In Appreciation of Pearl River Mart

I am so happy that Pearl River Mart has survived the retail apocalypse. There’s nothing else like it for a departure from the trend that is Normcore, or really any other trend for that matter. It’s the store where you can purchase face masks for Chinese New Year’s or a Japanese fish kite, but also some great basics. I’ve always loved their classic blue on white ceramics which can be mixed with almost any dinnerware.

The other things I just love are their everyday items such as greeting card or matches. These do not resemble what you’ll find in CVS or those big box stores.

Malaysian Matches.

Aren’t these cheery? Wouldn’t you love to get one of these in the mail?

Papier Maché head mask on display

Papier Maché head mask on my friend.

A Painterly Garden

This is my mother’s garden.

It has a painterly quality with well arranged textures and brilliant colors.

She’s a former painter so I was curious to know if this effect was planned. “No,” she said with a wave of the hand, “I go shopping, I find things I like, then bring them home and plant them.” I was incredulous but perhaps without cause.

On the subject of landscapes, David Hockney speaks of painters seeing space in a way not everyone can see.  He says nature doesn’t follow the rules of perspective, because nature is too complicated. Hockney says with landscape, perspective doesn’t make space, it strangles space.

So, my mother the gardener, a former painter, planted intuitively for over 30 years. She’s created quite a landscape.

Painting As Kitsch, Kitsch Is Good

Like many people who meander into John Derian Company, I’d like to have pretty much everything in the store, though much of what I’d like to buy is either out of my price league or not something I should spend that on. 

Exhibit A:  an oil painting of a dog (what else?) costing around $650.00.  I showed it to a fellow prop stylist who said, “Oooooh, that IS a good one. But why don’t you find an artist to paint your own dog?”

A great idea though where to find an artist to paint a portrait for a few hundred bucks?  I asked around and here you go:  www.instapainting.com.  It’s web site where you can shop for artists to turn a photo into a painting.  One hundred and four dollars later, my favorite picture of T Bone is now a painting.  It just needs a cool vintage frame.

Top Image:  Finished Painting.  Bottom Image:  Original Picture Courtesy of Tara Sgroi

Wake Me Up When Everything's Not All White

What's all this I hear about wallpaper making a comeback?  As far as I'm concerned, it never went away.

For one thing, it’s the perfect solution for enlivening a blah wall.  In this case, a narrow space off my kitchen was prime for something interesting.  I thought almost any wallpaper would do, anything to give it some life, but this Tree paper from Cole & Son works especially well because the line of trees leads your eye around the corner to more trees down a hallway.

Carnie dog, from prior blog post, keeping it real in the foreground.

Before:  Nothing much to see here.

Carnival Figurines

Until the 1950's, before plush toys, carnival prizes were often garish, colorful plaster of Paris figurines. They're fragile and easily broken, so not many vintage ones survive in good condition.  Those that do are mostly found on eBay, which is where I discovered "carnieware" while trolling for dog figurines.  (Yes it's true, I collect inanimate dogs, see early blog post below.)  I've since noticed fans of these toys among artists, designers, photographers and general appreciators of the unconventional.  Below are some fun examples collected by the celebrated photo-journalist Mary Ellen Mark, plus those belonging to one of my most very favorite designers, Todd Nickey, partner in Nickey + Kehoe.  (www.nickeykehoe.com)

Mary Ellen Mark's dog and cowboy.  

Cherry-cheeked friends.

Thank you, Todd Nickey, for sending this picture. If I'm not mistaken, during our chat you said they look as if painted by drag queens, which is really a perfect description.    

T Bone and friends.

A lovely aside:  I told an Italian friend about this blog post.  He said, “ah, you’re taking me back.” He remembered as a child in Trieste after World War 2, the American soldiers stationed there coming back from the Luna Park, having won these toys and giving them to the local children.  They didn’t know what else to do with them. He remembered the hand-painted colors melted in the rain.

Content Link Block

Select a page and create a visual link to it. Learn more

BLOG

Coming Up Pink

As one who loves the color pink, it's more often association with what is tacky (flamingo yard ornaments, Elvis's Cadillac) rather than the sublime can be a bit disheartening.  So it was pretty great to see the art cast against petal pink walls to stunning effect at two of my favorite exhibitions this past winter.

