A Little Bird

Told me my bachelorette party is going to be in New York!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

image by phil poynter, via Coco + Kelley

This Ukranian Life

I recently downloaded the This American Life app for iphone. For $2.99 you get access to every episode plus a bunch of extras including early Ira Glass stories and even some Dave Sedaris readings. I highly recommend. But all of this is by way of telling you about this amazing episode I was listening to the other day called "the house by loon lake." In the episode, the narrator describes his experiences with an abandoned house in a small town in Massachusetts in which, mysteriously, the house's contents seem to have been left just as they were when the house's occupants abandoned it. He finds old letters hinting at illegitimate children, newspapers describing a Nazi invasion, and spectacles sitting neatly on a wallet. For some reason, and maybe it's just because I am so interested in history, I was really taken in by the story. I just love the idea of a life size time capsule, preserving a lost way of life. Maybe that's why I am so fascinated whenever I see pictures of Chernobyl. Being a bit of a Soviet history buff, I can't help but be interested in a preserved soviet era town. Sadly, I've heard that vandals have taken or destroyed a lot of the town. But the pictures always have such a wonderful eerie quality to them.

Am I alone on this one?

Photos Courtesy of Andrzej Karon

Hat Hat Heat!

I have always been very particular about my hats. Ordinarily, the main issue with hats is that in our normally hatless modern society, the act of wearing a hat, in and of itself draws too much attention. I might feel that way because I grew up in a region where you only really wore hats skiing since it never really got cold enough to wear them during the winter. But actually, my particular problem with hats has nothing to do with standing out. In fact, I LOVE wearing my big fur Russian hat (and by Russian I mean bought on a snowy day from a man with gold teeth in Moscow). For some reason, I've always just had a problem with hats that might.....look like they're from Jamaica. To avoid looking like a Rastafarian, I have a strict non-floppy beret only policy for round hats. But I've started seeing a few pictures around that have made me think differently.

A few weeks ago, I saw Naomi of Rockstar Diaries (an avid hat wearer from what I can tell) wearing an awesome hat.

Then today, I saw this on Garance Dore:

I don't know...maybe they're just beautiful women and it wouldn't matter what they had on their heads. But I've been perusing these guys over on Urban:

Thoughts? Is it too.......playing hackie sack in Berkeley (or juggling in France as it may be)? or can it be done with the right clothes?

In the Mood for Love

One Saturday night over the summer my girlfriends and I watched a gorgeous film called In the Mood for Love. In addition to being a beautiful love story, the film is also just plain beautiful. I love the printed dresses and their contrast against the flowered wallpaper and cigarette filled rooms. So, I was so happy when I finally caught up on my design sponge reading and saw Amy's post, living in: in the mood for love. It definitely gave me ideas of how to use all that jadeite from P.O.S.H. that I've registered for. Ugh, so pretty. I think I'll have to netflix it again.




Are there any movies that you wish you could just step into and live there (although maybe without some of the social/ personal issues faced by the characters)? I think Baz Luhrman's Romeo and Juliet would be another one (and there's actually a living in post on that at Design Sponge too) as would Discreet Charm of the Bourgoisie and the Lives of Others.

Sharp Ideas at Vogue

I was stunned when I opened my latest Vogue and saw this amazing home. I love the bright colors and the mix of old and new pieces. I always love the idea of clean white spaces and modern (i.e. Swedish) design, but I just love "stuff" too much.

I WANT those couches! Also, how come my stacking of books never looks like that?

I think PB would die for a bath like this

Who would think stacked firewood could look so awesome?

What do you think?

photos courtesy of Vogue

The Publican

I know, I know, all Chicago. But we just had such a good time....and I've been super busy lately and not able to keep up with my 94 blogs and just general web surfing. Plus, I think I was needing a little wedding break (it really does ebb and flow). Only a few more....

PB and I love food, and we were super excited to get reservations at the Publican. In choosing which restaurants we had to go to we were swayed both by some great reviews and a perusal of the menu, which revealed both oysters and pork belly, for me and PB respectively. On a sidenote, aren't oysters awesome? They're delicious and they make jewelry!

I'm not sure what this bulding was, but it was gorgeous. And I'm pretty sure we took this picture while crossing the bridge on which John Cusack lists Laura's cutuest habits in High Fidelity.

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The Dana

(room with a view)

Although Chicago itself was awesome, about half of the fun of going away was just getting to get out of our cramped apartment and staying in some awesome digs (that are cleaned on a daily basis). Enter, the Dana. The bed: fluffy and huge, the shower: waterfall style, the view: awesomely displayed in floor to ceiling windows.

(The view from the shower into the bedroom)

Plus, they had turndown service. I know, lots of hotels have turn down service. But it's just so awesome to have someone come down and pull back your sheets, close the blinds (which were fairly complicated), and leave you a chocolate. I wish that could happen every day (and yes, I know that if that happened to you every day it would make you Cleopatra or some sort of despot).

Oh, and there is are some really awesome view from the rooftop lounge as well, although it was a little too clubby for our taste.

Escort Sheshcort

I'm so happy that we've got almost all of the vendors chosen for the wedding (oh my god, need to do invites still!) because that means I can start focusing on some of the smaller aspects that I can do myself. One of these projects is escort cards. The thing is, despite all of the cool ideas floating around out there, I still haven't found anything that fits into our sort of new Spanish world theme, and is also affordable when you have over 200 on your guest list. But, I really like these olive branches that I saw on OnceWed today.




Of course, the couple typed up people's names with their vintage typewriter (dude, who are these people?) but I think even if you lacked an authentic typewriter it could look cool printed on a regular printer.

The whole wedding is featured on Martha Stewart, here.

How I Met "How I Met"

For a long time some friends of mine had been extolling the virtues of How I Met Your Mother. But for some reason....I was resistant. I guess because the few times I'd watched a few minutes of it there was this obnoxious laugh track that really turned me off. But one lazy Sunday while strolling through Hollywood video (RIP) PB and I decided we needed a new series, and plus I always loved Doogie Howser.

Kids, it is really good! yes, god knows why there is a laugh track, but honestly I laugh out loud as much as at the Colbert Report. But really, the star of the show is Neil Patrick Harris. I mean he actually has talent. As seen here: