LustList >> These.

navy + red = love
(bonus points for the red being in patent.)

Would love these in summer with rolled up white jeans, a breezy button-up, and a straw tote.

From Tod's.

Really??

Now I am definitely on the antique trunk-as-decor bandwagon, I love the whole concept of steamer trunks-- trunks that you would pack for a long voyage with every possible necessity and luxury you could need organized into neat little compartments-- but this??  Really?? 

Restoration Hardware,  the kings of knocking off the current trends (see their other trunks, which are direct copies of Andrew Martin's cool repro steamer trunks), may have gotten a little overambitious on this one.

While I do like the concept of an office-in-a-box (it just seems so wonderfully organized), this is a bit ridiculous.  A trunk + an office in a box is just too much.  And seriously, would you ever close it?  It's essentially an entire room within a room, it would look absurdly gargantuan if you closed it!  Like an actual elephant in a room!

Restoration Hardware Mayfair trunk here.

Just Because.

Love this image of Steve McQueen and his wife Neile Adams.  McQueen was born on this day in 1930. 

More photos from some of the 40 scrapbooks Adams kept of their relationship on Nowness.

From Sea to Shining Sea

Cool city posters designed by Heads of State, based on traditional tourism advertising icons for each city.

Award-winning poster designers and illustrators Heads of State here.

via Curated.

Interiors >> Art Over Bookshelves

Two things I love: bookshelves and art.

bookshelves + art hung over them = fabulous

For some people, this may be a bit much, but for me, it is like a result of this ideal world where you have so many books and so much art that they simply have to overlap because you don't have enough room for all your treasures.

William Waldron -- what a sophisticated bedroom.  I love the look of the architectural print hung over bookshelves.

By Nate Turner.  I also love this room in general (not that I don't love all of these in general, but anyway...)-- love that it is a tiny dining room but packed with character and looks cozy (love bookshelves, and well, art for that matter in dining rooms), love the crispness of the black and white-- the trim on the chairs and table skirt, the frames, etc.  This dining room looks like the kind of dining room you'd definitely use all the time-- for meals but also for working on projects, planning trips, etc.

Not sure who exactly this is by... all I put in the file name is "Donovan"?

And finally, Miles Redd's living room, which I also love for so many reasons, but here, just a small tableau showing one of his many great styling ideas.

At top by Jan Showers.

The Americans

I seem to be going in themes this week... yesterday, "golden age," and today, Americana. First L.L. Bean, and now this great exhibit...

Inspired by Robert Franks' "The Americans" project from the 1950s, which I saw and thoroughly enjoyed at the Met in the fall, Brit Jacob Perlmutter set out to create his own version of a photographic journal of America as it is today. 

He spent three months on the road, aiming to capture images that get beneath the surface of popular culture representations of the country, and these are the resulting photographs. 

As he said, ‘I went to America with a set of images in my head and came back with another in my hand.'

Aren't they amazing??  

They really do read as being so honest, with a photojournalistic quality to them.

All images from Jacob Perlmutter website.

Unfortunately for those of us stateside, the exhibit will be in London.  Hopefully it will come to the US at some point!  If not, I've got my eye on the catalogue from the exhibit...

Discovered via Curated.

New Summer Classics

L.L. Bean has debuted their new "Signature" collection, and there are a few great pieces for summer in there that I could see getting incorporated into my everyday wardrobe, like this chambray shirt-dress above...

this leather mariner tote...

this lightweight, crinkly cotton shirt...

these cute tassel flats (I'm a sucker for cute flats)...

and this white duffel bag. 

Listening To: Fats

Fats Domino's "Ain't That a Shame"



I love how he plays piano.

Speaking of a Golden Age...

Isn't this Dior image wonderful?

Golden Age

Loving this piece from the NYT Style Magazine on the former glory of the styles of the skies.

"We’re told that there was a magical time long ago when, whatever your seat assignment, flying was first-class. But when did it all end? Last week, Marie Force, the archivist at the Delta Heritage Museum in Atlanta, published an online gallery of photographs of Delta flight attendant uniforms from 1940 to the present. “Delta was one of the more conservative airlines,” Force says. “We didn’t have hot pants.” Still, for almost 40 straight years, the airline’s female flight attendants (something called “stewardesses”) turned heads.

In the 1940s, they did it with military-style overseas caps and spectator shoes; in the ’50s, with futurist insignias and stiletto pumps; and in the ’60s, with A-line topcoats, alligator-print boots, Chanel-inspired jackets with three-quarter-length sleeves and the “Delberet,” a pillbox hat designed for Delta by Mea Hanauer, a New York milliner. The ’70s were all about coo-coo colors, bell-bottom pants, Slavic tunics and, weirdly, a yellow raincoat. And then in the ’80s, Delta took a sartorial nosedive that it couldn’t recover from until 2001. Return your seat to its upright position, and take a look."

My mom was actually just telling me today that the prettiest girl she knew as a teenage in Memphis went on to be a Pan-American stewardess and that it was the biggest deal because only the most beautiful girls were hired by Pan-American.  Then, she was scouted by someone from Hollywood who was on one of her flights, and she ended up in the movie South Pacific.  A "fairytale story," as my mom put it.  Those were different days indeed.
Article here.

via... someone who still flies in style... thanks!

