“where do ideas come from?
from looking at one thing and seeing another
speculating, changing, pulling, transforming
and if you’re lucky
you come out with something maybe worth saving, using and building on
that’s when the game stops and that’s when the work begins…
and if you’re patient
there will come that moment
when you’re eating an apple
the solution presents itself politely
and says
Pinterest has saved me in more than one occasion. This time, it saved me from greasy counters and an inmoral waste of butter and sugar.
My kids love making cookies, I think cookie cutters are their favorite way of making things right now, but I’m always hesitant about making actual cookies because a)I end up eating them and b)a is enough.
This salt dough is amazing. It’s one part salt, one part water, 2 parts flour. It becomes rock solid and it’s much cleaner to work with. Also, cheaper.
The cookies are baked for 2 hours at 100°C
We actually made these a week ago, and this week we finally painted them.
The monochromatic ones are mine. I think what kids love most of painting is mixing the colors into shades of brown unknown to the human eye.
I know it is insane to nourish feelings of love towards an inanimate object, but this sofa does exactly that to me. I’m not sure if it was the simplicity of the frame, or the fact that it’s soft without being blobby, but I think it’s an amazing design. (It’s such a shame that it costs what a worker makes in a year. I think the Bouroullec Bros or Vitra or both just lost their marbles.)
Anyway, for technologies class (if you think it’s my favourite class ever, you guessed right) I’m making a little… replica? It’s just a case study, don’t sue me. Today I made a version of the love seat on a scale of 1:10. It’s my new baby:
I used Quicksteel to put the frame together. I also drew a 3D version and I’ll threedeeprint it tomorrow.
I used light foam rubber and a 1€ ikea fleece blanket to sew the cushions and walls.
The zippers that hold the walls together are a great touch and I wanted to keep it in my model so I.wentout.and.bought.two.tiny.zippers.
I can’t wait to make an actual love seat like this for the boys’ room. They saw this tiny one and Damiano approved.
Loved it. I am, as it turns out, a strident feminist, and it’s a great thing. If I had teenage daughters I’d read it out loud to them.
Yesterday was the hottest day of the year so far (Katie pointed out that the distance in days from the summer solstice is equal in April and August, and that might explain why it was so fucking hot). We went to the “beach”. The kids love it. They played and they let me read my book!
Santi got a haircut, finally. The previous one, about 8 months ago, ended up with him bellowing and kicking the toilet seat off the hinges in primeval rage. This time, it took 5 minutes and no drama. He’s growing. There’s hope for us all. He’s turning 3 in 2 weeks!
Yesterday was also a big day for me: I graduated from the Couch to 5K running program 2 weeks in advance. My friend Katie told me about the Twitter Road Race and I thought, yeah sure, I can do that. I had to begin week 8 of the program, which meant running for 28 minutes. Besides, Katie is an experienced runner with marathons and many races under her belt and she was going to run it with me. I couldn’t resist.
Now, it was a bit like childbirth. When we were 4 Ks in, I honestly thought what a fucked up idea it was. I had chills through my scalp and was panting heavily. Telling myself that I run my own body wasn’t even making any sense. But today I’m like, I need to run again. I started running in March, after the XC-skiing season ended. I noticed how much better I was feeling after doing that every other day during my winter break. I really felt depression FREE. So when that was over, I got myself an App and I couldn’t recommend it more. When I began I was completely out of puff after running 45 seconds. Yesterday I ran for 37 minutes straight, and it felt great, chills and all. For a millisecond, seeing the results on twitter was disappointing. People run 5Ks in 20 minutes. It took me almost twice as much. But then I remembered I’m doing this for myself, so I won.
Yesterday I drove to Milan to see my set of wine glasses on display at the Salone del Mobile. Danese has shown interest in them and included them in their exhibition in the Fuori Salone. There was a lovely brunch with the well-to-do Milano folk. After that, I dashed to Ventura Lambrate where amongst many design schools in Europe, the best designs of My University were showcased. In that same part of town was the IKEA pavilion and after I stopped hyperventilating, I went right in. This is what I saw:
This chest of drawers is as fun as it looks. It is actually two: the square set on top is sold separately, and would make a good bedside table. I can see it with cooler knobs and a lick of paint. It’s in my wishlist.
The collection has a bunch of things targeted for children’s rooms and it’s fresh and fun.
The textiles are understated and pretty. I love these polka dots with a bit of ghosting.
This set of 3 nesting tables is very clever: the outer ones are made of powder coated sheet iron, the middle one is made of wood. When stacked, the middle one disappears in between the other two.
My love of chairs was tickled by this one. The form reminds of a swedish country chair, but it’s plastic. Light, sturdy plastic. I love plastic. It’s a shame I don’t have at least a second house to decorate, sigh. The lamps overhead are nice, too. Everything has a very geometric feel about it.
This bookshelf looks very pretty, but the door is one-piece so it’s not very practical, especially since the front is slightly slanted. In any case, judging by the amount of people drawn to it while I tried to snap this shot, they might have a winner.
I
The rugs are interesting, especially the laser cut felt ones. These bamboo nesting boxes with matching plastic drawers are really fresh and look very nice when hung up on a wall.
There’s plenty more, and also some things I cannot wrap my head around, like that horrible tutu lamp, but hey, de gustibus non disputandum est.
For Technologies class I was asked to make a cube, in any material and with any function.
I thought of those cubic photo frames at once, and I decided to give that a little twist. Also, working with perspex is fun. I cut 8 squares and joined them together with a pivot. Sounds easy, the whole process took me one week, mostly because I had to produce my own custom pivot, which involved making a screw from scratch.
Each photo is sandwiched between two squares and kept together with a little screw. Sounds easy. It wasn’t.
I’m so happy it’s finished. I always have these ideas with methacrylate, and they turn out to be 100 times more time consuming than I think. But it’s always worth it: so shiny!
