November 2005
Orange22 is a downtown LA-based high-end design and build company specializing in enviroments and furniture objects that "push the envelope". The also have opened a new retail showroom downtown LA. Housed in a renovated turn of the century bank building, the showrooms white, glowing curtains span 20ft floor to ceiling. One side of the 2000sf space houses Orange22's design studio with a model shop in the back while the other half is lined with oversized white bases making for an impressive stage upon which design objects are honored. The gallery space is showing a collection of local designer talent that represent the style and vision of Orange22. The showroom's mission is to highlight great work and position it so that it makes way into the studio's designed environments. Events will be hosted throughout the year featuring the new designers as well as Orange22's latest furniture creations.
Internationally renowned photographer Julius Shulman celebrates the official transfer of his historic archive to the Getty Institute with this landmark exhibition. Showing a huge collection of his work, including Koenig’s Case Study House 22, pictured, Shulman demonstrates how his iconic images have helped define modern architecture.
11 October-22 January, 2006
The Getty Center, 1200 Getty Center Drive, Los Angeles, CA tel: 1.310 440 7300
For those with sensitive ears, Origin Live's new Sovereign turntable is something of a frequency smorgasbord. Using an Encounter arm and Goldring 1042 cartridge, experts swear they can hear subtleties in sounds that they'd never noticed even in their favourite discs. The turntable is beautifully machined but the adjustment bolts are hidden from view and, coupled with a complex assembly, this can make for difficult work on Christmas morning.
The wine bars I most enjoy are those that open early in the morning, have an unpretentious neighborhood atmosphere, and feature good food, friendly people and reasonable prices. Most of the wines offered at these places sell for anywhere from 5 -10 Euro per glass and one can easily dine at most of these places for under 12 Euro. I especially those wine bars whose owners re- cognize that wine is meant to be drunk with food, and whose specialties are simple, bistro style dishes that can range from cold plates of cheese or charcuterie especially designed to match the wines that are being offered. My true favorites have no printed menus, and both the wines and the daily culinary offerings are hand-written on blackboards that are hung behind the bar.
Continue reading "Paris Wine Bars" »
The archetype of a table lamp now floats in a swimming pool is a ready-made project based on a traditional lampshade and an emergency light in use on the seaside. In ‘off’ position, outside of the pool, the lamp has to be placed upside down (during the day), in the ‘on’ position the lamp can float on water facing upwards (at night). The lamp can be recharged after 8 hours of use. Rotation-molded polyethylene. The ‘waterproof’ is produced by metalarte and they are part of its new collection metalab launched in september 2004 in barcelona, spain and presented internationally at the light+building fair in frankfurt, germany. By Hector Serrano
Discover the South American continent's most pristine, magical regions aboard our new small cruiseships, the M/V Mare and Via Australis. These Expedition Cruise Ships take you around the island of Tierra del Fuego, through the legendary Strait of Magellan, Beagle Channel and Cape Horn. Their second vessel (Via Australis, built in 2005) will allow their program to offer 2 weekly departures from Punta Arenas (Saturadys and Wednesdays) and 2 weekly departures from Ushuaia (Saturdays and Wednesdays) giving passengers the option of 3-, 4- or 7-night journeys visiting the world's southernmost cities and Cape Horn. Disembarkations into uninhabited islands and fjords take place daily in Zodiac motorized rafts, allowing passengers to see penguins and other wildlife colonies, the region's most important glaciers, and Cape Horn. Daily lectures on specialized area subjects (Glaciology, Native Cultures, Navigation Routes, Flora and Fauna, and Penguins) complement the experience.
CRUCEROS AUSTRALIS. TEL (Toll-Free): 877-678-3772; FAX: (305) 534-9276;
Access to mobile phones is rocketing, along with its impact on poverty, writes Matthew Bishop.
In rich countries, mobile phones can seem something of a mixed blessing – particularly if you are stuck on a train next to a teenager with a Crazy Frog ring-tone. But in poor countries, mobile phones have no obvious downside and have already delivered remarkable bene?ts, in terms both of economic growth and personal empowerment. They may even enable poor countries to leapfrog over some of the traditional stages of the development process.
Continue reading "Mobile Phones Increase GDP" »
We all know smoking is unhealthy to people like ourselves and the environment. What better way than to use a Klop to filter cigarrette/cigar smokes. Smoke naturally flows through the Klop and becomes filtered by the plant leaves itself. Do ourselves a favour and save the environment. Designed by Grégoire Vandenbussche
Via | electro^plankton |
GLS Landscape Architecture is a multidisciplinary firm specializing in design and construction services for institutional, public and residential landscapes that have a complex architecture and site planning component. There are six people in the firm: Gary Strang, the principal, one architect and four landscape architects. Because GLS is involved in landscape architecture and architecture construction, the firm is especially skilled at working with architects, engineers, planners and public works agencies to integrate landscape architecture with architecture, urban design design, and infrastructure. GLS also works with clients to integrate interior and exterior spaces and materials, reinforce spatial ideas with horticulural design and solve problems associated with difficult sites.
