Remember the rotary handsets? I never used one quite this old but the one I grew up with wasn’t far from it! The iRetrofone Base ($200) holds all models of iPhone. It’ll recharge the phone and the handset is fully functioning.
Via Uncrate.
Name: The UNstudio Loft
Location: Greenwich Village, New York
Size: 550 m2
Designed for dual use as both an art gallery and a loft living space, the undulating walls and curvilinear features of the UNstudio loft caught our attention as a dream space for anyone who collects art, books and loves the minimalist aesthetic. Our tech side appreciates the use of 18,000 LED lights illuminating the ceiling and shelving, while our favorite room is the stunning office space with flowing worktop and a city view to die for.
As noted, the look isn’t for everyone, but for those of us aspiring for a more minimalist aesthetic, there’s a lot to admire about the space. Most notably the interior architecture itself “framing” all the decorative, art and printed elements into the forefront. Also, we’re envious of the LED lighting system, which can be programmed to change to various degrees of warmth or cool, depending upon the time of day and weather. We like the idea of integrated interior architecture light therapy! And of course, we always love any space where we can’t find a cord or cable in sight.
Photos by UNStudio
Story by Gregory Han.
This story appears in partnership with Unplggd, a site for people who embrace technology and design in their home.
What’s the best part of working from home? On a day that involves a fried egg sandwich, the answer has to be “lunch.” I consider myself something of a connoisseur of the genre, and have arrived at the following recipe that gets a kick from Sriracha aioli. If you haven’t tried Sriracha, it’s a Thai hot sauce made from chilies and garlic and is a Southern California staple. I like to add it to mayonnaise to make this super-quick spicy aioli (it is also killer on a cheese burger). When choosing a cheese for the fried egg sandwich, look for something nutty and salty like Gruyere and make sure it’s sliced super-thin so it will melt on contact with fried egg hot off the griddle. The nuttiness also plays well with the multigrain bread. A peppery leafy green like arugula or mustard greens adds a bright note. Or make the sandwich your own and get creative by adding bacon or avocado—or both!
The Foodinista’s Fried Egg Sandwich with Sriracha Aioli
1 tablespoon mayonnaise
1/2 teaspoon or more, to taste, Sriracha chile paste
2 slices lightly toasted whole grain bread
1 fried egg
2-3 thin slices of Gruyere
Handful of mixed greens
Freshly cracked salt and pepper, to taste
Mix mayo and Sriracha to make aioli. Spread the aioli over lightly toasted whole grain bread, and place a fried egg on one slice. Then, cover egg with cheese like Gruyere. And finally, sprinkle with some greens and freshly cracked salt and black pepper. Top with second slice of toast.
Where we’ve been this week…
1. Tweetdeck’s Blog You may have noticed my rather clumsy attempt at getting the word out yesterday about our Ideal Live/Work Space series and Alain de Botton’s contribution. Twitter was down (something about double messages). Facebook was slow (so I triple posted in my haste to get something, anything out there and now there are three messages sitting on top of each other saying pretty much the same thing and I look like a right fool!) All in all a very unsatisfying experience. Thank goodness my husband came home for lunch and loaded Tweetdeck for me. I’d been introduced to it before but didn’t get why I’d use an app like that when I could just use Twitter. He kindly walked me through it. Now I get it (I think!) Where to start: Their blog turns out to be helpful. It’s a nice window into the workings of this clever app. Start at the top and wander through.
2. Idiot Box And the nice thing about Tweetdeck is that it has led me into a whole new world of blog surfing. Producer Dan Taberski retweeted the Alain de Botton story so I checked out his blog, Idiot Box. First it’s a Tumblr blog and you get design cred points for that. Second he is the creator of Destroy Build Destroy which my son loves so more points for that. And finally he has a great eye for interesting tidbits. Be prepared: this definitely falls into the Stop Work category. Where to start: The front page is a mosaic of stories and the best place to begin.
3. CurbedNY The Curbed family, with it’s gossipy real estate slant, always has something intriguing to share. I used to live in New York, way back in the 90′s before the husband and kids came along. I love dipping back into that world via CurbedNY. Where to start: The latest plans for public art on Park Avenue. I still remember Fernando Botero‘s sculptures gracing that street.