Richard Haines "Larger Than Life" at Daniel Cooney Gallery

Cecily Brown Rehearsal at The Drawing Center.  The color is Benjamin Moore Easter Bonnet. I know because I asked.

The Drawing Center, Cecily Brown.

Detail Cecily Brown 

An Ode to Toile

You've come a long way baby.  Brigitte Zieger uses toile's traditional framework to challenge feminine stereotypes.

Toile, with its repeating patterns of idyllic landscapes and figures, is often considered to be conventional and bourgeois.  But toile wallpaper is in the homes of some of our foremost tastemakers and modern interpretations of It's classic design can be found in unexpected places ....

At Nickey Kehoe, the best store in L.A., with toile dining chair.

Flavor Paper's custom Williamsburg toile at The Wythe Hotel.

Brooklyn toile in Beastie Boys Mike Diamond's home.

Detail Mike Diamond's Brooklyn toile.

Inez van Lamsweerde's pup Leo at home.

Artist Richard Saja collaboration with Keds for Opening Ceremony.

Fredericks and Mae

Gabriel Fredericks Cohen and Jolie Mae Signorile, the design team of Fredericks and Mae, met while studying art at Oberlin.  Initially, the two didn't know each other.  They had different schedules.  But each noticed and was intrigued by the other’s studio scraps.  Jolie was using old Vogues, neon paint and thousands of plastic soldiers and Gabe was working with thread, gold leaf and little nails.  “It was fun!  We had a materials crush on each other,” Jolie says.

After graduation their first collaboration in New York was inspired by a pair of vintage milliner wings Gabe found in a West Village shop.  "Wings are so emotional - they are amazing real instruments (birds) and have huge symbolic power (angels)." The pair began sourcing feathers, reconstructing wings and selling to individual shops.  Then they moved on to handmade archery arrows. "We had the components," Gabe says simply.  

Much of what Jolie and Gabe make is driven by their shared materials vocabulary and what elements they already have around the studio.  But they also have an informed respect and concern for the historical, political and cultural context of objects.  There is a brief, fun-to-read history of each item on their site, some of which may surprise you.  Darts are one example. "Darts were historically used in warfare in ancient history; skirmishers used darts of varying sizes, similar to javelins."   Hmmmm, it's a thought, but think I'll stick with the modern, recreational usage.

Fredericks and Mae is now an expansive line of hand-crafted toys and games, tinsel or horse hair tassels, paper kites, wooden worry beads.   Go to www.fredericksandmae.myshopify.com

Arrows and twine.

Tassels in progress.

Vestige of the beginning, a milliner wing.

Dart board with horse hair tassels.

Fletching station at the studio.

Checker Board

Beach Tennis Paddles.

Jolie Signorile and Gabe Cohen

Another in a series....these are the people in my neighborhood.

I love color. Cheery bright pops of color. Which is probably why Johnna West's stationary caught my eye on a recent trip to design store fave, The Primary Essentials. Lauren Snyder, TPE's owner, showed me some of Johnna's line, called Frances Lab.  It includes notebooks, cards, wrapping papers in abstract, painterly patterns as well as crisp, graphic designs. 

All curious, I recently visited Johnna to find out more about her work.  Frances Lab's HQ is Johnna's comfortable, spacious apartment in Bed-Stuy, a home she shares with her boyfriend and a ridiculously cute feline showboat named Luna.

Johnna describes her process as one that walks a fine line between between design and art. She begins by creating an oil painting, watercolor or line drawing, then digitizes and formats the art for printing. Johnna began making stationary in 2013 while still at her day job as creative director for a restaurant group. This past January she fully launched Frances Lab with a new collection.  "It's been exciting to see the immediate response -- and a bit of a roller coaster," she says.  

You can find Frances Lab at The Primary Essentials, People of 2Morrow and of course, Frances Lab.

New Patterns.

Luna like this one.

Luna.

These are the people in my neighborhood......

