Pret-A-Voyager – an engaging and well designed travel blog, written by a nice lady living in Paris. I love the Boarding Pass feature – where designers and others divulge their travel habits.
Pink Tentacle – an excellent Japanese art/culture blog of sorts.
Men, please see also – “I have to look a little bit nice because If I don’t look good, people will say, ‘Oh, what the heck is this guy?’” A sleek video lookbook on NYMag.
I listed my top ten Kiwi online stores in the fashion/lifestyle/design sphere for Orcon’s Digital Life. Read the list here. Perfect for all ye lazy shoppers.
30 Bucks A Week – vegetarian recipes and food shopping for 2 – with a budget of thirty dollars every seven days. I’m trying to cook more, for less and this blog is brilliant
20 ways to makeover your wardrobe (with a NZ designer focus). As Garth says on Wayne’s World – “Live in the now” and keep up with the seasons.
Out Of Print – your favourite book covers reproduced on tees. Love it – good for both ladies and fellas!
Karen Walker at New York Fashion Week – complete with a mini interview with Karen herself. I loved the hair, red lips, thigh highs and blouses. The collection’s called Salzburg USA. [Also, the Karen Walker website has just had a fantastic makeover and features new sections like an inspiration scrapbook. Check it.]
“I was always sorry when I closed BackTrack Records in Trenton, NJ back in 1992. At that time, I went online with a computer messaging system called Wildcat. I had all the records from the store online for people to download and buy. From a 2400 baud modem. It was called This Notes for You BBS and I was one of the first people to ever sell records online in this form…” Read the rest of this comment from a record store owner on the PSFK post What Happens When Record Stores Die? He talks about the full circle of the internet – now we’re back to seeing and speaking to each other.
If any of you are are in NYC you must go see Mr. Brainwash’s first solo show in the city. It’s called Icons and is at 415 W. 13th Street, Ground Floor. Dude is a genius and I really regret not buying one of his prints last year when I had the chance!
I am really excited by Stafford Wilson’s art – he’s taken op-shop bargain paintings and added to them – creating surreal futuristic scenes. Excellent concept. I’d love to hang something like ‘Venice’ above my desk.
Great podcast on 95bfm: Annabel Youens, digital strategist for Musichype, discusses the concepts behind starting such a multi-faced musical project, which prompted The Mint Chicks to ditch Warner for their next release, “Bad Buzz”.
Look at those stunning eyes! Gaggle are flipping great, and this is their first video – I Hear Flies:
Cool and fool from Something Changed. Yes, yes, yes.
And finally (but not least) my friend Pete is serialising/blogging a novel. A blovel? No matter, A Fucking Awful Weekend is off to a good start. Can’t wait to read more; and in an unprecedented deal he is publishing another chapter tonight in return for this plug. Better catch up with the story now.
Australian & New Zealand friends -Yen Magazine and their surfy mates at Rip Curl are running a fashion blogger competition. Dip your toes in the frothy sea of fashion power scribing.
This worked, I tried it! “Nearly-instant mood lifter: throw 5 cinnamon sticks & some orange peel in a pot. Add lots of water. Bring to a boil. Simmer. You’re welcome.” – Emma Alvarez Gibson.
Look at this sweet shot of Raquel Zimmermann by Nick Knight for Alexander McQueen’s Spring 2010 Campaign. Snakes on a model lolz, etc.
Demi Moore – a lovingly photoshopped advertisement. Before and after…
Oh yeah, and on the topic of ‘editing’ – Heidi Montag’s face… Laugh (or not because your face is frozen) but the photos in this article are pretty raw/good.
You can listen to the underwater sounds of the Antarctic Ocean! There’s delay of only a few seconds.
RZA recommends this sweet vege burger. Can’t wait to make it and I’m pretty sure there’s a waffle iron lying around here somewhere (or a crimping iron, ha).
Vintage Christopher Walken: “Despite popular belief, Christopher Walken did not come out of his mother’s womb as an old man who takes no shit from shit.”
Photographer John Rawlings shot over 200 Vogue covers in his lifetime. He died in 1970, leaving behind an archive of over 30,000 images. Curator Kohle Yohannan lovingly edited the collection into a monograph featuring the stage, screen, and society stars of the 1940s and 1950s, including Marlene Dietrich, Salvador Dali, Veronica Lake, Lena Horne, and Montgomery Clif.
Amy posts on the Beginner’s Mind – a wonderful concept for anybody who’s stuck – Buddhists, older people or even you.
365 days of Ampersands. More than you can shake that twisted stick at. Click each to be directed to the typeface’s library.
First one for the year, first one for the decade! I hope you’re all still information and inspiration junkies. Ugh, I am. Need more links to feed my insatiable curiosity.
The Weardrobe 100 is a collection of 100 personal style shots collected from the top fashion blogs in 2009. I really enjoyed the diversity and ‘flipping’ through some great outfits.
This infographic was handmade by Russian cosmonaut, Georgi Grechko. It’s a cyclogram that shows a 96-day flight of Salyut 6. Some 22 parallel time-series show 1500 sunrises and 1500 sunsets during the flight, a schedule for space walks and baths, and visits of resupply ships bringing equipment, fresh fruit, and gingerbread. Not much more to see than that; but I loved the way he tracked it by hand.
Running the Numbers by Chris Jordan looks at contemporary American culture through the ‘austere lens of statistics’. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on. Phenomenal images!
Caffeine pa-pa-power! Not all hits are equal. Use the handy chart to get more from your morning fix.