GLS has received two AIA awards and and ASLA Honor Award for Beth Israel Memorial Gardens, a 7,000 sq ft. chapel and three acre cemetery in Houston and was recently selected to be the landscape architect fdor the Divinity School of the Pacific at UC Berkeley
If you'd rather not be home for Christmas, here are three London hotels where you'll find a festive welcome. At The Langham Hotel a butler will wrap your presents while you have a massage. An alternative Christmas menu (offered in addition to turkey) includes venison and pork belly. A two-night stay for two costs £1,485. 020 7636 1000; www.langhamhotels.com. As well as dinner on Christmas Eve and lunch on Christmas Day, treats on offer at Dukes Hotel include Christmas stockings and family movies in the Marlborough Suite. A two-night stay for two costs £840. 020 7491 4840; www.dukeshotels.com. Mandarin Oriental is offering a £123 room rate over Christmas, including cocktails in the Mandarin Bar and porters to collect purchases from nearby boutiques. Christmas lunch costs £200 per person. 020 7235 2000; www.mandarinoriental.com
The ingenious, yet simple design of the Eva Solo Barrel Grill includes a number of unique features. First, it is made from stainless steel so it is built to last. The portable coal bucket is easy to empty of ashes and the flat protective lid provides an extra surface on the patio when the grill is not in use. Cook directly over the hot coals or convert it into an oven using the optional domed lid. The Eva Solo Barrel Grill is designed to be pleasing to the eye so there is no need to hide it away after use.
Optional accessories available: Grill Tongs for moving and turning food, Domed Cooking Lid to convert the grill into an oven, Table Legs to convert the Flat Lid into a table, Cover Jacket to protect the grill from the weather.
Buy it Online @ Amazon.com
Perhaps the most exciting vintage for sparkling wine yet from Argyle! The aromas are a wonderful ebb and flow of fruit and mineral. Look for an immediate hit of peach with apricot fruit that flows into double baked wheat cracker yeast, then on into pear tart—vanilla crème. The flavor is multi-tiered and extraordinarily long. Apricot and pear fruit with a toasted yeast edge are balanced atop a crisp, mineral structure. It’s this marriage of fruit, bottle age, and mineral, which lend this Brut its creamy texture (especially with food!).
Continue reading "Argyle 2000 Brut Sparkling Wine Willamette Valley" »
California Design: The Legacy of West Coast Craft And Style
The furniture, jewelry, recreational objects, ceramics, fabric arts, and other designs that emerged from the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s California would come to identify its outdoorsy, eccentric, sometimes entirely funky persona. And the best of these were exhibited, sometimes idolized, through a series of popular shows at the Pasadena Art Museum. California Design is a detailed retrospective of these exhibitions and the West Coast style they epitomized, replete with hundreds of innovative photographs showcasing the works in all their original glory. Signature works from Charles & Ray Eames, Tropi-Cal, Don Chadwick (co-creator of the Aeron chair), and many other designers and studios illustrate twenty years of style that was as diverse as it was pioneering.
The saturated colors and candid nature of old snapshots vibrantly mirror our experience of memory; no other medium even comes close. A self-described "histo-tainer," Charles Phoenix weaves together fact and fiction, using the power of found slides to tell his triumphant and tragic holiday tales. From mixing Easter cocktails in a motel bathroom to a how-to session on making a Christmas tree out of toilet paper, each story uncovers the "true" feelings and attitudes behind the posed faces in the pictures. You'll laugh, cry, and cringe as the show brims with equal parts nostalgia and kitsch.
Egyptian Theatre 6712 Hollywood Blvd, Hollywood 323–466–FILM Fri 11–25 - Sun 1–1–06
2005 marks the centenary of the constitution of the group of artists called Brücke, founded in June 1905 by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Fritz Bleyl, Erich Heckel and Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, who at the time were architecture students in Dresden. Emil Nolde, Max Pechstein, Cuno Amiet and Otto Mueller were among the most outstanding painters who later joined this association, which broke up definitively in 1913. The eight intensive years of activity of this group witnessed the greatest development of the first period of German expressionism, which went through various stylistic phases marked precisely by the artistic objectives shared by its most important members.
Continue reading "Brücke: The Birth of German Expressionism" »
Now kids can film digital movies, take photographs and create their own personal video discs with a digital video camera made just for them. VCAM NOW, with its hip, sleek look, is portable and affordable. It's the perfect accessory for tweens with an "on-the-go" lifestyle. Kids can view their digital movies and photos on TV and view, edit and send video and photos on their computer. The VCAM NOW digital camera comes complete with VIDEONOW MEDIA WIZARD, a software that enables kids to copy their creations onto blank Video Now Personal Video Discs (PVDs) that can be played on a VIDEONOW personal media player. VCAM NOW comes packaged with two blank PVDs.
Buy On-Line @ Amazon.com
Frog travel bags are agile, light and colourful. their bodies are soft and elastic. the frog line explores these traits in aesthetic and technological terms, creating a uniquely-shaped product suitable for travellers that love distinctive design. Thanks to its innovative shape and materials, frog teams a lightweight but strong structure with an adaptable volume: polypropylene trolley shell, aluminium tow-bars, three-yarn flock fabric elasticised and expandable in the soft sections. several styles and colors available.
About Mandarina Duck: Italy, the year is 1977. two childhood friends, already long-standing business partners, decide to branch into leatherwear taking their inspiration from a brightly-plumed oriental duck that symbolises happiness and loyalty: this is how mandarina duck started out. the liveliness and spirit of this little duck were instilled into a breakthrough backpack, 'utility', which changed the rules of the game. almost thirty years after such a brilliant start, mandarina duck continues to be original and independent, but also modern, coming up with innovative new products, year after year.
You can buy them On-Line @ Flight 001 or Unica Home
Choosing wines to enjoy with Thanksgiving dinner is easy. Why? Because it's hard to make a bad choice. Simply picking your favorite wines to share with your guests on this special day will make them thankful.