This week we meet Kelli Galloway, floral designer and owner of Hops Petunia. (www.hopspetunia.com) There are quite a few gifted floral designers in Brooklyn right now, but even in this illustriously-crowded marketplace, Kelli's work stands out for her unexpected combinations of textures and colors.  She mixes flowers that look as if they might come from someone's back yard with more exotic varieties.  An art director in her former professional life, Kelli began studying with various horticultural masters a few years ago and found her calling.  "I'm so much happier now, it's crazy," she says. Her success is due to word-of-mouth and the support of her fellow floral designers.  "Everyone wants everyone to be successful, people kind of hold each other up."  Her studio is located at the Jill Lindsey store (www.jilllindsey.com) in Fort Greene and if you stop by you'll spy her distinctive arrangements throughout.  Who doesn't want to look at flowers right now?

Winter whites.

Arrangement for the opening of Jill Lindsey store.

Kelli Galloway at floral class in Seattle, on the day she decided to become a florist.  Photograph:  Dart Photographie        

Bouquet for city hall bride.  Erin Nicole Brown Photography

What I'm talkin' about.

At the Wythe Hotel

Spectacular arrangement at Jill Lindsey store.

I spied over the holidays.......

The busyness of holiday life meant little time for studio visits and interviews but I do want to share some of the lovely things I saw and, ahem, maybe bought.  I bet you like them too!

A lively pop up sale at the studio space shared by woodworkers Ariel Alasko and Amelie Mancini featured their beautiful work plus that of ceramicist Josephine Heilpern and jeweler Nick Lundeen.  Just look at these hand carved wooden spoons, ceramics, jewelry, printed linens.   I wanted everything!   www.arielealasko.com, www.ameliemancini.com, www.nicklundeen.com, www.recreationcentershop.com

Napkins from Amelie Mancini, Spoons carved by Ariel Alasko and Ceramics by Josephine Heilpern.

Photograph by Ariel Alasko

             Photograph by Nick Lundeen

                 Jewelry by Nick Lundeen, Tumblers and Pitcher by Josephine Heilpern  

                 Tortoise Cuffs by Nick Lundeen.     Photograph Nick Lundeen

                                Printed Fabric Pouches and Napkins by Amelie Mancini 

                  This is Mazie.  She was there too!  Photograph by Ariel Alasko

These are the people in my neighborhood....

One in a series featuring local artisans from Clinton Hill, Fort Greene, Bed-Stuy whose work I love and want to share.

Have you SEEN these quilts?!  This is the work of Haptic Lab.  Haptic means a sense of touch and hand-made is the creed of Emily Fischer, the studio's founder.  Emily started by making kites on her living room floor after being laid off from her architecture job in 2009.  "It's the best thing that's ever happened to me.  Now I get to make things."   She also now works from a spacious studio in Bed-Stuy with her own crew of artisans.  When I visited recently they were in full holiday elf mode to meet demand for her hand-stitched, elaborately patterned quilts and fantastical sailing ship kites.  What enamors me about Haptic Lab is the combination of high craft with visceral, dreamy design.  www.hapticlab.com

Inspiration board.

Constellation Quilt.

Emily Fischer holding a kite in progress.

Flame Sailing Ship Kite

Coastal Quilt.

Quilts awaiting shipment to their lucky owners.

Moi!

Today's obsession. Yves Klein Blue

Yves Klein Chalk Table.

Collecting, in this case dogs.

Susan Sontag wrote "There is no such thing as a monogamous collector.  Sight is a promiscuous sense.  The avid gaze always wants more."  I collect these mostly from flea markets and antique stores, although Paula Rubenstein in Noho and John Derian tempt my avid gaze.

John Derian

Ebay $175.00

Flowers at The Primary Essentials with Fox Fodder Farm

The Primary Essentials (www.theprimartyessentials.com) is one of my favorite shops in Brooklyn.   There is treasure everywhere, Helen Levi pottery, textured linens in deep indigo blue and ceramic barrettes of all things!  So I was pretty happy to spend a cheery, rainy Saturday morning there recently drinking delicious coffee and arranging flowers with Taylor from Fox Fodder Farm. www.foxfodderfarm.com