Internet favorites for April: Barrettes

Check out these amazing surreal barrettes from Dream Collective! As a lover of jewelry but a coward when it comes to wearing necklaces, bracelets, and rings, these are just perfect. 

here are all the other internet favorites. :)

Internet Favorites for Tuesday: A few amazing pieces on being a woman/writing/the internet

This piece by Jia Tolentino is incredible. She examines the paradox but she doesn't just leave it there--she makes assertions that actually make sense--I never read anything on feminist blogging (a favorite topic of mine, what can I say) so well-reasoned, so detailed. This essay encompasses so much, in a fluid, quick, thorough way.

Let’s say a feminist site fucks up occasionally; so do feminists. Let’s say even that the site is frequently unpalatable; that seems reasonable in a world where every human is a nightmare to someone else. To me, the obvious conclusion from everything that is annoying on the internet is that the stakes of representation should be much, much lower. But we are trudging through these wild storms of approval and disapprobation on a failing hunt for consensus; we are worshiping and trying to locate a mirage.

Then I followed her on all possible platforms. She wrote this beautiful story about Kyrgyzstan, where she was in the Peace Corps. And she also wrote this smashing thing. I love her!

Because this is kind of more of a notebook than a newspaper, here are a few other essays along similar lines, that have gone very viral for good reason.

On Pandering, Claire Vaye Watkins (and Tolentino's take)
80 Books No Woman Should Read, Men Explain Lolita to Me, Rebecca Solnit

<3 <3 

internet favorites for january: molly young's critical shopper column

This month, I wanted to highlight Molly Young's amazing column for the New York Times. She goes to a variety of stores (from upscale to goofy) and reviews the experience--the ambience, the clientele, the employees, the products. And she's hilarious and super smart and this is exactly the kind of fashion/style writing that brings meaning to my life.

 Some favorites:

1. Flying Tiger Copenhagen--the post where I first sat up and said, "Who is this genius writer?" (Here's my haul.)

"As retail experiences go, it is like walking into a junk drawer that was blown up to theme-park scale. If your reaction to that sentence is to physically swerve away from your reading device, you may cruise along to the next article. If your reaction is “Tell me more,” here we go."

2. Totokaelo--my love for this sort of thing runs deep.

"If you’re in the mood to hit the playground or just to obscure your secondary sex characteristics, any of these will do the job."

PS Another astonishingly accomplished (and gorgeous, Molly Young too, I said it) writer hero--Alice Gregory. Here's a piece of hers I never forgot, the real experience of working at Sotheby's.

PPS All of the Internet Favorites!

internet favorites for december: the only apps i've ever loved

As a rule, I dislike trying out apps or downloading things. Technology-wise, I am a late adapter. But these three apps have made themselves essential to my life, and I wholeheartedly recommend them!

1. Unroll.me
Eve showed me this. It combines all the subscriptions you choose (how about some Madewell promo emails? Everlane? Bookcourt?) into one single email, and sends it to you every morning. It has saved my inbox!

2. VSCO Cam
I know this is old news for smartphone owners, but this is an awesome app for photo-editing on your phone--more subtle filters than Instagram, and lots of fine-tuneable options.

3. Camerabag 2
I can't afford Photoshop or even Lightroom, and this $20 thingy allows me to edit my digital photos to the extent that I want. And it's been invaluable for my Fusion freelancing. I love it! It's like VSCO Cam for a desktop, but with even more options. And if all your images from an event have the same problem--like, they're all too yellow--you can create your own filter and save it.


PS Here are the other internet favorites.

internet favorites for november: favorite things from instagram

My favorite instagram users, consistently, are the illustrator/designers Leah Reena Goren, Kaye Blegvad, Amelie Mancini, Louise Lockhart, and Phoebe Wahl. I also love the Swedish mother Erica (but her photos fill me with so much longing and delight I can barely look at them),  photographer Diana Markosian, and (for art project inspiration) Maya Climbs Trees, Kirsten Rickert's homeschooling account.

 But I follow something like 700 other accounts, and so here are some screenshots of favorite things I've seen on instagram (not all these accounts are consistently amazing, but some are--you be the judge)--inspiration for writing, painting, and photography.

1. Julia Rothman

2. Danielle Kroll

3. Maria Kozak

4. Louise Lockhart

5. Monika Forsberg

6. TimeSpacePlace

7. Hyperallergic

8. Sam Is Home

9. Esther Coxs Kiosk

PS Here are all the other Internet Favorites!