Or, let us give you some ideas. Because your guest list is as diverse as the dishes you plan on serving, we have supplied you with advice for red wines, white wines, rosés and sparkling wines to serve. You may prefer to serve all whites or all reds, or a few selections of each. You may want to start the evening with a sparkling wine and carry it all the way through the meal. And, don't forget how delicious rosés can be. Continue reading the extended entry for this years Thanksgiving wine selections.
Continue reading "Thanksgiving Wine Pairing" »
Swedese is a classic Swedish furniture producer with a strong anchor in both the public and domestic domain.Swedese was founded in 1945 by two brothers, Yngve and Jerker Ekström, with Yngve leading the company until his death. Together with names including Alvar Aalto, Bruno Mathsson, Arne Jacobsen and Poul Kjaerholm, Yngve Ekström was at the core of a generation of designers who made the concept "Scandinavian Modern" famous all over the world. With a keen eye, he designed Swedese's furniture, the head office building, logo, catalogues and personalised Christmas cards including their own poems. And so on. The most well known design of Yngve Ekström's extensive portfolio is the Lamino armchair from 1956, which is still manufactured and sold all over the world. In 1999 the Lamino was voted the Twentieth Century's Best Swedish Furniture Design by the Swedish interior design magazine Sköna Hem.
The Seventh Heart is a locally owned men's and women's clothing boutique. They have an excellent blend of designers such as Modern Amusement, Estrella del Amor, Juanita More, and a variety specialty and rock t-shirts, vintage, bags, unique accessories, military inspired clothing , as well as consignment from local designers. They are all about having a hot store with really creative merchandising and price points that are affordable. You will find unique fashion ideas, inspiring displays,
affordable and hip clothing and accessories, and an overall creative and positive atmosphere. The Seventh Heart is a perfect compliment to San Francisco's unique sense of style.
They will be opening in early December and are located at 1592 Market Street at Franklin in San Francisco
I had a chance to stay at the Mill Valley Inn this past Saturday night. I was in town to check out a show at the Sweetwater Saloon. This intimate hotel is tucked away in a redwood grove at the foot of majestic Mt. Tamalpais, just steps away from the bustling town plaza, where galleries, fine restaurants, boutiques and theaters abound. The Mill Valley Inn combines the sophistication of a small European hotel with the cozy charm of a historic California mill town
You can book a room via Tablet Hotels.com
The Egg & Muffin Toaster - is a multi-function kitchen appliance that can simultaneously: 1) toast two slices of bread, English muffin, bagel, croissant, etc., 2) cook an egg (poached or steam-scrambled), and 3) warm a pre-cooked slice of ham or sausage or any combination of these three functions. The toaster’s intelligent "Egg/Toast" function directs steam cooking and toasting to complete at the same time.
The Egg and Muffin Toaster appliance also features wide toasting slots, an auto shut-off for individual toasting and poaching options, an easy-to-clean control touchpad, light to dark toaster settings, and the ability to boil up to four eggs at the same time. Features a built-in cord storage and a removable crumb tray for easy cleanup. This baby was all the rage on the internet earlier this year, but it wasn’t available for sale. It looks you you can buy it online at Amazon.com right now.
They don’t call them travel podcasts but Sounds for Sights is offering downloadedable, self-guided audio walking tours for sights and cities around the world.
Sounds for Sights was created by two friends who love traveling, the outdoors and New York City. Being a tech-savvy pair and disappointed with other group, book and bus tour options, they considered additional ways to provide an entertaining and educational destination guide. While spending time in the city, they noticed the obvious prevalence of iPods and wondered what other purposes they could serve besides simply playing music. Being visitors themselves, the answer was clear; develop helpful and fascinating self-guided audio-walking tours that could be downloaded and enjoyed at a person’s convenience. Although the concept of prerecorded audio guides was not brand new, little attention had been paid to providing quality content in a convenient and highly portable package, which was easily accessible online. Most tours cost $5 and last around 45 minutes.
Via | Jaunted |
USA Today published this list today of places to visit this winter. Included is the list and a brief excerpt from each city in the article. You can read the full article here.
Austin, Texas - Known as the live music capital of the world, Austin combines Texas charm with a funky, free-spirited vibe. Winter temperatures range between 60 and 70 degrees in January, February and March, allowing travelers to take advantage of the city's many outdoor activities without the oppressive summer heat. The mild temperatures are ideal for running or biking around the Town Lake hike and bike trail, exploring the music venues in the Warehouse District or on Sixth Street, and wandering South Congress Avenue (or SoCo, locally) in search of Tex-Mex and barbecue.
Beijing - While Beijing's winter weather is not considered ideal by many travelers, the off-peak prices may make the temperatures more bearable. In winter, Beijing is relatively tourist-free, except, of course, during the weeks of the Chinese New Year celebrations in late January and early February. Because winter is Beijing's off-peak travel season, visitors can see major historical sites such as Tiananmen Square, the Forbidden City and the Summer Palace without the hordes of tourists that flock to the sites in July and August.
Germany - This winter, there are noteworthy celebrations and events in several regions of Germany. Many parts of the world will celebrate the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth in 2006. A range of musical events will take place in January and February in Germany, including events in Berlin, Dresden and Munich. In February, several German cities also stage elaborate Carnival celebrations, complete with parades, music, costumes and food. Some of the larger celebrations will occur in Berlin, Frankfurt and Dusseldorf.
Paris - Like most of Europe, Paris' off-peak travel season occurs during winter. However, winter is a great time to bundle up and take to the streets. The City of Lights stays alive with both Parisians and tourists in the colder months, sipping cafe au lait at cafes, or ice skating (for free) at the Hotel de Ville.
