The High Standard

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More pics from our NY trip – I'm kind of going in reverse chronological order, for anyone who cares, i.e. Emily....

Sunday night, September 6th, for wedding anniversary no.12 (wedding anniversary number twelve!!!), we stayed at the Standard Hotel. After we checked in we took a walk on the Highline, which runs right under it.

A lot has been written about the Highline and I'm sure we'll have more to say about it in the future (they still have at least ten blocks to add on to the North end).

The designers (landscape architects James Corner Field Operations, with architects Diller Scofidio + Renfro, and planting specialist Piet Oudolf) found an impeccable balance, keeping elements of the beautifully rusted, overgrown old structure, but making it into a fun, functional public space, equally beautiful in its own way.

I had this thought while we were up there that experiencing such a space – an environment where every last detail is designed, but allowed to breathe, never forced – is a feeling of pure luxury.

It's an amazing gift for the people of New York City, and judging by the crowds, they seem to be loving it.

Everything in The Standard is also well-designed – all of the rooms have (widely publicized) floor-to-ceiling windows, and ours had a cool little seating area right next to the view. It was a little like an Airstream trailer, with everything in its right place.

A totally schizo panorama of the view. That little bubble of glass in the middle of the photo (click to enlarge) is Diane von Furstenberg's building. Must be nice.

Back to the hotel room. There's no door on the bathroom and the wall of the shower is glass, so that you can see right into it from the main room. I have a pet peeve about people calling inanimate objects "sexy" but it is a "sexy space." Honestly, I kind of prefer the slightly more rustic-feeling Maritime Hotel, but we enjoyed our stay and would go back.

And honestly, at that point, after three days of drinking and catching up with friends and walking around, we would have been happy with anywhere that had a TV and a bed. We're old, god dammit! BBC America delivered for us with an encore showing of one of my favorite Bond movies. Emily made fun of me for taking pictures of the TV.

After that we had a drink in the bar downstairs. The patio is nice – good for people watching.

Then we ordered room service.

Starvation Nation

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[From Lily + Mika]

Need vs. Want

Continuing my own little fashion week up in here:
Crescent Down Works shirt jacket, $300.
South Willard already sold out of them, but Crescent Down Works is up the street from the PS. Gotta get me one. Need.

Need vs. Want

Balenciaga sneakers, $595.
Alas, current finances suggest hitting the ol'
Rod Lavers with Spray & Wash again. Want.

Image of the Day

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I actually posted this (from one of my black books) last year on September 14th, the sweltering day in Fort Greene when we we loaded our moving truck. Emily flew from JFK to SEA with Inez, and on September 15th at 5AM my brother Sky, Littlejeans, and I got in the Penske and drove to Chicago. The next day, we narrowly missed a hurricane and drove all the way to the godforsaken rockpile that is Gillette, Wyoming. The day after that, we hit Seattle. And here we are.

Image of the Day

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Giovanna Battaglia and Mario Testino en route to a Chanel haute couture show in Paris.

Here we are in the middle of New York Fashion Week but I had to post these, from the street fashion blog Jak & Jil, because they both look so classic and I haven't seen anything yet this week that could beat 'em.

Check out Giovanna Battaglia's styling work at Art Department and some of Mario Testino's photography at Art Partner.

Some things I was privileged enough to work on with Mario Testino while I was at Visionaire are here and here and here.

TBD

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I've been listening to a radio show called Too Beautiful To Live since it started up in early 2008. I always look forward to it and at this point it almost feels like the host (Luke Burbank), the producer (Jen Andrews), and the sound engineer (Sean DeTore) are a part of our family. Well, I'm happy to announce that today TBTL gets even better. Having been dropped by its radio station (KIRO, where the show always seemed like a boozy cousin Ray-Ray to the station's other programs), Too Beautiful To Live is defying its name and switching into DIY-podcast mode. They're actually broadcasting right now, as I type.

Listen live every day at 11:30AM, or download the podcasts, at TBTL.net.

Last Exit to Brooklyn

So, yeah, we got back from New York last Thursday and I immediately came down with the worst cold I've had in years. Not the swine, but swine-ish. It's still pretty bad but Littlejeans is doing his best to take care of me while I slog through my projects (Emily, pictured above in all her chicness, is in Idaho for one last trip before diving head-on into school next week).

