Pool/Shark

In case you aren't sick of all this talk about skating in empty pools, this weekend will mark the last weekend Taro Hirano's landscape-style photos of skate-appropriate pools will be exhibited at Tortoise on Abbot Kinney. Go check it out (and buy some stuff, to stimulate the economy of course). And when you're done drooling, check out another one of my favorite Taro works.





tortoise general store (former tortoise)
1208 Abbot Kinney Blvd.
Venice, CA 90291
tel/fax: 310-314-8448

tortoise (new location)
1342 1/2 Abbot Kinney Blvd.
Venice, CA 90291
tel/fax: 310-396-7335

and one more for the road.

I like all kinds of jam. In fact, nearing the peak of stone-fruit season this year, I made delicious peach jam from free bruised peaches I picked up at the farmer's market. But this Jam, I also love.

And how can we forget...



Buy the cd here.

guilty pleasure

I just can't help it. I really try to avoid them, but everything goes back to Bowie.

I will heart Roxy Music forever. and ever.

This changed my life. Now I'm revisiting.

vanity shot

I quite like what I wore today.

I haven't washed the scarf in a while!

how to say

Photos photos photos

Me you and me and you and our us we

Happier times. Unknowing smiles. Those heady conversations that encompass the unforeseeable. Mainly because we were dreamy or maybe because it was easy.

Harder times. Emphatic soliloquies. Strained discourse. Fleeting moments. Our hand-holding replacing the eye-opening; I plaster my face with tears like garish makeup in vain. You said. I blink doubts away.

And then the photos photos photos

#4 of my favorite 10 Radiohead songs

True Love Waits

I'll drown my beliefs
To have you be in peace
I'll dress like your niece
To wash your swollen feet

Just don't leave
Don't leave

I'm not living
I'm just killing time
Your tiny hands
Your crazy kitten smile

Just don't leave
Don't leave

And true love waits
In haunted attics
And true love lives
On lollipops and crisps

Just don't leave
Don't leave

Just don't leave
Don't leave

andy WOAH hol

There's a possibility my winter plans will include a trip to London. Fingers crossed. I know, I know. With the economic slump, how could I even consider battling the ever-so-terrifying dollar to GBP exchange? The good news is, my cousin lives there, and saving on room and board seems more than enough reason for me to return to the city I fell in love with many Shakespearean acts ago (referring to my brief summer study abroad experience, ahem). There are millions of things I want to do there. I want spotted dick from Sainsbury, retail therapy from Top Shop, really cheap wine and really luxurious cheese, Indian food, the Tate and you know, all the other cliched London-esque things to do, people to see, food to eat.

But I also really want to see this.




Since October 2nd, the Hayward Gallery has been hosting the Other Voices, Other Rooms: Andy Warhol exhibit. Archived Warhol art and paraphernalia will be on display. In unveiling Warhol's "personal" repository of goodies, curators hope to answer longstanding questions about Warhol's life beneath the surface of...well, our understanding, I guess (redundant much?) In a Ponystep review, Rachel Newsome asks:

"How little or much we value Warhol’s contribution to art and culture comes down to the question of his sincerity. Was he being ironic when he said: “If you want to know all about Andy Warhol, just look at the surface of my paintings and my films and me, and there I am. There is nothing behind it.” Or did he really mean it? In which case, is the joke ultimately on us? "

In Rachel's review, it seems as though the exhibit was an implosive failure of sorts. Even with all the collected text/visuals/soundbytes etc., Warhol's inner Warhol will never be justified (much less understood) by empirical data. But can any human mind or motive really ever be? I'll believe it when I can hold it and swallow it. And come on, do you think Dorothy really wanted to find out that the Wizard was a creepy short guy?



If I happen to be in London before the exhibit closes in January 2009, I'll be there. Mainly to see all the great stuff Warhol's produced. And the polaroids. Gotta love the polaroids!


photos courtesy of The Guardian

via Ponystep

hair around the world

This appears to be a salon in Japan. Not sure if I love it. I think I kind of do. Very DIY.

via Nakajima

NYT = artsy

When I browse through New York Times' online doppelganger (newyorktimes.com), I always see little bits of art and graphics that I kind of fall in love with. A few days ago, Christopher Silas Neal's work was featured in an article that I don't even remember reading. If you check out his website, you'll see some of his past editorial work that remind me of vintage 1960s children's book-graphics. Here's what I "clipped" from the page.




And here's a link to his website. Neal is a former Texan and current Brooklynite-illustrator/designer whose clients range from reputable newszines like The New Yorker and Texas Monthly (har har) to Sub Pop Records and some of my favorite reads, Seattle's The Stranger and Paper Magazine. I had a feeling I was onto something when I screen captured his artwork.

feast your eyes

So ironic.