4. Treehugger With Halloween fast approaching it seems an opportune time to think about doing it a little greener this year. Treehugger always has great green round-ups and their Halloween green guide doesn’t disappoint. Where to start: Once you’ve checked out the Halloween guide head over to this post on literally greening your home office.
5. Buzz Beast A nicely designed online magazine that covers trends and is slanted to Gen Y but packed with enough good stuff to keep Gen X and Boomers happy. Where to start: Check out the first in their The Way I Work series.
Here is the first in the BROODWORK Ideal Live/Work Space series. Philosopher Alain de Botton, a recent addition to the BROODWORK family, discusses his favorite place to write and announces his plans for Living Architecture – an exciting new project that makes contemporary residential architecture more accessible.
Alain lives in London and is the author of a number of critically acclaimed books including The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work. When asked what he does all day, Alain replied “Sit at home, at the top of the house, and think about stuff. And then mornings and evenings, lots of childcare with 2 very demanding and wonderful young men under 5.” Sounds rather familiar.
We asked Alain to describe his ideal work space. This is what he had to say:
“The best place I ever worked was Heathrow Terminal 5, where I had a desk right in the middle of the departures hall. I was invited to the airport to be a Writer in Residence (and later wrote a book about the experience, A Week at the Airport). The terminal turned out to be an ideal spot in which to do some work, for it rendered the idea of writing so unlikely as to make it possible again. Objectively good places to work rarely end up being so; in their faultlessness, quiet and well-equipped studies have a habit of rendering the fear of failure overwhelming. Original thoughts are like shy animals. We sometimes have to look the other way – towards a busy street or terminal – before they run out of their burrows.
The setting was certainly rich in distractions. Every few minutes, a voice (usually belonging to either Margaret or her colleague Juliet, speaking from a small room on the floor below) would make an announcement, for example, attempting to reunite a Mrs Barker, recently arrived from Frankfurt, with a stray piece of her hand luggage or reminding Mr Bashir of the pressing need for him to board his flight to Nairobi.
For most passengers, I was simply a terminal employee and therefore a useful source of information on finding the customs desk or the cash machine. Those who realised my role found it more appropriate to consider the desk as an opportunity for confessions. I was approached by a man embarking on what he wryly termed the holiday of a lifetime to Bali with his wife, who was months away from succumbing to incurable brain cancer. She rested nearby, in a specially constructed wheel chair laden with complicated breathing apparatus. She was 49 and had been entirely healthy until April, when she had gone to work on a Monday morning complaining of a slight headache. Another man explained that he had been visiting his family in London, but that he had another one in Los Angeles who were ignorant of the first. He had five children and two mothers-in-law but his face bore none of the strains of his itinerary.
When we call a chair or a house beautiful, really what we’re saying is that we like the way of life it’s suggesting to us (Alain’s home office is pictured above). It has an attitude we’re attracted to: if it was magically turned into a person, we’d like who it was. It would be convenient if we could remain in much the same mood wherever we happened to be, in a cheap motel or a palace (think of how much money we’d save on redecorating our houses), but unfortunately we’re highly vulnerable to the coded messages that emanate from our surroundings. This helps to explain our passionate feelings towards matters of architecture and home decoration: these things help to decide who we are.
Of course, architecture can’t on its own always make us into contented people. Witness the dissatisfactions that can unfold even in idyllic surroundings. One might say that architecture suggests a mood to us, which we may be too internally troubled to be able to take up. Its effectiveness could be compared to the weather: a fine day can substantially change our state of mind – and people may be willing to make great sacrifices to be nearer a sunny climate. Then again, under the weight of sufficient problems (romantic or professional confusions, for example), no amount of blue sky, and not even the greatest building, will be able to make us smile. Hence the difficulty of trying to raise architecture into a political priority: it has none of the unambiguous advantages of clean drinking water or a safe food supply. And yet it remains vital.
Judging from the success of interior design magazines and property shows, you might think that this country was now as comfortable with good contemporary architecture as it is with non-native food or music.
But scratch beneath the metropolitan, London-centric focus, and you quickly discover that Britain remains a country deeply in love with the old and terrified of the new. Country hotels compete among themselves to tell us how ancient they are; holiday cottages vaunt that they were already in existence when Jane Austen was a girl. The draughty sash window shows no signs of retiring. Inheriting furniture and not bothering with plumbing continue to function as mysterious symbols of status.