I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy of Twin Magazine. It’s founded by Becky Smith, one of the Lula geniuses. She says “I wanted to expand and create something more grown up, versitile and stronger. Something that still looked gorgeous but something that really said something as well. It is possible to have the best of both worlds.”
Seth Godin has published a free ebook – What Matters Now. “Here are more than seventy big thinkers, each sharing an idea for you to think about as we head into the new year.”
I had an email from Brooklyn based line, Beetle and Flor and loved their work. They make hand casted porcelain skulls – inspired by North American flora and fauna. This here beaver has 18K gold teeth. A paperweight for the power CEO?
The Shortest Word is nice words for people who like and love them. Very similar to Phraseology, but watered more often!
Speaking of words, I’ve been doing a bit of naming work of late. It’s bloody alchemy I tell you. Hit the right mood, prop up the benefits, find a semi-okay url (must have), convince the designer they can make a sexy wordmark. One pinch luck, two pinches wooing other people. Anyway, once you’re done The Name Inspector will rip you to shreds in an educated and humorous manner. Sigh, too late to rename the baby, the name has stuck.
An awesome video from Air (love!) – Sing Sang Sung - psychedelic 2D animation for the win.
Prominent NZ beat conductor Stinky Jim interviews Hudson Mohawke! “When I’m writing it is almost as if I can see what I want the drums to do, not actually visually, but if I close my eyes. I definitely do have an image in my head of where everything should sit in a song.”
“No.Zine is an independent arts zine, released in series, the first collection; 1 to 3 features a variety of young artists, designers, writers, photographers and illustrators. Each issue is conceptually centred around it’s issue number.”
Earth sandwich! If I put my piece of bread on the ground in Shanghai (perhaps I will get Jules to do this for me), and the people of Argentina put a piece of bread near the border of Paraguay – we’d make an earth sandwich. Auckland makes a sandwich with Spain, Hawaii and Botswana sound delicious… what about where you live? Nom.
The Guardian comments on 10 top fashion blogs of the moment. Some of their snarks are hilarious… “And we all know that a call from Kanye is the true measure of modern success.”
Cat Party checks out what might be the best iPhone app… ever. Something is way too perfect about that middle picture.
The Eyewriter is a low-cost eye-tracking apparatus + custom software that allows graffiti writers and artists with paralysis to draw using only their eyes. Super awesome.
Cole Rise takes beautiful photos – Wyoming rainstorms, thoughtful cows, the universe, etc.
Design Assembly has a great article on colour choice, Watch That Swatch. What culture is leading your colour choices? This might just explain all the grubby baby pink buildings in Shanghai.
Wireless Internet Guide to the Top 20 US and 80 Major International Airports. (All I have to say is “boo Los Angeles”. Not only did they charge but they sent my bank into a security tizzy.)
Jason Lewis’s Tokyo Multiples. Things look better in groups, things look better in Japan.
Brand Twist: You don’t need a social media strategy. You need a brand building strategy.
A rare bird indeed, a decent twitter suggestion for you all: FakeAPStylebook. Read more about the project here (wait, how long did it take them to get a book deal?!).
An amazing article by Sarah Von – Who I Am vs. What I Do. She gives advice to a 24-year-old writer (quit looking at me funny) on how to cope when the labels we define ourselves with don’t quite match up to how we earn our keep.
Que Houxo is a Japanese artist who does paints ‘live’, in a acid-bright style – thanks to his use of fluorescent paints with black lights.
1AM Magazine features some of New Zealand’s creative young guns – all talented young things who create with their hands (accessories, knitwear, bags). Catch Part 1 and then mosey on over to Part 2.
52 Suburbs is an incredibly beautiful (and ongoing) documentation of Sydney, Australia’s diverse neighbourhoods.
Blog of the week – ii ne kore. Ii ne kore is a shorthand version of kore wa ii desu ne, an expression of appreciation or delight in Japanese.
Uh, speaking of delightful Japanese things, I like this video. Especially the last 4 seconds. Forgive me, I don’t usually fall victim to these sorts of cat-baby shenanigans, but gosh, look at em:
CatParty reviews a very enticing fashion book called I Love Your Style. (Pssst it’s nearly Christmas! Or how about as a birthday present for all your favourite Scorpio girls?)
Fashematics… This, plus that and a dash of crazy = haute couture.
Queen Michelle dresses up in a post called Layer Cake. Aside from being a beautiful display of style, it’s like a mini lesson in layering. A brilliant refresher for those of you going into winter.
Uh, hey Uffie, can you explain just exactly how you drilled into my mind and extracted my dream aesthetic for your Pop The Glock video? I kinda feel like this is motion picture Code For Something. The song is kinda nice too… lazy Saturday afternoons sipping vodka sodas (hair of the dog) by the pool.
CFS Loves Number 40. That’s 40 weeks of linktacular goodness. Because I am a nerdy cave dweller and y’all say you love what CFS loves, today’s one is extra beefy. Om nom nom.
A great TVC for The Economist magazine and a brief introduction to their excellent ads. If you want to be a copywriter, the Economist billboards are compulsory reading/studying!
What is Slow Sync Flash and how do you use it? An introduction to a cool low light photography solution.
China celebrates 60 years – and puts on a show like no other. Having recently spent several hours waiting in line at Tiananmen Square (to visit Mao in his mausoleum, reccomended) – the scale of pictures is phenomenal. In fact, I do believe my guide told me the square can hold a crowd of one million!