I've been really feeling Toga, a brand founded by Yasuko Furuta back in '97 and wanted to dissect her S/S 09 ware. In googling Toga, I randomly came across a piece written in Nylon by my friend from the other coast, Jinnie Lee, reintroducing (or introducing, if I may) the brand's new vintage shop, Toga XTC, to Nylon.com readers. So. Weird.

With that being said- here's a little visual aid for those who are interested but have no idea!

color me badd

I am a huge fan of Daughters by Obedient Sons. Every season, I salivate a little bit when I see all the wonderful, unique designs they are contributing to the garment game. The cuts are precise and clean- and their spring/summer 09 season emphasizes on the linear color gradient that so many people seem to poo poo on. To all the folks who snub "one colla" head-to-toe... nyah nyah! (PS. Does someone want to buy me those beautiful teal platforms?)

it's the shit!

From the website:

"£22.00 GBP
THE RAREST COFFEE IN EXISTENCE
UNIQUE DELICATE FLAVOUR AFTER FERMENTATION IN THE CIVET'S DIGESTIVE SYSTEM
ONLY 500 KG'S OF THIS COFFEE ARE FOUND EACH YEAR

This is the rarest and definately most extraordinary coffee in the world! This coffee has been selected for us by Paradoxurus Hermaphroditis. Better know as the Common Palm Civet Cat. It prowls the Sumatran coffee plantations at night, choosing to eat only the finest, ripest cherries. The stones (which eventually form coffee beans) are then collected by cleaning through the droppings by the natives who collect it.

Kopi Luwak as it is known, is considered to be the world's finest coffee by Native Sumatrans. This coffee has an Intense but delicate flavour and no aftertaste, which is unique in coffee. This flavour is due to the fact that the coffee has been partially fermented by passing through the system of the Civet. Only about 500 KG's of this coffee are found each year."

Another interesting Civet Cat Factoid

shoe porn

Not that I need new shoes or anything (trust me, I don't). But recently, my friend Alice showed me three enticing pairs of DRU New York wedges that I kind of can't stop thinking about. Dru New York is the brainchild of designer Tiffany Chantra, who is talented to the nth degree and also extremely nice, EXTREMELY.

Anyway, in an effort to stimulate the economy, I plan on purchasing some past season's hits. She's offering me a sample sale price since they are soon to expire. Here's a glimpse.








What do you think?

this makes me want to start a band

Finnish illustrator and designer Inka Jarvinen is blowing my mind. I want to start a band and record an album just so she can design the identity.

via Lost At E Minor

nails on chalkboard

Chalkboards remind me of my pre-school through third grade years, before dry-erase boards replaced those dusty matte-black (or green) slabs. Inspired by the lost art of chalkboarding, this deck is an homage. $65

Those were the days

Hüsker Dü-in it.

awesome.


And the most embarrassing cover ever.



Therapy?, apparently an Irish metal band?

world's smallest

My best friend Diana just sent me the world's smallest birthday card. And in honor of all things small and precious- the world's smallest fast food meal.


via Daily Cognition

chartreuse is my favorite color.

Again, behind with my updates.

Recently I made a very wise purchase at the Creatures of Comfort sample sale. I bought a beautiful chartreuse Zero + Maria Cornejo sleeveless blouse. My friend Alice spotted it amid the volcanic-eruption-of-clothes and luckily, there was another one for me. Of course I lunged at the last one, staking my claim. After all, the Brit-born Chilean designer is one of my favorites. She embraces subtlety but her designs definitely showcase her neurotic obsession with detail.

My shirt:



It's no wonder I'm obsessed with her Spring/Summer 2009 collection-

ha ha ha.

Here's a funny story:

Sometimes I want just lean over and kiss you and eradicate the weirdness planted there, that abysmal performance of sometimes-friendship. I used to scorn impossible relationships. Now I'm trapped in one, one eye shut and the other looking away. How you do that to me. You're hand is still on the wheel and I'm racking my brain for the words that used to count.

"How did we get here?" Oh wait. How did I? (cue in the strangely autobiographical reverb of my roommate's guitar-playing). How how how how how... Did did did did... I I i i i?


Let's pretend this is my story, and the author decided I needed a foil and then the task befell upon you. Like one of those one-act plays and the strange, contiguous events that borderline "scripted" and uncomfortably real. Our worlds collided like clockwork. There was that one song.

"No way!"

And that gut feeling leading the blind astray. "No way!" Why did it feel like magic? We should have stopped with the high school shit but "no" turned out to be "yes", "yes" turned out to be "more" and it was Opposite Day. We looked forward but each with one foot out the door. Vans, high tops. Chucks, low tops. And now you're staring blankly ahead, hand on steering wheel, barefoot. I'm trying to mentally make out with you, but it's like I forgot how to kiss.

Life is funny that way. (muttering under my breath "love" in size 5.6 font) is funny too. You're really funny. In hindsight, I was funnier when I thought it was a comedy or maybe a joke. But then I realized my heart was the punchline.