Archive for: June, 2012

Hej!

Posted: Jun 28 · Comments: 64

I know this already seems like the year of extravagant travel, which is kind of because it is, but Max and I went back on the road about a week ago. If roads went across oceans? All the way to SWEDEN. This is yet another example of something that is old news on the Twitter and Instagram but blog-only old-school folk would have no way of knowing about. So here you go. That’s what’s up.

We’re both taking a two-week intensive graduate seminar on Scandinavian design through Parsons, where Max is getting his graduate degree. As an undergrad at NYU, I just weaseled my way in with my mediocre looks and social awkwardness and creepy obsession with the Swedes. That’s just how I do.

Obviously visiting Stockholm is a long-time dream come true, having been infatuated with this country, its people, and its design sensibilities for years. I am not disappointed. Everyone is so lovely, the city is so easy to navigate and get around, and everything looks so amazing that it makes me want to puke.

OH, SWEDES. I love you. You are so efficient and friendly and clean and kind. And did I mention sexy? Because HOT DAMN. Sexy sexy Swedes all around me. Normally I’d be annoyed because good looking people genuinely upset me but not if they’re Swedish.

(Aside: when we checked into our hotel at 2 a.m. after about 24 hours of travel, Martin at the front desk offered us a “sweet snack” or a “salty snack” and gave us a form with two boxes so we could check one. Thinking about this still makes me immeasurably happy. ”Salty snack.”)

The itinerary is packed but I’m trying to sneak in some thrifting where I can get it and making Max insane with my lunatic antics. Even if he’d rather lay down and die in the street, I’ve been dragging him off down quiet roads and across long bridges and into weird places the internet told me to go only to end up at stores that only sell vintage records or retro women’s clothes. He likes it. That’s what I tell him, anyway.

I love little vintage Dala horses, especially when they look a little rough and tumbled and distinctly handmade like these two. Also, that happy happy tray. Irresistible.

Among some other random stuff we picked up is this little shallow West German bowl with super trippy glazing inside. We’ll use it for something.

Goofy amateur brown studio pottery abounds at Stockholm thrifts and it’s taking all my willpower not to buy it all. But the suitcase is only so big and my chances of successfully transporting everything home are only so realistic so I’m resisting. I know these particular items will be *controversial* (loathed by most) but fuck it, I love these little blobby candlesticks, and for only $2 I’m 100% allowed to. I know they look like alien poops here but once they have candles and are on my mantle you’ll be singing a different tune. JUST WAIT.

I should probably note that the educational opportunities on this trip are totally amazing and, it should shock you to hear me say, totally outshining the whole thrifting situation. We’ve had a couple great days in the NationalMuseum, Drottningholm, Skokloster (AMAZING), the Nordiska Museet, Skansen, a lecture on IKEA—all amounting to the conclusion that Sweden is Where. It’s. At. We have a fantastic syllabus with fantastic readings and teachers and curators around every corner telling us what things are and happy to field questions constantly. Truth be told it’s been a while since I felt quite so enthusiastic about school and learning stuff and doing assignments, but this is different. I’m among the Swedes, after all.

Can I just say, though—these tea towels are fucking cute. If I can’t be renovating my kitchen then at least I can be buying small jolly things for it to use when it’s done? This has been my logic for the past year now. Speaking of, a little progress happened before I left and I even took pictures, so let’s hope I have some time to put together a post or two before I’m back in Brooklyn. Shockingly, I have already hit some unforeseen speed bumps and I need an internet hero to set me on the right path.

What am I saying? I already need that right now in this very moment. The Google machine has been iffy about where the good vintage is at in/around Stockholm. We have the weekend free, so do any beautiful residents of this magical land have any recommendations for a flea market or several? Or any particular stores or areas or things I should really know about and check out? Tell me everything you know! I demand it!