Vancouver - Vancouver was recently ranked the top city in the Americas by a Conde Nast magazine reader survey, based on factors including culture, restaurants and shopping. The home to the 2010 Winter Olympics offers a variety of activities, both indoor and outdoor, for travelers this winter. And, no matter what idea "Canada in winter" brings to mind, the weather in Vancouver is not inhospitable, with winter temperatures
hovering in the 40s.
Fellisimo Design House introduces Feliciti, a new line of home accesories for kitchen, bedroom, office, living space and bath. Derived from the word “happiness” Feliciti is not only a product line, but a lifestyle – a lifestyle where the inspiration is life at its most peaceful and serene.
Felissimo Design House is located at 10 West 56th Street, New York, New York. Their store hours are Monday thru Saturday, 11 am - 6 pm,
Friday 11 am - 8 pm.
Its a well known fact that things that dissapear often reappear down the sofa. Sometimes you find things that you thought were lost forever down there. That doesn’t mean normal sofas are suitable for storing things. Thankfully Gyugiu Chyon and John Stanislav Sadar, the duo behind the design company Little Wonder , have capitalized on the sofa’s storage space potential with their SleepSexWorkEatDream sofa. It consists of a seating area that is perforated with eight holes and are help in place using metal cylinders that are inserted into the holes. Depending on how you choose to position the cushions, SleepSexWorkEatDream can be used for all the activites its name suggests. More information at http://www.littlewonder-design.com
MIT has unveiled its $100 hand-cranked laptop computer to the United Nations technology summit in Tunisia and said that it hopes to make millions of the devices to give to the poorest people in the world.
The lime-green machines, which are about the size of a text book, will offer wireless connectivity via a mesh network of their own creation allowing peer-to-peer communication and operate in areas without a reliable electricity supply.
Brazil, Thailand, Egypt and Nigeria are candidates to receive the first wave of laptops starting in February or March, and each will buy at least 1 million units, he said.
The computers operate at 500 MHz, about half the processor speed of commercial laptops, and will run on Linux rather than Microsoft’s or Apple’s Operating systems as previously hoped by the two companies.
The computer uses a screen from a portable DVD player, which can be switched from colour to black and white to make it easily viewable in bright sunlight, said Mary Lou Jepsen, the project's chief technical officer.
Garmin nuvi 350 Personal Travel Assistant - This portable GPS navigator is a great companion and guide for traveling to new places, as well as making it easier to get to places you normally travel to. The preloaded City Navigator NT v.7 maps contain detailed road maps throughout the entire United States, Canada, & Puerto Rico. Which allows the nuvi 350 to plot your course, call out turns by street name, and avoid traffic jams - all with a stunning color touch screen! But when you're on the road, the nuvi 350 can also offer you more than just directions. It has an MP3 player, audio book player (for Audible.com media), JPEG picture view, and more! SD memory card expansion slot Powerful built-in speaker Traffic alerts with optional GTM 10 FM TMC traffic receiver Text-to-Speech - unit prompts you to Turn right on Main St. instead of Turn right in 500 feet Audible and visual navigation instructions and warnings Offers a three dimensional mapping perspective, or 2-D overhead view Built-in lithium ion battery Battery Life - 4-8 hours depending on usage Unit Dimensions - 3.87 (w) x 2.91 (h) x 0.87 (d) Unit Weight - 5.1 oz.
Movie Colony may seem a strange name for a hotel, although we must say it beats naming the place after its street address. It’s named after its neighborhood, it turns out, where the stars came to escape the pressures of Hollywood and spend some (more) time in the sun. Cheap and easy jet travel took the stars farther afield, to Miami and elsewhere, and Palm Springs has become a more low-key destination, still an easy drive from Los Angeles, and with prices within the reach of the common people.
The building is a landmark, designed by Albert Frey in 1935, and it’s a textbook example of the Art Deco style that was then the standard. Today the hotel is packed with references to that era, with kidney-shaped couches and those vaguely Jetsons-looking coffee tables. Modern touches include wi-fi internet, DVD players, and exquisitely comfortable pillow-top king beds, with 400-thread duvets.
Downtown Palm Springs is just blocks away, though you may spend most of your time lounging by the pool, in the shadow of the stark San Jacinto mountains. Perfect for a taste of old Hollywood glamor—book one of the townhouses (our money is on the Sinatra) for the real star treatment.
726 North Indian Canyon Drive
Palm Springs, California 92262, United States
Book it online @ Tablet Hotels
Etsy.com. Sort of like ebay.com for handmade goods. Allows you to list your own items as well as search for items by description and geographic location. This would be a great site for small up and coming designers who don't have the resources to setup their own website. Via | Protein Feed |
I was born in Detroit and my parents lived there for 30 some years, but I have never heard it called the Paris of the Midwest. But according to dETROITfUNK that is exactly what it is. Now I wouldn’t go that far but they do have some beautiful pictures of French renaissance architecture in Detroit. This is the Detroit that I remember.
The Craig Konyk designed New York flagship for Malin + Goetz grooming products recently received an honorable mention in Travel and Leisure Magazine in their best retail design category. Malin + Goetz is a modern apothecary located in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City. You can view a store tour on their website.