Anyway – this week I'm going to somewhat haphazardly post a selection of photos from our time in New York. Today's are from an afternoon we spent in Red Hook – something we always loved doing when we lived in Brooklyn. It continues to develop in interesting ways while maintaining its industrial flavor.

The Mighty Gowanus – miniature Duwamish of Brooklyn

[Click to enlarge – artwork by Swoon]

Hope & Anchor was full-up so we had lunch at this new place, Fort Defiance. Emily had a tomato, mozarella, and basil sandwich, and I had a banh mi, and both were delicious. They also have Six Point Apollo Wheat on tap and their cold-brewed iced coffee is maybe the best I've ever had...no small thing, being from Seattle.

More NY pics coming soon, and you are welcome to have a look at my Flickr sets for old ones if you like.

Do You Like Websites?

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[via funny or die]

Statement for the Season

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Posters on Orchard Street near The Sound Library, NYC

Today, as New York Fashion Week moves toward top speed, the YSL street team is on street corners in NYC and Paris passing out limited edition tote bags, each housing a copy of the label's Fall/Winter 2009 Manifesto.
Last season's package (pictured above and below) included a fold-out poster and a heart-shaped YSL flash drive on a string.

The bags are not, you know, the highest quality, but don't look a gift horse in the mouth – they are functional for light travel, and the silk screened prints are always interesting.
The Spring/Summer lookbook featured Claudia Schiffer under the Hollywood sign, photographed by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin. Some of the images were die-cut peel-off stickers:

They really spare no expense, so it's no wonder the Manifestos are so sought-afte. If you find yourself in New York or Paris this afternoon, make it your mission to find one.
If, however, those cities seem a million miles away right about now, don't fret too hard – you really don't need more stuff, and you can preview the Manifesto here:



Check out the whole thing, as well as past Manifestos, at yslmanifesto.com.
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When I'm Gone

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Conversations Regarding The Future of Architecture, a vinyl record pressed by the Reynolds Metal Company in 1956, featuring interviews with Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, Eero Saarinen, Richard Neutra, Philip Johnson, and others.

I narrowly missed out on acquiring this while we were in New York. Emily and I were having a beer and some snackies at The Magician on Rivington Street last Friday evening before joining our friends and family at Arrow Bar, as is our way. At 6:58PM Eastern Daylight Time the weekly e-mail from Seattle's Wall of Sound Records came across my crackleberry. I immediately went outside to call the store and see if they could save it for me if I paid by credit card right then and there. Alas, by the time I called, three other people had already done the same and it was gone.

It has been added to the want list. Some day it will be mine.

For now I am consoling myself with sounds from the Vivian Girls' new LP Everything Goes Wrong. You should do the same. Here's a sample (via GvB). Play it loud:

Vivian Girls When I'm Gone mp3

And here's another nice take on it, from They Shoot Music:



More info on Vivian Girls here.

...
Update: Oh, sweet internet. You can download both side one and side two of Conversations Regarding the Future of Architecture for free at Record Brother. Mies van der Rohe: "I don't want to be interesting. I want to be good."
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Image of the Day

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Artwork by Milton Glaser, September 2001

[More on Milton Glaser, above in a photo by Eric Johnson, coming soon.]
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Your Weekly Mr. Littlejeans

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Emily and me with Jeans in our apartment on Union Street between Smith and Hoyt, Brooklyn, Spring 2001

Good Enough, Smart Enough

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This is impressive – it's sort of the political/historical equivalent of Picasso drawing a horse starting with the tail, or something.

Okay, so the Olympic Peninsula is not quite that big compared to the rest of Washington State, but it feels like it when you're out there.

[Via A Special Way of Being Afraid]

Image of the Day

. Crosby Street, last Thursday afternoon.
More photos from our NYC trip coming soon.

Image of the Day

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Roman Ondák Measuring the Universe (detail), 2007, at MoMA.
Click here for more info and images.

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Rated X By An All-White Jury

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We're not in Seattle right now, but if we were, bet your sweet ass we would be heading over to Northwest Film Forum for a screening of Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-Itchyfooted Mutha. The film's 75-year-old director, Melvin Van Peebles (pictured above in a spread from Wax Poetics Anthology Volume 2) will be in attendance to introduce the film and answer questions. Click here for info; the film screens through September 14th if you can't make it tonight.