Rocker

Posted: Jun 12 · Comments: 35

One of the things that I love about Eames shell chairs is how versatile they are by design. Take out four screws, pop on a new base, and BLAM-O, your desk chair on casters just became a lounge chair! Or a dining chair! Or a school desk! Or a bench at the laundromat with pieces of ABC gum stuck and hardened on the bottom! Like magic.

I bought that blue shell about a year and a half ago when I was visiting Chandler in Portland. The original naugahyde upholstery had seen MUCH better days, so I made the decision to just strip off the upholstery, restore the shell, throw a 4-star contract swivel base on it, and cover the screw holes on the seat of the chair with an IKEA sheepskin. Like so:

That’s the other great thing about the original fiberglass shells—they’re INCREDIBLY durable and even the crappiest-looking, saddest, down-n-out washed-up piece-of-shit chair can be brought back to gleaming, glorious life with a few simple steps and only a couple potentially hazardous chemicals. I can’t stress enough: when it comes to shells, vintage is always, always best.

I talked some jive after the restoration about replacing the base with a rocking base and using it in my Manhattan living room, but I found a dining table instead so the chair remained a desk chair through my move to Brooklyn. Using it as a rocker was always in the back of my mind, but there hasn’t been a great spot for one here, either.

UNTIL NOW.

Hello, baby. You are so ubiquitous and I love you.

I finally bit the bullet and purchased a rocking base (black metal with birch runners) from the Modern Conscience eBay shop. For 95 bucks plus super cheap $4 shipping, it’s basically a whole new chair for just under $100. So worth it. The base is really nice and seems very well-made and assembly could not have been easier. I can also say that there was a slight hiccup with the shipping but the customer service at Modern Conscience was extremely responsive and remedied the situation quickly and efficiently.

For serious stalkerz, don’t you worry—Bertoia Diamond is still around, just not in this same spot. The living room has been feeling a little stale and I needed to shake things up. Yes, white Bertoia set against black pocket doors totally brought the high-contrast drama, but bright blue rocker brings some summery colorful fun or whatever that I love.

The other great thing about these chairs is how petite they are, taking all the comfort from a big lounge chair but none of the size. It’s comfy and cozy and a place people actually want to sit, but appropriately scaled to smaller spaces. It’s also super duper light, so it’s easy to move around all the time to wherever my finicky heart desires.

I also like having this chair in the living room because it plays off the blues in the rug super well. That’s not usually something I spend too much time worrying about, but I do like when really different pieces coordinate instead of trying to get all matchy-matchy with shit.

This chair is the best of all the chairs. To review:

1. Versatile.
2. Durable.
3. Small.
4. Cute & colorful.
5. Comfy.

I don’t care that everyone and their mother has one. I love it. I love it so much.

Sweet Victory, at Last.

Posted: Jun 6 · Comments: 39

One of life’s biggest hardships and greatest injustices over the last three years or so is that I’ve been stuck with the above setup for dispensing salt and pepper onto my food. I’m not a terribly fabulous chef, so I rely heavily on these two basic seasonings to render my meals edible, and I have long dreamt of a pairing that could do the job with a bit more panache. That salt shaker has a matching pepper shaker, and while they’re cute and vintage and cost me all of a couple dollars at Salvation Army, what am I supposed to do with pre-ground pepper? What do you take me for, some kind of goddamn animal? The little plastic “temporary” pepper grinder is way too small and has to be refilled constantly and just makes me generally sad with its apathy and mediocrity.

Walking through IKEA with my pal, Anna, we both totally plotzed over these new salt and pepper mills from the new ÄDELSTEN line of kitchen products. Made from black and white marble, the texture in real life is kind of super amazing (the lighter looking parts of the pepper mill will darken with use over time), and at 7 inches high and about 3 pounds each, they just feel nice to use. Like things that fancy people with fancy pepper would own. People who buy kosher organically-produced cage-free fair-traded artisanal salt and exotic gourmet free-range peppercorns raised on a diet of human breast milk and diamond dust. From Fiji.