The Double Helix Theatre Company presents the fifth annual One Festival featuring seven original solo shows. The one-week festival will be presented at the 45th Street Theater in New York City from the 16 - 20 Nov 2005. They believe that one-person shows continue and develop the tradition of story telling, which is the origin of powerful theatre. The One Festival enables Double Helix to preserve and champion this art form. In recognition of the challenges that performers face in producing their own one-person shows, the festival provides a structure for these solo artists to collaborate with our designers and technicians, as well as receive support from our administrative staff. In this environment the solo artists can focus on their highest artistic goals and provide audiences with an entertaining and thought-provoking experience. This years festival has seven solo shows including Accidental Pervert, a stand-up comic's story of sex, fantasy, and family life; Soul to Keep, a meditation on the African-American experience set against a musical backdrop; and Creation, a clown show in the style of Bill Irwin
As Ubiquity prepares to mark its 15th anniversary in December, the label shows no signs of slowing. The imprint, which releases albums spanning soul, funk, hip-hop, and jazz, is consistently recognized as one of the industry's strongest independents — having won the Gilles Peterson Label of the Year Award for 2004 and received nominations for 12 honors in the awards' 2005 iteration. Ubiquity has recently embraced downloading (through iTunes) with its Shape of Things to Come release, featuring exclusive, unreleased, and forthcoming tracks.
After visiting San Francisco on their honeymoon and falling in love with the city, DJs Jody and Michael McFadin went home to Southern California, sold most of their possessions, and moved to SF with a fuzzy dream of starting a record company. While continuing to dream about starting a label, they invested the last of their savings into a business that would combine their passion for music and provide an income to live on, and opened the Groove Merchant record store on Haight Street in early 1990.
Within a year the small shop had built a reputation the world over as a place to find rare records and learn about new sounds. A haven for collectors, DJs, and producers looking for soul jazz, musical obscurities, and break beats, the Groove Merchant even earned a toast on the Beastie Boys song "Professor Booty", "This one goes out to my man the Groove Merchant, comin' through with the beats that I've been searchin'," rapped Mike D. on 1992's "Check Your Head" album.
The 2002 - Vincent Girardin Chambertin Clos de Beze was just ranked number 1 by QPR.com. If you are unfamiliar with, QPRWines is a wine buying guide that groups wines by the major critics' average wine scores, then lists them by price and ranks them by value. They typically will review one region or varietal per month and send you a report via email.
Alas, the 2002 Vincent Girardin Chambertin Clos de Beze was ranked at the top Burgandy in the 2001, 2002 and 2003 Red Burgundy class. The 2002 Vincent Girardin, Chambertin Clos de Beze averaged 95 points, and at $136 it is 30 percent of the average $447 price for a similar-scoring wine. It ranked as the highest scoring wine with a list price of $136, but with a little searching on the internet you can find this wine for under $100 giving it an even higher QPR. Premiercru.net has it for sale for $99.
Tasting Notes: 98 points Spectator: "A brilliant red. Wild and feral yet refined, combining cherry, mineral, licorice, animal and underbrush notes with sweet, concentrated fruit and ripe, vibrant tannins. Shows an underlying energy, with a long, long finish. Best from 2012 through 2025. 45 cases imported.
Right under the sun: Landscape in Provence from Classical to Modernism.
Provence was a cradle of modern art, inspiring Cezanne, van Gogh, and a horde of Post_impressionists, but this how reaches further back, to find the roots of the region’s aesthetic allure in 18th-century Arcadian and Italiante landscapes and the 19th-century fascination with Marseilles, gateway to the orient.
Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
Sept 22–Jan 8
Update: Artblog has a great wrap up of the show complete with beautiful pictures
How do you fly to London for $100 round-trip? Hong Kong for $300? Rio for $150? Mexico for FREE? Easy. Travel as an air courier. There are numerous air courier companies that will fly you to cities around the world for prices that no consolidator or Internet special can beat.
Being an air courier requires nothing more than signing up, being willing or able to travel light on short notice, and being responsible enough to meet a representative in an airport for a few minutes before beginning your vacation. It’s not hard, but like some other alternative transportation options, it requires a little more planning than simply buying a ticket and climbing aboard. This basic guide to courier travel will get you started.
Continue reading "Air Courier Travel" »
Here is a list of my top 5 travel gadgets.
HP Photosmart 475 GoGo Photo Printer, $299.75
Great for folks on vacation, as they can store the photos on the printer and reuse the camera's media card to take more pictures. Available at: amazon.com
Phillips Pet1000 DVD Player, $349
It's a compact portable DVD player. Available at amazon.com
Archos Portable Media Center AV700, $799.95
Think of this as a TiVo to Go. The AV700 can record your favorite TV shows when you're at home, even store photos; then, when you're on vacation, you can watch all your favorites. It plays video, shows photos and can store music, like an iPod. Available at: amazon.com
Sling Media Slingbox, $249.99
Just as the AV700 will let you take your favorite shows with you anywhere, the Slingbox will let you access your shows from anywhere over the Internet. A program running on your laptop computer can talk to a box you hook up in your house to your cable box or DVR. Then, from anywhere in the world, you can get a broadband connection. You can watch your favorite shows and even change channels. Available at: amazon.com
Seven pounds lighter than your laptop, the LifeDrive mobile manager has all you need to take your life on the road. Carry all your important files and have them when you need them. With 3.85 GB of usable storage, you can store and access years worth of e-mail, thousands of Word docs, 1200 PowerPoint presentations, 300 songs, 1000 photos, 2.5 hours of video, and more...all with room to spare. And your information is always safe on your LifeDrive mobile manager, even if you're too busy to recharge the battery.
