Happy Belated Thanksgiving!

Ok, ok, I know I’m late (been hanging out with the family in South Florida) but I have been meaning to wish you all a Very Happy Turkey Day. Belated though it may be, I figure hey why not: since they started up all of the Christmas shenanigans so darned early this year we might as well carry on with the thanks giving. Right? Right! So go on and buy your Christmas/Hannukah/holiday presents, but don’t forget to keep on being thankful for the little big things.

Like Turkey Cake (the family tradition pictured above)((and getting to blow out birthday candles on a cake shaped like a turkey!)).

Color my world

Uncanny that I stumble upon this, the new art installation located on the ceiling of the UN’s Human Rights and Alliance of Civilizations Room in Geneva, Switzerland, immediately after I babble on about how obsessed with color and texture I am. It took artist Miquel Barcelo over a year and more than 100 tons of paints and pigment to create the striking piece that’s arousing controversy for the large amount of money that was spent in it’s creation (approximately 23 million US dollars) because it has been speculated that some funds may have been diverted from efforts to alleviate poverty and boost health care in poor countries. However, the Spanish Ministry insists that this is not the case in the least. On its inspiration, Barecelo states: “On a day of immense heat in the middle of the Sahel desert, I recall with vivacity the mirage of an image of the world dripping toward the sky”.

Personally, I think it’s exquisitely awe-inspiring what with it’s dreamy, fanciful yet organic cave-like feel. (I would *LOVE* to have a ceiling like that/this!). It’s beautiful to see how all of the colors work so magnificently together, the way that we humans ought to with the palette of our cultures. I’d bet that that’s the sort of sentiment Mr. Barecelo hopes to inspire in all of the world leaders and representatives sitting below.

via notcot, joyengine, Life in the Fast Lane, Times Online

Textile Art by Tinctory

I’m admittedly a bit of a fabric addict, and people who know me well-enough/long-enough have likely seen me get all giggly and bubbly over a fabric, a particular technique in a garment, color, a really fascinating texture, etc. And I must say that Tinctory gives me that same ineffable sort of feeling. The swedish-born designer, Eva, resides in the UK and creates all of her pieces by hand using old world techniques like smocking. She is truly a textile artist who amazingly employs a vast array of the beautiful, interesting (and meticulous) hand sewing techniques I’ve been admiring in my The Art of Manipulating Fabric book I’ve had since college, and often dyes her own fabrics. I love and relate to her fascination with texture and really admire her dedication to the craft. I’ve contemplated trying some of the more laborious techniques out, but I’ve sometimes wondered if I have the patience; that’s probably a cop-out, though, since I have spent an entire all-nighter (or two) hemming a gown(s) by hand (*shudders at the though* – I hate hemming)((yeah, the picture of me falling asleep at my old ghetto ironing board in the Hello section was from one of these such nights)).

And I love, love, love that she takes this lovely old technique that is most often seen nowadays in childrens-wear and makes it both modern and adult and uses often striking combinations of colors and textures (swoon!). The fact that it is fabric jewelry pokes me affectionately in the heart as well, as I’ve been pondering making some and seeing this is most definitely inspiring. It kind of makes me want a sort-of-ruff-inspired piece. 0:)

In fact, it’s only adding to the pot of ideas I’m internally gathering towards a sort of biggish idea (..maybe…).

I highly recommend checking out tinctory’s flickr site, where you can see a lot of present and past work (including other really swell and intriguing techniques) photographed in a matter that is quite lovely.

If you weren’t smiling a moment ago…

For those of you who haven’t seen it yet, little Capucine:

That settles it: When I have little creatures of my own, they’re totally going to learn french because hearing the product of this adorable child’s imagination in french ups the awwwwwww factor by about a zillion degrees.

You know, I think we should all give our imagination some exercise and sit around and try making up the most fabulously absurd stories possible!! Just because you’re a grown up it doesn’t mean you should stop putting that imagination to good use.. really, who wants to be realistic all the time. Not me, that’s for sure. haha ;)

Here Hear!

Concepts and conceptual jewelry after my nerd-girl heart (*warm fuzzies*):

Sounds.Butter’s conceptual product that would allow a physical (and wearable) representation of sound. I don’t think this is a functioning example but more a prototype; but I think it’s a pretty cool idea. I’m imagining an embroidery machine hooked up to an equalizer (?)((similarly set up to Sakura Koshimizu’s – who you’ll read about in just a moment or two)) so that the sound could be fed right into the machine… or at the very least you could take the visualization of the sound and program it into the embroidery machine (I’ve never actually fiddled with one, but I used to work in a small fine fabrics store where I saw them demonstrated a fair amount).

I have a certain affection for words.. though I imagine that sounds a little goofy. Poetry, quotes, books, lyrics, etc. I’m always writing and/or collecting little sayings. Sometimes I just love the way that words sound together play with one another (witness, perhaps, some ee cummings poetry). Anyway, it’s not uncommon for me to incorporate the written word into my clothing-designs and well anything (such as the hello painted on my ceiling in my college apartment, and the window project I’ll be doing and posting about soon(!)) in some way, shape, or form; so the this is just a whole new and throughly intriguing way of incorporating words – and the spoken word no less (!) – onto clothes/fabric. Imagine the visualization of a poem spoken out loud onto a dress or skirt or set of curtains!

