Print of the week, extended play version: Beklina
Sometimes I think it wouldn’t be the worst idea to have a firewall built between my computer and certain particularly tempting e commerce sites—much like the ones big companies put in place to keep their employees from looking at porn all day. I am not a problem or compulsive shopper, but I do possess the ability to make a rational argument for even the most irrational of purchases. And this has, at times, proven to be a dangerous gift. So far I’ve resisted buying anything from Beklina, an e commerce site based out of northern California, but the effort is killing me. Does this vessel look like anything you’ve ever seen? Those rings appear to have come from the branches of some very psychedelic trees.
Also: you can take the rings off and rearrange them, which is fun. And the glass interior makes it usable as a vase (the rings themselves, interestingly, are paper).
My home is so crawling with decorative pillows that even I would have a tough time talking myself into more. Which is too bad, as this marbled-looking number would fit right into the story my living room sofa is telling.
From the British design house Swash, whose prints are always so fun and arch and acid-bright: an oversized cushion printed with all the ingredients of a pleasant summer day.
Beklina sells a small selection of fabric, and I do find myself very tempted to buy some yardage of this abstract blue and yellow print from Brooklyn-based design team Mocioun—for, I don’t know, the world’s trippiest drapes or something?
Department of: things that couldn’t be any prettier
Were one to set a whole table with it, the new butterfly-themed dinnerware collection from Christian Lacroix might come off a touch too Lady’s Auxiliary. But I love the idea of buying just one piece of it—like, say, this dessert plate—and then deploying it as the most spectacular butter dish ever.
Print of the week
There is no corner of my home that cries out for this Christian Lacroix silk cushion. But oh, how my soul does.
Knowing what time it is—always
Do you guys have clocks in your homes? Because I don’t anymore. Not one. If I wake up in the middle of the night wondering how late it is, I need glance no further than the cable box. In the morning, my iPhone’s alarm wakes me, and throughout the rest of my apartment, I need never wonder the hour for long, because any number of gadgets artlessly blare it. I no longer tell time by looking at clocks, and that is too bad, because clocks can bring such excellent little moments of good design into our lives, and that’s something to preserve, no? This classic Nelson clock is so brilliantly early-space-program (maybe only in my mind though; it was designed much earlier) that I can practically taste 1964 when I look at it. For a less splurgy version, here’s a quite similar take for just $40.
Half trippy, half classic, and, from the looks of it, totally useful as a paperweight, too.
This one is sort of like the periscope of the most orangey-orange submarine ever.
From Tivoli Audio, who make the best-looking stereo equipment: a super-handsome clock radio of the seriously old school.
It’s the little things
I haven’t a clue how good a job melamine does of keeping one’s hot liquids hot, but the cuteness of these tall latte cups can not be denied.
Monkey of invention
My extra set of keys lives in the random-items-that-fall-in-no-category drawer in my kitchen—we all have one somewhere, yes?—and I am forever losing track of them, because they are on a dinky hardware store ring, and the random items drawer is full to capacity. This poses a problem whenever I lose my primary keys—which occurs if not constantly, then not infrequently either. And because this is exactly the type of factor that can cause a person to be stupidly late to important engagements, a solution was clearly in order. Something that borrowed from the concept of an oversized paddle board gas station key ring, but smaller and less ungainly—and I knew exactly where to get it. The West Village Little Marc Jacobs store has a selection of Steiff key rings that I’ve spied on more than one shopping-for-children expedition: not the most elegant solution, to be sure, nor the most sophisticated. Even borderline embarrassing. But the objective is brilliantly accomplished, with one extra added bonus: you will never dig through your bag for your keys when they’re attached to a furry little stuffed creature.
Your assistance is requested
I do not need this fabulous little ethno-modern stool, but I am also not at all certain I can live without it. Please talk me into it.
Mock me if you must
But I think these are awesome.
Mommy was a punk rocker
Graphic designer and music lover Mike Joyce takes posters from actual concerts that really happened and re-conceives them through the prism of Swiss modernism. It’s very stroller land Brooklyn in its post-edginess, and maybe altogether way too precious, but I am completely down with it nevertheless.
I get excited sometimes
The instant I spied these Christian Lacroix notebooks on the Twitter feed for West Village boutique Castor & Pollux yesterday, I sent a DM to owner Kerilynn Pamer saying I’d be right over. Could they as fantabulous in person as they were in pictures?
They could indeed. I am not a fancy-blank- notebook person, and would even go so far as to say I am anti-fancy-blank-notebook: I banned them from our annual December issue gift guides at my old job, because they seem like the type of gift that people receive and then never go on to actually use. But these are different. I’d write in these every day just to have a chance to look at them.
Kerilynn’s having a tough time keeping them in stock (that top one is already on re-order) and she’s not selling them on the website, so if you’re in the city, get yourself in down to Tenth Street! Otherwise, give a call, and they’ll be pleased to hook you up.