Continue reading "Palm LifeDrive Mobile Manager" »
This month the French, Cinematheque Francaise, grandly opened up in its new quarters in Frank Gehry's "fantastic" building in the east of Paris right on the edge of the Parc de Bercy. Orginally comissioned as the new home for the American Center, a hub for experimental music, dance, and theater in Paris since 1932, the building opened in 1994 with great fanfare. Gehry himself has said that his creation reminded him of a dancer with her "tutu" in the middle. For me, the building resembles nothing more than the kind of house you read about in fairy tales, with all the rooms going up, up, up to the sky (not very practical, in fact: architects had to entirely re-do the inside of the building to adapt it to the needs of the new Cinematheque). Dominique Brard, the french architect chosen by a jury for the $41 Million rehab says it was possible to reconfigure the interior without altering the stone exterior, and form the start Gehry gave his blessing for change. Gehry told the jury not to revere the building.
Mozy is a secure, automatic online backup and archiving service for any PC in any home or office. It's simple to install and configure. No external hard drive, expensive subscription services, CD or DVD's to burn. All you need is a broadband connection and you are ready to go! I installed it this morning and it is grea. 2 gigs of space. I must admit, that as an IT person I preach backups everyday, but when it comes to my home computer I don’t back up anything. Mozy has changed all that.
Jen Mood Paris: One often thinks of librarians, drama teachers, and a stylin’ great aunt when they think of eyeglass holders. But once we saw these from French designer Jen Mood, we wanted glasses of our own. Made from vegetable resin in a variety of mod and art nouveau shapes and colors, the “chains” drape boldly down the back or front, and can clearly be worn sans glasses. With one of these draped around our necks, we’ll never misplace our glasses again!
Type Z is the brand of the fashion future. Hot, fast, and just marvellous, these shoes will turn any wardrobe fashion chic. A confection of simply smashing styles in sharp colors and fresh silhouettes made of rich textures and materials. Type Z is where you can find that perfect pair of shoes for a fashion edge.
Buy them On-Line at Zappos.com
Amazon.com plans to let consumers search more than 100 travel sites for deals. Visitors will use SideStep Inc.'s travel search engine on Amazon to shop for rooms and airline tickets from brands like JetBlue Airlines, Hyatt Corp., Thrifty Car Rental and American Airlines as well as online agencies and consolidators. Visitors who click through will transact at the brand's site. This partnership would begin early next year and it would give Sidestep access to customer accounts of more then 52 million Amazon users. Sidestep.com specializes in offering a search engine that hunts for cheap travel fares for customers. They do not sell tickets and travel packages themselves.It will be interesting to see if they eventually start taking bookings on their site. Watch out SABRE.
East Berlin’s answer to retro Vegas, featuring one huge, monumental, paved pedestrian plaza, surrounded by boxy, tinted glass, mid-sixties high-rises housing shopping malls, hotels, a train hub, and an elusive casino. This is Communist architecture at its garish best, though most Berliners loathe it. Why do we like it? Because it's stark, gaudy, and Space Age, and features an awesome over-the-top needle that takes you far above the city streets. Then again, we didn’t have to put up with the Communist reign of scarcity either. Apparently, while most East Germans suffered severe food shortages, the neighboring storefronts of Alexanderplatz were showcases of coffee, chocolate and liquor, with prices only the Commie elite could afford.
A centerpiece of Alexanderplatz is the World Time Clock, which keeps time for all the cities of the globe (in fitting tribute to GDR inefficiency, during our visit the clock was two hours off for every city on the planet). There’s also plenty of open air food stalls, including the quirky sight of portable food vendors cooking Bratwurst on stoves that hang off their necks. Germans love a good circus. And there's no better circus in all of Berlin than Alexanderplatz.
The Dwell Home is for sale, with bids starting at $550,000.
From the Official Press Release: “Raleigh, NC – November 8 -- The most celebrated modern prefab home in America is now offered for sale. An open house will take place from Thursday, November 17 through Sunday, November 20 at 196 Beech Hill, Pittsboro NC. Bids begin at $550,000. Directions and more information can be found at www.Wieler.com”
The fake prada store, entitled prada marfa by berlin artists michael elmgreen and ingar dragset is located on desolate land with no other visible trace of civilization.At first glance, it looks to be a luxury boutique with a display of fall 2005 prada shoes and bags. Yet, one cannot open the door - it's a new permanent public sculpture -'branding as art'. the 0,000 prada marfa is located in in Texas 26 miles northwest of marfa on highway 90 and was inaugurated on october 1st, 2005. Prada Marfa blends into the exciting historical structures of the area in which it will be placed. The building is white adobe, a regional material, and the design references prevalent architectural styles. Marfa, largely through the renowned Chinati Foundation, is identified as a centre for minimalist and land art. As we purposefully will not preserve Prada Marfa, it will eventually become a ruin so that even in a future decayed state it will remain relevant to the time in which it was made, Fall 2005, precisely because it has aged.
Set to rise 54 stories above Manhattan, the crystalline Bank of America Tower at One Bryant Park will incorporate an unrivaled number of environmentally friendly technologies, from its windows to its toilets. The building will supply 70 percent of its own energy with an on-site natural-gas-burning power plant. For climate control, One Bryant Park will rely on excess thermal energy from the power plant, a groundwater heat exchanger that is the first of its type, and an air-conditioning system cooled by ice made with excess power during off-peak hours. The building will even have waterless urinals and use water collected from the roof to flush toilets. Together, these systems are designed to earn the building a Platinum rating—the highest possible—from the U.S. Green Building Council when construction is completed in 2008.
In a full-bodied blend of blasphemy and ingenuity, a Los Angeles couple is seeking to market a wine called "Jesus Juice" that bears a label showing a Michael Jackson-like figure appearing to be crucified. "Jesus Juice" merlot, the label for which you'll find above, is the brainchild of actress Dawn Westlake and Bruce Rheins, a veteran CBS Evening News producer who headed the network's coverage of the Jackson child molestation case.