PPS Here is my instagram :)

internet favorites for october: favorite enormous eyes

Enormous Eye is a kind of writing project--art project?--by Amy Rose Spiegel of Rookie. Various writers--not all young, but mostly, not all New Yorkers, but mostly--record every single detail of their Saturday, and she publishes the results pretty much unedited. And you're not supposed to go out and have a really dynamic interesting day--just do what you'd normally do.

I got to do one in the spring, and it was my favorite day of living in New York. (It didn't hurt that it was one of the first warm days of spring.) Everything was incredibly vibrant and exciting and fresh, and I felt like I could see it all. I felt half-nervous, half-powerful. I told Eve, this is probably what I hoped being a writer would feel like every day!

Anyways, the whole Enormous Eye experiment is worth reading in its entirety. It TRANSCENDS the sum of its parts. On the one hand, I found it very comforting to realize how many of my writer heroes are introverted like me, or spend a lot of time alone. (Sometimes living in NYC it feels like there's a huge party going on, just beyond my reach.) On the other hand, it reminds me of what the best lecturer I ever had at Harvard, Phil Fisher, said about Joyce's Ulysses--the idea is that in one single day you remember/relive every important thing that's ever happened to you. I also think it's interesting to see who's really blasé about the activity, really bare-bones, and who is a little more writerly.

I have so many favorites, but here is my favorite one ever, by Lola Pellegrino. I also forced Eve to read it.

I also love Haley Mlotek's, so beautiful and simple.

And I love everything by Sarah Nicole Prickett and this is no exception (but have you read her bit in Women in Clothes??).

Here are the other Internet Favorites.

internet favorites for september: dream interiors

a while ago, i posted my two favorite apartments from the selby.

here are some recent favorite spaces from design sponge.

1. i love the calm wood pieces and the graphic/organic artworks in holladay and sam saltz's apartment...

2. i also feel inspired to make some stuff by these bedroom shots from rodger stevens and johanna goodman. though my minimalist gf might not be able to cope with such a riot of colors...

as you can see, it's never a bad moment for josef albers

3. and best for last, check out this house and its astounding attic, from darbie nowatka and justin rice... it is just....so lovely...

ghjhkshdkfhsdkf and tune in next month for more internet favorites.

Internet favorites: Giant, Loose, Unaffordable

Those who know me well know about my unstoppable passion for giant, loose clothing. Basically, if it looks like you might wear it as penance, I probably like it.

For example, I just bought this "raw-edge linen sack dress" in two colors:

Internet favorite: nuclear waste, the distant future, and invisible danger

I was reading Hiroshima when a friend emailed me about this project--how can we communicate the dangers of nuclear waste disposal sites to the mind-bogglingly distant future? These things stay dangerous 10,000 years, at which point "today's written languages are unlikely to survive."

This site, related to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, gave me nightmares and colored all my recent walks through the city.

The goal is to make a repulsive, unnatural place, that even without languages clearly telegraphs the following points:

This place is a message...and part of a system of messages...pay attention to it!

Sending this message was important to us. We considered ourselves to be a powerful culture.

This place is not a place of honor...no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here...nothing valued is here.

What is here is dangerous and repulsive to us. This message is a warning about danger.

The danger is in a particular location...it increases toward a center...the center of danger is here...of a particular size and shape, and below us.

The danger is still present, in your time, as it was in ours.

The danger is to the body, and it can kill.

The form of the danger is an emanation of energy.

The danger is unleashed only if you substantially disturb this place physically. This place is best shunned and left uninhabited.

I'm fascinated by the way the researchers reach into the distant past to think about what is universally beautiful or horrible to humans. For example, obelisks, spheres, cubes and other perfect geometric forms would show that the waste site is sacred in a good/important/valuable way. So many of the concepts include purposefully distorted forms--like a series of rectangular prisms that are all hacked off. It's clear that we knew how to make perfect things, and deliberately chose not to. 

For another, the researchers promote the idea of spending a huge amount of work crafting cheap and common materials. "Doing substantial work on materials of little value suggests that the place is not commemorative of phenomena highly valued by the culture that made it, but as marking something important yet quite unvalued ...not a treasure, but its opposite...a location of highly devalued material ("dangerous garbage" or an "un-treasure")."

Internet favorites for August: Odds and Ends Wishlist

What are these little things? They are the sorts of things that prevent me from living a minimalist lifestyle. Here are the rest of the internet favorites.

1. Tell my mother I love her, from Explorer's Press

2. Eye earrings that go on either side of your ear, Bauble Bar

3. Small bronze hands from Small Bronzes on Etsy

4. Eyes by David Prossler, PAOM

5. Alexander Henry Frida's Garden fabric (for a curtain maybe??)

6. Ayame socks from Koshka

Internet favorites for July: Favorite tote bags

Here are all the other internet favorites!

