather balloon, and outfitted it with an HD video camera and an iPhone. Last August, they sent it into space.
“The mission was…was send it up into the upper stratosphere to film the blackness beyond the earth…Eventually, the balloon will grow from lack of atmospheric pressure, burst, and begin to fall…It would have to survive 100 MPH winds, temperature of 60 degrees below zero, speeds of over a 150 mph, and the high risk of a water landing….To retrieve the craft, it would need to deploy a parachute, descend through the clouds and transmit a GPS coordinate to a cell phone tower….Then we have to find it.”
The video gets really suspenseful as the balloon approaches the breaking point. We find it really inspiring to ride along with homemade spacecraft.
via Pamela Hovland, via Objectified Blog
Related post: ‘objectified’ will change how you view the things around you
Stacey Harwood
After reading our post on painting fabric-covered furniture, Stacey Harwood sent us an email about her great “guest” chair. “I knew a white chair would not stay white for long in my NYC apartment so I bought some fabric markers and I invite our guests to sign it. I’m happy to say that it has been signed by some of our most celebrated poets: Mark Strand and John Ashbery are toward the top; Charles Simic is on the seat. You can also distinguish Jim Cummins, Susan Wheeler and Star Black (poet, collage artist, photographer). To the lower right is Gabriella Gershenson, a senior editor at Saveur. On the left is Deborah Landau and Richard Howard…”
Harwood’s husband, David Lehman is series editor of the annual The Best American Poetry books, which is how they come to have to many fine poets and writers as friends. Their blog is The Best American Poetry.
“It’s a wonderful record of the first two years in our apartment and truly a one-of-a-kind piece that gives us much pleasure.”
Harwood improvised a whole other order of guest book…
…
….That long list of poets made us poke around the internet to read some poems. Here’s a beauty by Mark Strand: read more…
We made this sign almost a year ago to accompany our post about making time to pursue what’s REALLY important to you; we can’t remember why we didn’t publish it. When we stumbled on it after all this time, it shook our head up a bit and put a few things in perspective, which we figure is always a good thing.
Related post: the power of time off
Steve Burns/New York Magazine
It snowed AGAIN last night in New York City so we thought it fitting to post New York Magazine’ SWELL slideshow and story about the snow fort Steve Burns made in the courtyard of his chic-o apartment in Williamsburg, during the blizzard of a few weeks ago.
Piling the snow took about three hours, digging it out took a bit longer because I did it myself with a shovel and a really big serving spoon. All in all, I’d say about eight hours of work.
We LOVE the iced refreshments… read more…
World History Archive/Alamy/Alamy
The Happiness Project recently posted Tolstoy‘s Ten Rules of Life, found in Tolstoy, Henri Troyat’s biography
“Have a goal for your whole life, a goal for one section of your life, a goal for a shorter period and a goal for the year; a goal for every month, a goal for every week, a goal for every day, a goal for every hour and for every minute, and sacrifice the lesser goal to the greater.”
We discovered that asking ourselves “What is our goal for this moment” can mean the opposite of the usual “goals-for-getting-ahead-and-keeping-tight-control-on-life” thinking. It makes us ask “What’s REALLY important here?”
“…a zoom into the majestic disk of stars and dust lanes in the NASA Hubble Space Telescope view of the spiral galaxy NGC 2841, which lies 46 million light-years away in the constellation of Ursa Major (The Great Bear).”
via OpenCulture
We love this imperfect round of chalkboard painted on a wall. It made us think “Oh yeah….why not paint chalkboard paint in odd or organic freeform shapes on the wall, instead of the usual rectangle? Or perhaps a long thing strip/stripe across a whole wall….
You can buy chalkboard paint here
via Style Files
Related post: good idea: chalkboard panel as disguise
grown-up chalkboard “art”
jars with chalkboard labels to buy or d-i-y