Maximilian Riedel (11th generation) presents his first glass series. The Riedel connoisseur will be surprised to find that this new glass series has something missing – there is no stem or base. So what is “O”? Riedel “O” is the new innovative take on the wine tumbler. In short: “O” is the ideal glass for every day use and for every occasion. It is fun, feels good to hold, looks trendy and it works!
The designs of “O” are based on the benchmark shapes of Riedel Vinum. For the first time in glass history the design parameters such as shape of tumbler, size and diameter of rim, have been fine turned to enhance the world’s most important grape varietals. “O” is available as: Cabernet/ Merlot, Pinot/Nebbiolo, Syrah/Shiraz, Chardonnay, Viognier/Chardonnay, Riesling/Sauvignon.
Buy them online @ Wine.com or Amazon.com
Were you lucky enough to get word of Expedia’s pricing problem this week? If you were you would have booked a room at either the Hilton Osaka or the Hilton Tokyo. Both had rooms as low as $2/night if booked on Expedia.com. Expedia has been asked if they would honor these rates and here is their solution. “If a booking was made for the month of November, Hilton will honor the reservation at the quoted price. But if a booking was made for December or beyond, it will be cancelled – unless it is part of a package, which Expedia.com will honor.” Wish I had been so lucky. Combined with cheap flights from San Francisco to Tokyo you could have had quite a vacation in one of the worlds most expensive cities.
For more that 20 years photogrpaher David Maisel has shot aerial landscapes with an eye on documenting the environmental impact of human development. Last fall he completed The Lake Project, a series of photographs of Owens Lake, which was drianed and destroyed over the course of a 13 year period to bring water to Los Angeles. This oversized, 14"x14" book is comprised of surreal aerial images made in the vicinity of Owens Lake, California. With an introductory essay by Robert Sobieszek, curator of photography at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Continue reading "David Maisel Photography ~ The Lake Project" »
Coming on the heels of Michelin's rankings of New York restaurants, the annual Zagat airline survey has been released. Tops in the premium segment include Continental Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines, Aloha Airlines, United , and American . In the economy segment you'll find Midwest, JetBlue, Song, Frontier, and Independence Air. That's all and good, but what I really wanted to find out was who is ranked tops for food. We all love airplane food here at Urban Zeitgeist, so we were curious. Surprisingly the same airlines came up, except Midwest Airlines pushed Independence out in the economy section. More amusing than anything else on the site though are the quotes from the reviewers:
If you are like me somtimes you find yourself bored at work dreaming of living in a foreign country. The more exotic the better. And if you are like me you also then start looking at what your dollar will buy you around the world. Well today I came across the site callled Prime Location. Its a great agency that allows you view houses, apartments, and land all over the world. It covers homes for sale as well as rentals. Obviously I am not the only one interested in buying seconcd homes abroad. The NYTimes had an article not to long ago about this very thing.
The New France. This groundbreaking book not only covers all of France's fourteen wine regions, but also includes full-color maps for each one, with unrivaled cartographic detail. Andrew Jefford has traveled extensively in each of France's fourteen wine regions to enable him to write the most exhaustive and authoritative book on French wine to date. Producer listings are a significant and important feature of the book, with up-to-the-minute research on terroir and its effect on the wines of each region, and how accurately it is reflected by the infamous appellation controle system. At the core of the book are the full-color maps of the key wine regions and how they look right now. Vintage information is available in chart form at the back of the book, and over 150 specially commissioned color and black-and-white photographs illustrate the secrets and inspiration of France's wine landscapes and its personalities.
Buy it On-Line at Amazon.com
Pierre Charpin was voted Designer of the Year at this year’s Salon du Meuble in Paris, but he never set out to be a designer. Initially qualifying in fine art, Charpin later became more interested in the function of objects and how they’re produced. While working alongside George J Sowden in Milan, he was spotted by Ettore Sottsass. But it wasn’t until 2002, when he presented his ‘Stands’ collection at the Design Gallery Milano, that his work got the attention it deserves and commissions began to roll in from producers such as Zanotta and Montina. This year’s Salon saw the launch of his ‘Oggetti Lenti’ collection at the Design Gallery Milano. The result of two years’ work, it consists of 28 objects that, although extremely simple in design, are very sophisticated in their execution
Why not take a break from work? Stuart Rees Jones, founder of Camps International, which has taken school-leavers to Kenya to work on community-run projects since 2002, launches a programme for 'grown-up gappers' this month. Groups of up to 20 volunteers help out on a variety of schemes, such as building classrooms, teaching and working at an elephant sanctuary.Their feeling is that world-minded travellers are motivated by being able to “give something back” to less fortunate communities in the third world. Camp Kenya Life offers you an opportunity to meet your Life challenges and to contribute your efforts and inspiration, directly to some of Kenya’s underprivileged communities.
Rineke Dijkstra brings together seventy photographs chosen from the most important series which the photographer has realised between 1992 and 2003, such as her beach portraits, new mothers immediately after giving birth, bullfighters, girls from the Buzzclub, photographs made in Berlin’s Tiergarten, the series of Almerisa, a Bosnian refugee, and those of Oliver, a French youth in the Foreign Legion, and the portraits of male and female Israeli soldiers. Further, two of her video works, “Buzzclub/Mystery World” and “Annemiek”, will be included in the exhibition. This will be the first time Rineke Dijkstra’s work will be seen in the context of her whole oeuvre.