A few years ago, I wrote a book about architecture critical of our nostalgia and low expectations. It got a healthy amount of attention, on the back of which I was invited to a stream of conferences about the future of architecture. But one night, returning from one such conference in Bristol, I had a dark moment of the soul. I realised that however pleasing it is to write a book about an issue one feels passionately about, the truth is that – a few exceptions aside – books don’t change anything. I realised that if I cared so much about architecture, writing was just a coward’s way out; the real challenge was to build.
So on the back of a notepad was born a project which officially launches this week: Living Architecture is a not-for-profit organisation that puts up houses around the UK designed by some of the world’s top architects and makes these available to the public to rent for holidays throughout the year. (Dutch firm MVRDV‘s Balancing Barn is pictured below).
Our dream was to allow people to experience what it is like to live and sleep in a space designed by an outstanding architectural practice. While there are examples of great modern buildings in Britain, they tend to be in places that one passes through (airports, museums, offices), and the few modern houses that exist are almost all in private hands and cannot be visited. This seriously skews discussions of architecture. When people declare that they hate modern buildings they are on the whole speaking not from experience of homes, but from a distaste of post-war tower blocks or bland airconditioned offices.
Living Architecture‘s houses are deliberately varied. One of them by the Dutch firm MVRDV hangs precariously off the edge of a hill in Suffolk. Another in Thorpeness by the Norwegian architects JVA has four steel roofs, each of which houses a bedroom and a bathroom (the Dune House pictured above). A third, by the young Scottish practice NORD is a stark black box in the shadow of Dungeness nuclear power station. A fourth, by the legendary Swiss architect Peter Zumthor, is a secular mini-monastery which aims to bring an ecclesiastical calm and solemnity to the Devon countryside.” (Zumthor’s Secular Retreat should be completed next year, pictured below).
Photograph of Alain’s home office and the Living Architecture homes: Edmund Sumner
1. Design House Stockholm Umbrella Stand, $140 Designed by Eva Schildt, this inspired stand is as useful as it is sculptural. (Bonus: it comes with its own umbrella.)Get it: Huset
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4. Umbrella Pot, 66,700 JPY This eco-friendly, eco-chic, eco-smart (eco-everything) piece uses the extra rainwater from your wet umbrella to nourish a small plant. Get it: kyouei-ltd.co.jp
5. KARTELL Umbrella Stand, $155 These rainbow-reminiscent containers designed by Gino Columbini back in 1966 are the perfect remedy for a wet, rainy day. Get it: Mod Livin’
Images linked to their sources within the numbered text
A couple of years ago I was on an architecture tour in Los Angeles. We had seen a bunch of houses and were ending the long (and rather hot) day at a home flung far back in the hills behind the city. We got lost. The driveway was dirt. I wasn’t holding high expectations but the building was a gem and suspended above the dining table was a wonderful, crazy, scribble of green wire – a sculpture by Rebecca Niederlander. I took a photo of it. Many photos actually and I tracked Rebecca down – I won’t say stalked! But I found her and in finding her I discovered BROODWORK; here was an extraordinary coalition of artists, architects, designers and writers who all share one thing – they are deeply immersed to the integration of their work and their family life. This was the first time I had come across a group that celebrated the impact family had on one’s work.
I’ve been trying to figure out how to fold them into the Lifework family ever since. Along came the Post Family and the birth of the Ideal Live/Work Space. And it became clear that this was a perfect place to explore the work of BROODWORK.
After a productive meeting with Rebecca and architect Iris Anna Regn (who co-founded BROODWORK with Rebecca) we are now ready to launch the latest Ideal Live/Work Space series. I think you’re going to enjoy it. The first participant is acclaimed philosopher and author Alain De Botton. Look out for his post later today. We will also visit Rebecca’s Eagle Rock home and studio; the home Iris is designing with her husband, architect Tim Durfee; graphic designer Juliette Bellocq and Families and Work Institute founder Ellen Galinsky and painter Norman Galinsky.
What song does Bosco the dog listen to while his owner, Jean Lin, covers commercial interiors and architecture for otto, forecasts trends for WGSN, or designs for her women’s clothing line, Dressed in Yellow? Take a listen.