I know I certainly love that idea, which is why I was tickled pink to then stumble upon Sakura Koshimizu’s work. Koshimizu laser-cuts visualized sound into metals to create jewelry :

“I do” wedding bands

“Bell” cuff

“Giggle” necklace

Via DesignBoom and The Carrotbox

How now, Moscow?

Love it or hate it, here’s a woman unafraid to rock a style all her own. Makes me smile, it does.

Looks pretty toasty, too, eh?! Thoroughly tempting, what with winter being all up on fall’s heels. *Shivers just thinking about it*

via (where else) The Sartorialist

The Wrap-able Boot

The dancer in me can’t help but adore wrapable shoes (oh how I miss those pointe shoes! *sniffle*), and these elastic wrap boots from Toms are absolutely no exception. The elastic wrap bit also reminds me a bit of the Ace bandages I’d sometimes have to wrap around my knee! But, of course the cool thing about being able to wrap them yourself, is that you can adjust the height. And hey, gone is the problem of not being able to cram my sometimes (err, formally) large calves into boots, or having trouble getting them zipped up over the tights, socks, and leg-warmer (sometimes jeans in there, too) combo I tend to don in the height of winter that always seems to result in boots with busted zippers (seriously, I have two pairs I still need to take in and get fixed)….

Anyway, the super awesome things about all of Toms Shoes is that for every pair you buy, a pair is given to a child in need in Argentina and South Africa. The boots also happen to be vegan-friendly, and come in black, brown, tan, olive green, and red. Personally, I’m loving the red…. Red being my black and all.

Ooooh: A packrat’s delight or nightmare?

Check out this “transformer-shelf” created by Amsterdam based designer Martin Sammer. When closed, it looks like a regular sort of storage unit, however (in practical terms) it opens into a rather complex interior that allows you to customize your storage options… hold all sorts of different objects or (in our favorite artist/designer terms) encourage you to interact with the object and became a part of it’s shape evolution, allowing you to become it’s designer so-to-speak as there are a myriad of different ways in which it can be interpreted.

I think it’s intriguing from both the practical and artsy person standpoint. Because I:
a): Have a lot of stuff… And an object that is not totally huge but has lots of little nooks and crannies would enable me to stick A Whole Lot Of Stuff in it, which is a really exciting prospect because I’m still looking around my quasi-newly-moved-into apartment trying to figure out where to put everything. I could see myself enjoying tossing it all into this (*ahem* maybe just so that I don’t have to look at it anymore)… Granted, it may be rather complicated so I could also see myself not remembering where in this labyrinthian storage device I put all those random objects. Not that that’s a totally far cry from how things are now (laughs awkwardly)….
b): As a designer I really, really enjoy customizable things that I can play with. It’s so much more fun that way! And I really like things that encourage others to do the same. Interact with your stuff, yo!

via Gizmodo

Hello, Mr. President

I am so proud, tonight. Here’s to history being made. Here’s to hope and change. And here’s to knowing once again that if enough people get up and say something we CAN do something. And in doing something we can change the country, change the world.

It’s beautiful.

Wow.

Do Something Different

(My team circa 2000, when all of these Bush shenanigans began.)

Ladies, gentlemen, and everyone in between:

Back in the day I was a part of something awesome. A team. A performance ensemble. A gaggle of teenage girls (and we all know what bitches teenage girls can be) from all different “cliques” and/or social groups, ethnic backgrounds, religious affiliations, political affiliations, etc; we didn’t always like each other, didn’t always get along or see eye-to-eye, but when push came to shove we were a team always working on being the very best we could be. We counted on one another.

Sometimes one of us would have trouble with a particular move, toss, etc. Surrounded by our entire team practicing the work, one of us (and indeed sometimes it was me) would have it wrong and know we had it wrong; it didn’t look right or feel right, and when we tossed that saber, riffle, or flag it very often didn’t land in our hands but flat on the floor with a resounding thud… but despite this, we did it the same way over and over and over again expecting that perhaps magically without any effort we’d suddenly get it right just by wanting it to be better.

And don’t we all know that it just doesn’t work that way. So you’d end up standing there getting increasingly frustrated that it isn’t going your way, and our instructors would really start to bellow – we’d get the full name treatment – “[insert full name here]!!!!!!! I’ve just noticed you doing the SAME THING a hundred times in a row. Next time do something – anything!- different. I don’t care if you drop it, or if it falls on your head JUST DO SOMETHING ELSE! If you do the same thing again the entire guard goes down for 25 push-ups.” (or something like that). Now your heart is thumping in your chest and your face is red and you’re trying to stomp down that frustration that’s billowing inside you as you can literally feel the pressure of your teammates not wanting to do 25 more push-ups… And so, you manage to do something a little or a lot different; sometimes it clanks to the floor and sometimes you get it right the first time – either way it’s a process.

In anything in life, it rarely does any good to do the same thing over and over when those actions or decisions clearly don’t work or give you the desired result. No doubt we’ve all given this advice numerous times in different shapes and forms to our friends and family members, and now we need to do it as a country. Our country is just like any team, we don’t always get along or see eye-to-eye but as we’ve seen when tragedy strikes we have an amazing knack for banding together.

And we need to do just that Right Now. Change can be scary, but doing the same thing again by voting for McCain/Palin will be result in an even scarier future. So, America:

Do Something Different.

Vote for Obama.

He’s already inspiring people not only in our country, but around the entire world.

So get off your butt and don’t let an amazing opportunity pass you by. (Seriously, I’ve been sick all night and I’m just about to head out to the polls barf bag in hand)