“Rineke Dijkstra” opened on December 14, 2004 in Paris, in the new photography museum in the Jeu de Paume, and will be seen there through February 27, 2005. Next it travels to the Fotomuseum Winterthur (March 11 - May 22, 2005) and toLa Caixa in Barcelona (June 4 - August 21, 2005). From November 4, 2005 until February 6, 2006 the exhibition will be on view in Stedelijk Museum CS.
Sony announces a new member of their ultra-compact Cybershot T-Series digital cameras - The Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T9.
The Sony Cyber-shot T9 follows the Cyber-shot DSC-T5 (Buy Now) introduced in August and the Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-T7 (Buy Now).
Sony was able again to improve the looks of this new T-Series digital camera. It has a very refined case design and looks very elegant in black and silver.
Continue reading "Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T5" »
Smart Travelling, the special travelling community. Smart-travelling.net members find here the hippest places, hidden highlights and hot tips for more than twenty European countries.
Hotels, bars, galleries and restaurants have to meet two specific criteria: they must be original and unusual. Smart-travelling is a personal travel guide, not trying to please everyone but striving to fit the community members like a bespoke suit.
Smart-travelling is devised for determined and discerning travellers with a sharp sense of style and atmosphere who are always on the lookout for something new, spending sometimes more and sometimes less. It is for people who travel alot, are curious and open-minded and who seek both the big thrill and the tiny oasis of luxury. Bilingual German-English.
Im not exactly sure the what this all means but the blurb from the website is below
“This is a project visualizing the world map which many fools in the world imagine.
If you can see this map comfortably, you are definitely a fool.
One day, a Texan asked me a question when I lived in U.S..
The question was "How many hours does it take to go to Japan by car?". (true story)
He didn't know where Japan is, and even bofore that, he didn't know that Japan is an island.
And then, I thought. "What kind of world map is pictured in his mind?"
This was a beginning to think that it might be fun to gather those mixed up recognitions of countries and visualize it as a world map imagined by the fools in the world.
First, the countries are roughly allocated. From now on, countries will be added based on participants' comments. If you "don't know" or "don't even care" about the countries that are added, please submit a comment such as "Huh?" .
Rucksack Haus is a portable extension that hangs from the steel cables fastened to its host building. Stefan Eberstadt, and artist now based in Munich, Germany, worked with engineer Thomas Beck to build the house last fall. He claims that addition can be suspended from most buildings as long as they structurally sound.
Try this. Go to Google and type in San Francisco to London nov 18 to nov 12 and see what you get. It looks something like this:
When you click on one of the travel brands like Expedia, Hotwire, and Orbitz, you are taken to the brand's site where the search has magically been conducted for the dates you inputted into the search engine. Similar to the way Booking Buddy works, but w/o the ability to input one-way or round-trip. Interesting application. And what if advertisers could post their deals for these destinations? Sounds like a great a great future adwords campaign if it becomes popular.
A head for business combined with a love for all things Scandinavian inspired Catarina Norman to develop the idea for Flicka. She recognized that while San Francisco readily embraces new cultures, design trends and shopping experiences, the city lacked a destination for Scandinavian style. Refining and developing the concept over the past year with Malin Leschly, a Swedish transplant with a Stanford MBA, it became clear that Scandinavia's unique blend of tailored, modern designs, coupled with respect for tradition and quality, would fit perfectly into San Francisco - a hotbed of innovation set against a Victorian backdrop.
Flicka showcases Scandinavian lifestyle with a variety of women's fashion and design items. Flicka's products meld a clean, simple look with a fashion edge from designers who embody the Scandinavian ideal of being trendy yet timeless. The Flicka boutique at 1932 Fillmore Street is a cool, comfortable and inviting place, infused with Scandinavian style.
Flicka is located at 1932 Fillmore Street, between Pine and Bush. There is metered parking along Fillmore Street, and there is a big parking lot with 2-hour parking one block away on California, between Fillmore and Steiner.
Throw out the stereotypes about Zurich and its stuffy bankers and chocolate shops—the Widder defies all these with strikingly inventive design, while never forgetting about the fundamentals that make Swiss hotels some of the most professional in the world.
Cobbled together from eight medieval townhouses on the Old Town side of the Limmat river, the Widder's traditional exterior gives away no hint of the ultramodern interiors inside. No two of its 42 rooms are alike, and in fact each building's interior differs widely—expect anything from architecture-office chic, metal catwalks suspended by cables, to a sort of arts-district loft-renewal look, with visible ceiling beams and exposed brick or stone walls, to the beyond-traditional baroque looks of the Haus zum Pferch, with its ornately carved woodwork and minimal modern furniture.
Continue reading "Widder Hotel Zurich" »
Placeopedia, the marriage of Google Maps and Wikipedia, where information gains a third dimension and mapping becomes more complex. Placeopedia a simple site where you can connect Wikipedia articles with places, and then make use of our database either to browse, or syndicate the whole lot. They hope that lots of people will connect places they know with their corresponding Wikipedia article, and then our syndicated data can be used as a general geographic lookup table for Wikipedia.
Morning Becomes Eclectic is committed to a music experience that celebrates innovation, creativity and diversity by combining progressive pop, world beat, jazz, African, reggae, classical and new music. Recognized nationally as a forum for promoting a wide range of music ahead of the curve, the show has become a very attractive whistle stop for both established and emerging artists from around the world. .
Now, live sessions from “Morning Becomes Eclectic” are the latetest addition to KCRW’s podcast lineup. Nic Harcourt, Music Director for the station and host of the show which airs weekdays from 9AM to 12PM says KCRW had several requests to make their music programming available for podcasting. In response, live sessions featuring performances and interviews with independent and unsigned artists will be available for podcasting for free
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