What do you listen to while you work? This depends on what work I’m doing and what kind of mood I’m in. If I’m writing, I generally can’t listen to music with intense lyrics, so I’ll listen to the mellower jazz like Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue or melodic electronic stuff like Múm and The Album Leaf. When I’m drawing or working on my clothing line, anything goes. It helps to have something upbeat like MGMT or thought-provoking like NPR. I’m addicted to This American Life and Fresh Air with Terry Gross.
How do you listen? I almost always use my computer, either with my iPod or streaming online.
Do you have any favorite music websites/providers? I grew up in Massachusetts and there is a great chain there called Newbury Comics. They now have a website where you can order CDs and vinyl, but back in the day it was a great spot to find new music and a creative atmosphere.
Does music influence your work? Once I designed an entire collection while listening exclusively to Miles Davis. It wasn’t a conscious source of inspiration, but when it came time to present what I had made, I realized that the moody spirit of the music had found its way into the clothes. You can see it here.
Where do you find music recommendations? Who influences your musical taste? My brother Jasper and boyfriend Rory are always recommending music they think I’ll like. If it wasn’t for Jasper I would still be listening to Weezer’s first two albums on repeat.
If your work was a song or a musician, what or who would it be? Well…I inadvertently named my clothing company after a line in Young MC’s “Bust a Move”. I’ll let you decide.
JEAN’S PLAYLIST
In The Beginning, K’Naan
Re:Definition, Mos Def & Talib Kweli
Heartbeats, The Knife
Wagon Wheel, Old Crow Medicine Show
Hey, The Pixies
Dead Sound, The Raveonettes
Drop It Like It’s Hot, Snoop Dogg and Pharrell
My Block (Nitty Remix), Tupac
In The Air Tonight, Phil Collins
The ’59 Sound, The Gaslight Anthem
A Sunday Smile, Beirut
Cry, Cry, Cry, Johnny Cash
The Subtleties of Chores and Unlocked Doors, Des Ark
Images: Jean Lin
Today is the last day to go into the draw for the Eames plywood splint. I was at the Eames Office recently and couldn’t resist snapping their display of splints. These light weight plywood pieces were the Eames’ response to the heavy stiff metal splints that were used during WWII. About 150,000 of the Eames product were produced. When the war ended the Charles and Ray took the work they’d done with the splint and molding plywood and used it in their furniture designs.
Below is a splint proudly displayed on the living room wall of freelance writer Bill Robinson. You can read the full story on his favorite wedding present here.
“For the last few months, I’ve been extremely busy. I’ve got a full teaching schedule, I’m a graduate student in mathematics, I run my own business, and I do freelance writing. My day usually starts at 7AM and ends at 11PM. Being able to schedule my day is really important and I use a variety of high-tech and low-tech solutions to get me through the week.
For a few months, I didn’t check my email in the mornings. One of the reasons why was that I had to immediately start replying to emails and get tasks done. This took time and would derail my morning routine. Instead, I sat on the sofa, drank my tea and took time to wake up. I’ve been using Inbox Zero for most of this year and I’ve recently actually managed to check my emails in the mornings without hampering my schedule. I don’t do it every morning, but from time to time, I manage to check my email in a few minutes.
Any task that I need to accomplish, I’ll usually write it down somewhere. I’ve got a stack of papers from my daily Moleskine calendar that I use for this. Making lists is a really good way to do so. You can also send yourself emails. Since I use Inbox Zero with Gmail, these tasks will get done very quickly. Google Calendar is also a great tool. If your schedule is pretty loaded, then using Google Calendar will makes things clearer for you.
I also use a daily planner to jot down stuff as well as a paper-based calendar, in which I like to cross out the days. Why do I use paper alternatives instead of just using electronic versions? It’s because that every time that I open up Gmail, I end up doing more work. So when I don’t have time for this, I can easily reference a paper calendar or a daily planner to see what’s up. It’s also easier to carry and modify on the fly.
When you are busy, you need naps in order to get through the day. I like to take daily naps, which vary from 20 minutes to an hour, depending on how much time I have. This usually happens during my lunch break. It’s a perfect way to recharge your batteries. After a nap, I like drinking a cup of coffee to fully wake me up.
If you are very busy, the trick is to find some time to relax, no matter what. For example, I tend to sleep in late on the weekends and I usually don’t do much on Saturdays. It’s the day that I recuperate from the week, taking a long afternoon nap and taking it easy. It gets me ready for the week to come.
By Range.”
This story appears in partnership with Unplggd, a site for people who embrace technology and design in their home.