The bottoms even double as cute little salt and pepper cellars, which is just all-around smart and adorable. I LOVE THEM. The whole line is beautiful, by the way, and includes probably the most amazing rolling pin I’ve ever seen that I was SO tempted to buy before realizing I’m about as likely to roll out some dough as I am to eat my own toes. Read: I’d have to be very hungry and out of hummus.

Of course, they were also $15 a pop, making them super cheap for the materials, design, and quality of construction. People talk smack about the quality of IKEA products all the time, but here’s the thing: their best stuff is really nice, and usually cheaper that their competitors’ worst stuff. They definitely make some crap that falls apart, too, but nobody’s forcing anyone to buy that. IKEA4LIFE.

Naturally, it just so happens that the very next day, Chandler was in town for the weekend and we took a little jaunt out to the Design Within Reach Annex store in Secaucus, where damaged goods and floor models go to die before people like me come along to buy them (my very damaged but mostly-fixable bubble lamp came from there, negotiated down to $65!). I know what you’re thinking: Daniel is the greatest host ever! “Here, come to Brooklyn for the weekend! We’ll spend an hour and a half driving to New Jersey and you can watch me shop!” I really know how to show people a good time.

I’ve been pining after these Muuto “Plus” salt and pepper mills designed by Norway Says for a couple years, but the $70 price tag for each one always stopped me from buying them. It always went like this:

Beautiful? Yes. Am I in a place in my life where I can justify spending $150 on salt and pepper mills? Fuck you, stupid.

But the price on this lone pepper mill was slashed in half and had no visible damage, so it kind of had to be. So what if I found perfect salt and pepper mills just the day before? I can use those for cooking, and this for eating? Like it can sit on the table and make me happy while the others sit five feet away on the counter? Sure. Why not. Let’s do this. You see my lack of options, here.

Also in the category of things I’ve wanted to happen finally happening, we found a shower curtain! Max had an idea that he wanted a black ticking stripe shower curtain to bring a sort of vintage old-school barbershop vibe to our bathroom. It wouldn’t have necessarily been my first choice (being a super-boring-white-linens-only type of asshole), but he had my support with the caveat that it be extra-long. “Go forth, my child,” I said. “Make your dreams come true. While you’re at it, work on mine too.” And it was so.

The problem was that our old shower curtain (plain white waffle, like $10 from Target) seemed awfully short once the bathroom was “done” and made the huge medicine cabinet look even more huge, towering above the curtain rod like it was. That the shower head spout is abnormally high in this bathroom wasn’t really helping matters since it was so visible above the shower curtain.

The new curtain was custom-made by Alison Daniel at the Modern Folk Shop on Etsy. The fabric is really nice and heavy, and the whole thing is really well constructed. It wouldn’t be terribly difficult to just DIY an extra-long shower curtain, but it would need to be wider than a standard roll of fabric, meaning that a seam has to be sewn down the entire thing. And sewing a really neat 8-foot seam into a patterned fabric was just way more than my sewing skills are up for. I’m only human. This Alison Daniel lady is apparently more than human though, since her seam is perfect.

Of course, we still (still!) need to find a bathmat and I still (still!) need to finish re-caulking and I still (still!) need to fix up the super painty, inoperable bathroom window. The window thing feels the most pressing, since now it’s summer and the lack of bathroom ventilation will quickly go from being kind of irritating to kind of disgusting. That’s one of those projects that sounds easy and fun in my mind but I know will leave me crying and possibly regretful and shaken to my very core. Sounds like my kind of summer activity.

In other news, GUESS WHAT CAME IN THE MAIL YESTERDAY?!

This.

My prizes.

All my sweet prizes.

Apple Store Gift Cards. Big Money. It’s not everyday this happens. In fact, this has only happened once. And it was yesterday.

Oh yeah. Now I have no excuses to pull my shit together with this kitchen thing.**

**I might still have some excuses. Like fear.

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