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You are viewing the most recent 25 entries.
9th February 2010
5:44am: My musical wanderings....
When I'm not looking at furniture or old photos or magazines, I browse the music blogs. I look for blogs that are tasteful and pay attention to history. I am bigoted against music that doesn't look nice in its wrapping. Who could resist a blog called feelmybicep? It doesn't hurt that my "compatibility" on last.fm with feelmybicep is "very high". 
8th February 2010
12:05pm: My first interior at Polyvore
I am very pleased with it, I wanted it to look fanciful yet comfortable. I reached an "item limit" and can't add any more.
7th February 2010
5:55am: Wallpaper from the 70s
When I was a kid in the 1970s, one of my favorite books was a gigantic book of wallpaper samples. I have spent a lot of time combing the internet for a scrap here and there of the glorious silvers and velvets of my youth. A lot of the sites I visit come and go, or their collections are underwhelming. Wallpaper From the 70s carries a number of examples of these glam patterns. If I had my own place and enough money, I'd do a room with the "Elektra" pattern. I love wallpaper, most people are still afraid of it, since it was over-used or misused in the seventies and eighties.   Read about the history of wallpaper.
6th February 2010
4:57pm: Paper Pursuits: fashion and design print collectibles
 Here is the site where I wasted most of this Saturday. Never mind that I cannot at this time afford 80% of the material (some magazines and images are selling for $300... (libraries, take care of your precious collections!)Much of the content available for sale on Paper Pursuits is available for online browsing. On a related note, I spent a lot of time on Google Books a few weeks ago and noticed that you can browse entire magazines from twenty or thirty years ago. I myself looked at issues of Billboard from the 1970s.  Remember you can always 'print screen' if you want your own digital copy of this stuff!
5th February 2010
9:46am: More on Polyvore, and why people tire of good ideas
Polyvore is too much fun for those of us in the visual arts. However, just like everything visual on the net, you have to sift through a lot of disappointing content and - most depressingly - people who are too free with their praise. Polyvore reminds me of art or design school, where you have to sit through presentations by people who want to work in design or fashion because they think it is easy or glamorous. Here is an example of how people used a striking pair of sunglasses.  I think the image in the bottom row in the middle is the best of these six interpretations. I think that people use models and celebrities too much in their designs. What depresses me the most are the designs that are too in love with commercialism. Your work should be about you - even people in advertising look for originality when hiring. What can we do to promote stylistic diversity on the internet? I don't know the answer to this, other than rewarding people who do original work. One would think that good work would be in the interests of the site's creators, I think Flickr does a good job of subtly promoting talent from amateurs and part-time artists, others should follow their lead.
3rd February 2010
9:54am: I am addicted to POLYVORE
I spend a fair amount of time researching design, especially retail offerings, on the internet. How I missed Polyvore, I don't know. On Polyvore, an application you can access through Facebook, you can browse fashions and add them to your own "collection". You can then build an outfit or concept. You can also add items that you have found elsewhere on the internet. You can create architectural or graphic backgrounds, too. You can spend hours trying to make a ugly but brilliant shoe work, for example. You can also make collages that bring together clothing and art, or clothing and interiors. I don't think that Polyvore is for the casual design or fashion enthusiast. I can take a couple of hours to build a collection you can work with. After about four hours, I have come up with my first set: Jacket is from the awesome Modcloth, where I also spend a great deal of time.
1st February 2010
9:57am: Blippy, for your voyeuristic pleasure
I spent some time this morning browsing Blippy, a site which allows users to link online accounts so others can peruse your purchases! I signed up, thinking you could just type in your receipts by hand (that might be interesting and fun)...but no, you actually have to link Blippy to your online account information (you can control what visitors see, but still.  I found browsing this site fun, I would participate more if they allowed Amazon. I did link my Ebay account, but no way am I going to link my bank account (I don't even bank online anyway!). I neither want nor need to know ALL of someone's consumer habits, I find Blippy interesting for the snapshots it provides of an internet citizen's comings and goings (gas, lunch, music purchases and DVD rentals). For one thing, I have been out of the workforce for a long time, so it gives me some nostalgia for urban living and working.  I am neither perverted nor obsessive, and I do think that while Blippy is interesting and a fun way to waste a half an hour here or there, users should have the option of manually adding their daily purchases. Blippy.
25th January 2010
9:54am: Fashion critics can be so annoying!
 Caption reads: "Sandra's dress would be just as chic without the extra embellishment. B-." linkWrong. It would be boring without the electric blue collar. Since when did people who apparently never venture outside nor read fashion magazines become the dictators of style? It's as if buyers for the mainstream retail industry have decided what entertainers should wear. If I want to look at boring but "chic" dresses, I'll surf for wedding pictures on the internet. And also, if I read one more item on Rihanna's "poor" fashion sense I am going to choke someone. Performers aren't supposed to dress "tastefully". Rihanna's style is young and clubby, if you don't get it, maybe you should think twice before commenting on it. More on this matter (with pictures) later this week.
22nd January 2010
4:02pm: House of the day...in Bourbonnais!
Back to browsing the listings in my beloved Kankakee County. This town with the fancy French name, named after a fur trapper, has another masculine home that pays tribute to its history and location. The rustic pretensions of this home may put many sophisticates off - A-Frames are not trendy right now - but I find them endearing. The exterior is misleading:  I particularly like the pairing of painting and bathtub. It can't compete with the mafia-style tub in the St. Anne house featured earlier this month. I would probably replace this too tasteful tub with something bolder and less urban.  Smart wine-colored walls tell us that the designer knew what he or she was getting into.  As I said, I like my interiors slightly over the top and fun, I would be more aggressive in my choice of furniture pieces, but I am enjoying the "outdoorsman" themes in these downstate homes. Listing says, "One of a kind A-Frame four bedroom, three story home in unincorporated Bourbonnais located on two acres with a 40 x 50 four car garage! Scenic rustic grounds feature a 32 x 18 above ground pool with wrap around deck, koi pond with waterfall and three tear deck." At $399,900 it is a steal!
5th January 2010
9:27pm: Property of the day.....
A few years ago, I took the rental car down to the Kankakee and Iroquois County areas (in Illinois, about an hour and a half south of Chicago). Kankakee County is pleasant if economically depressed. Still I like to check out the real estate in this area. I wouldn't commute to Chicago from that far away, but if your work takes you further south, it is certainly worth looking at. The area is classic "Illinois", with its ridges, abundant trees and rivers, and old farm houses. Anyway, $350,000 buys you this subtly "pimp style" house in St. Anne. I won't give you the location or realtor because I don't want them to think I am insulting their property. I mean that in a nice way : gold fixtures, rustic touches, leather sofas....and lots of windows. It screams "upwardly mobile" without being pretentious. Normally this isn't my style, but I like how the decor has a bit of theater about it, with its marble and gold touches, not to mention the bathtub surrounded by windows.
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