I carry a tote bag every day. I have to carry around a lot of stuff for tutoring, and I usually carry a book/magazine, my calendar, my journal, a camera and film, and a draft of a story.

Internet favorites for June: favorite wallpapers

Here are the other internet favorites!

I don't know when I'll ever own a house. But I dream of having a room of my own where I can write at one desk and draw at another. I don't think my gf would like to have wallpaper--she's all about simple, white-box style--so I'd need my own space to put up one of these beautiful beautiful prints.

Hygge and West is what kicked off this strange new obsession with wallpaper. Feast your eyes on these beautiful designs from Rifle Paper Company:

1. Rosa in indigo

Internet Favorites: the world's most beautiful teatowels

1. flying geese

Internet Favorites for May: Things I cannot afford

I wish I didn't like stuff as much as I do. I love stuff. This has a lot to do with the internet, my #1 source of objects and lives that I must have for myself. I read blogs and feel sad until I identify some stuff I truly love, and then, instead of sadness, I feel desire. I guess this is what "inspiration" is?

Thing from the past: I remember when I was living in Italy trying to eat less dessert all the time. I felt like I was eating too much. But I went to a party for which my host family had made a tiramisù, and I noted sadly in my journal that the tiramisù was "not irresistible." Sometimes you just want to be enchanted by something, even when you know you shouldn't.


Some stuff I'd love:

1. Lucas Foglia's book for A Natural Order. Foglia is my favorite photographer. More of his photos are here. These photos had a huge effect on my writing project. Not sure if I want the book or the life. Well, if you can't get to Wildroots, wwoofing might be a good substitute.

2. Everything from Ace&Jig.

Simple, soft-shaped garments in the most sumptuous textiles. I went to their sample sale recently but I think I have found the brand I would like to wear at all times ceaselessly into eternity.

3. This Margiela earring, a daisy on a stem that shoots right through you...

 

4. hand and arrow from datter...

5. And most of all a trip back to Turin.

I was an exchange student in Turin from ages 15-16. One of the strangest parts of being in a real long-term relationship is that traveling is no longer my top priority. But I miss it. I recently learned that awe is the healthiest emotion. 

Internet Favorites for April: Print All Over Me

Some more heart's desires from your desire expert. Here are the other internet favorite posts.

Do you know the website Print All Over Me? Like Society 6 or Spoonflower or whatever, you can upload images and get them printed on all kinds of gear.

1. This scarf by jessssssseeeeeeee

2. This shirt or this shirt by Saskia Pomeroy

3. This tote bag by Sara Andreasson

4. This shift dress by Nathalie Chikhi

Internet favorites for March: two favorite New Yorker articles

I think about these two all the time:

Jonathan Rosen about passenger pigeons, 6 Jan 2014:
In 1813, John James Audubon saw a flock—if that is what you call an agglomeration of birds moving at sixty miles an hour and obliterating the noonday sun—that was merely the advance guard of a multitude that took three days to pass. Alexander Wilson, the other great bird observer of the time, reckoned that a flock he saw contained 2,230,272,000 individuals. To get your head around just how many passenger pigeons that would mean, consider that there are only about two hundred and sixty million rock pigeons in the world today. You would have to imagine more than eight times the total world population of rock pigeons, all flying at the same time in a connected mass.

Burkhard Bilger about Sandor Katz and wild fermentation, 22 Nov 2010:
The ants, collected from his woodpile in the winter when they were too sluggish to get away, had a snappy texture and bright, tart flavor—like organic Pop Rocks. (They were full of formic acid, which gets its name from the Latin word for ant.) He brought us a little dish of toasted acorns, cups of honey-sweetened sumac tea, and goblets of a musky black broth made from decomposed inky-cap mushrooms. I felt, for a moment, as if I’d stumbled upon a child’s tea party in the woods.

ps: all the other internet favorites

from the museum of natural history in berlin

edited to add:
derek parfit
bringing animals along
secret riches beneath a temple

Internet favorites for February--a shopping list for winter

 Internet favorites are back! Here are some snuggly things I'd buy if I were a woman of means.

1. This "magnet pattern game" rainbow toy handmade in Germany, I'd just hang it on the wall next to my Albers color studies and stare at it all day

2. little wire string lights, one step more magical than Christmas tree lights, though I love Christmas tree lights too.

3. This perfect scarf from Leah Goren, ugh come wrap yourself around my neck

4. And everything from Rikumo, but in particular this "broken cloud placemat" and this beautiful wooden raccoon which I absolutely do not need but that Rikumo has put in its "office supplies" section to tempt me into thinking that I can use it as an office supply.