You're Just My Type

 

What a cute idea.

Pencils above from Paper Pastries

Or, personalize your own pencils here.

Morning, sunshine!

  

I'm babysitting for my sister's kids, so this morning I woke up to two kids and two dogs jumping into my bed.  For those of you who didn't wake up to such cuteness, here's some cute kid photography from Modern Kids Photographer Sarah Wert. She's talented, no?

 

 

PS- I love when babies, like the one at top, are in the "surprise face" phase and they make that face all the time, like, for any/no reason.

Old Stuff >> Monogram Collections

Did you know that people in the early 1900s used to collect monograms??  I didn't, and I think it's so cool! 

Elizabeth Hildreth II, 1914 

Below is the description of this monogram scrapbook page, by Scrapbook: An American History author Jessica Helfand.  I'm still not sure though what these monograms were pulled from-- are the cut from stationery?  Or are the sewn?

Elizabeth Hildreth's book begins with a blurry snapshot of a kewpie doll surrounded by a whirling constellation of monograms, which were themselves highly collectable by both men and women during this period. (The English writer Evelyn Waugh had several such scrapbooks, which may have been compiled by someone other than he: they are meticulous, fastidiously — and densely — arranged on the page.) 

Indeed, while many collectors pasted their specimens into an alphabetical taxonomy, young Hildreth operated under no such apparent editorial constraints. Like many young people, her interest seems to have been based on creating pleasing compositions. Nevertheless, her pages display none of the polite placements that so consistently characterize many other nineteenth century scrapbooks. Collaged elements in Hildreth's book are more playful, and include fragments of letterheads and other typographic miscellany. 

I'm also intrigued by this girl because her name is Elizabeth Hildreth II -- "the second" -- a girl with a generational suffix.  That's cool.  Girls don't usually get to take part in that tradition.  But, it's also intriguing that she's not "Elizabeth Hildreth Jr." -- she's "II."  But that's cool with me.

Tastemakers (In Repose) >> Oscar de la Renta

Oscar de la Renta at his home in Punta Cana

How awesome is this room?  It's just cool.  I like when I can imagine various outfits that would look good in a room, and this room would be perfect for everything from all white linen (Oscar's M.O. here), to a colorful Missoni weave, to just a bathing suit, to a long black dress.

I don't know when it was designed, and I can't even tell, which I think is awesome.  Like I can't even tell what decade.  And it's going to look good for so long. 

Pretty classy for a beach house, eh?

Love these shutters-- they totally make this little space.

For no good reason...

I just love this image from the Steven Alan website, in this cheery and vintagey looking house, and thought I'd share.

Loving the Work of >> Morgan O'Hara

I just discovered the work of Morgan O'Hara, and I'm obsessed.  She documents hand movements, what she calls "Live Transmissions," of people engaged in activities like playing an instrument, cooking, lecturing, etc.

Above:

Movement of the hands of
Chef's assistant Jojo Sullamoff
while peeling a cucumber
Yatagan Kebab House, New York City
2 November 1995

I think it's fascinating that her artistic process is often a documentation of someone else's artistic process.  Also, I guess one reason I am drawn to her work is my love of maps, as her process is essentially a mapping process.

Movement of the hands of
pianist Martha Argerich
while performing the first movement allegro con brio of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4
Carnegie Hall, New York City
28 October 2001

Above:
Movement of the hands of
Conductor Riccardo Chailly
while conducting the Concertgebouw Orchestra in Mahler's Symphony No 4.
first movement
Carnegie Hall, New York City
10 February 2000

It's interesting when two people doing the same activity are compared-- above and below, two conductors conducting two different pieces -- are they different because of the piece of music, or because of their personal style of conducting?

Movement of the hands of
Composer Pierre Boulez
while conducting the London Symphony Orchestra
in Stravinsky's Petrouchka /
Carnegie Hall, New York City
13 March 2000

 Apparently, conducting and lecturing require similar hand movements...

Movement of the hands of
Dr. S. J. Schmidt while lecturing
Glarus, Switzerland
7 March 1999

Her working process-- multiple pens in each hand.


THEN, I discovered her installations -- blown up abstractions of the drawings.  SO COOL.

Galleria O'artoteca
Milano, Italia
left Aki Takahashi on piano
right: Quentin Crisp lecturing
flat black acrylic on white wall

Macau Museum of Art
Live Transmission: Kung Fu battle
flat black acrylic on white wall
black and vermillion calligraphy ink on rice paper

Aomori Contemporary Art Center Aomori, Japan
flat black acrylic on white wall
Left: Amiri Bakara reading his poetry
Right: Ishioka Toyomi carving cedar

Aomori Contemporary Art Center Aomori, Japan
wall drawing: hand movement of 3 Taiko drummers performing

Teatro Sociale di Bergamo,
Italia


I don't know what this one is of, but I like that she took it to sculpture too... I think if she continues to get less and less literal, these are going to keep getting more interesting.



I think if she keeps doing this, it could be really interesting to see comparisons of hand movements between cultures.  Would lecturers in one country be more emphatic with their hands than another?  Would musical styles require very different hand movements?

Morgan O'Hara website here.