Here's a classic from his most well-known work of, well, genius: the theme from Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song, written by Van Peebles and performed by a then-unknown Earth Wind & Fire.

Earth Wind & Fire Sweetback's Theme mp3

Image of the Day

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Sunny's Bar in Red Hook, Brooklyn

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New Style

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Mika Tajima The Double, 2008, The Kitchen, New York

I have been posting (here, here, and here) about the Spring/Summer 2010 lookbook shoot for Sunshine & Shadow, and here's the next installment – the styling. Mika Tajima is a highly accomplished artist represented by Elizabeth Dee Gallery in New York; she was featured in last year's Whitney Biennial (remember?) with New Humans, her ongoing sound collaboration with Howie Chen and Eric Tsai (and past co-conspirators Vito Acconci, C. Spencer Yeh, José León Cerrillo, among others). In addition to all of that, she handles occasional styling duties for the Sunshine & Shadow shoots, bringing a totally unique eye to the normal conventions of that duty.

Mika Tajima Deal or No Deal, 2008, Kevin Bruk Gallery, Miami

Here Mika is discussing an installation last year at the Honolulu Academy of Arts. (As a side note, I think some of the ideas she brings up would be of special interest to anyone who has been thinking about the themes of Target Practice, Painting Under Attack 1949–78, the current show at the Seattle Art Museum.)



Photos via Elizabeth Dee Gallery – click for more info and images on Mika Tajima/New Humans.
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Image of the Day

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The Highline from our room at (where else) The Standard.


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Image of the Day

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Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Image of the Day

Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

Dear Everyone in NYC who reads this blog,

We're in the city for a quick weekend (it's Emily's and my 12th wedding anniversary, can you believe it?). Tonight we're going to Arrow (Avenue A between 5th and 6th) to listen to the sweet sounds of Jason Crombie on the 1+2's. My brother and Daniela are tending bar. You should come join us, we'll be there at 9:30. This is not a wedding anniversary celebration, it's just a night at a bar. Our anniversary is Sunday.
Okay bye bye.
Strath

Words & Verbs

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I've been reading these books off and on over the last few months and I'm planning to finish them this weekend:
I can't recommend Photography After Frank highly enough. Philip Gefter was a photography critic at The New York Times for many years and was also the art director responsible for picking the main front-page image for the paper everyday; he has an extraordinary knowledge of photography from a multitude of angles. I've been plodding along slowly with this book because I'm trying to write down the name of every photographer he mentions and research the ones I don't know. Read a good review at The Year In Pictures and buy it directly from Aperture.
Susan Sontag's On Photography is kind of the classic in the field and I'm just now getting around to reading it. It's a little stinging in parts because she makes some sharp psychological observations about this desire/need that certain people (ahem) have to, uh, document everything. That she was writing long before cell phones, digital photography, and the web makes them all the more true now. Still, I'm finding that it makes me look at photography in different ways and I appreciate that.

I wonder if all art directors secretly want to be photographers.

What I Have to Offer

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I used to listen to this song all the time when it came out and for whatever reason it's back in my head this morning. The sound in this crummy video doesn't do it much justice, but download it from somewhere and flip that mega bass switch on your Walkman – the Mantronix bassline and drums are quite swass.

Your Weekly Mr. Littlejeans

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cat in a box

But This Got Made In The Day, It Was Bright

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Brendan Fowler, aka BARR, in a short film by Dash Snow and Jade Berreau for Purple.

Brendan Fowler had a good show at Rivington Arms last year which I briefly mentioned (it's fun to look back at those old posts...), but never elaborated on. On which I never elaborated. Take your pick, U.S. Americans, such as.

Here's probably the best known and my favorite BARR song, "The Song Is The Single," from Kill Rock Stars:



Purple Fashion no.12 is on newstands now, scoop it up and save it forever. More on BARR here.

Image of the Day

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Lenore Tawney, a master weaver and early innovator in fiber arts, in 1959 (Photo by Yousuf Karsh). Tawney died in 2007 at the age of 100; Holland Cotter's obituary at The New York Times is an interesting read.

I have no particular reason for posting this, other than that I think it's a really cool photo, and my mom was a weaver for many years, so I have some extra interest. It's on the wall in the office.