Disappearing ink!

Okay, it's really self-erasing paper, but it's still awesome! (although I think I'd rather have ink....)

Mobile Darning

Agh!! The most lovely project!

The Free Mending Library in San Francisco. PSFK writes:

On his old ice cream cart-style, treadle-operated sewing machine, [Michael] Swaine sets about mending and altering people’s socks, jocks and frocks and it’s all for free. Michael is interested in engaging the community to rethink their relationship with clothing and the disposable nature of fashion.

See more here.

Design for Mankind Magazine

A few weeks ago, Design for Mankind announced the launch of the first issue of Mankind Magazine! I love the website Design for Mankind, but I have to admit I haven't bought the magazine yet (even though I've got it bookmarked and on my "to do" list....I did look at the sneak peek, hoping that would get me going. I need a rainy day stuck at home? Or things to just s-l-o-w d-o-w-n at work!! I'm so curious to read this.....the cover is lovely, no?

Shoes Tell Stories

Short note on an upcoming exhibition that sounds worth seeing. The Perfect Fit – Shoes Tell Stories will be on display at The Fuller Craft Museum in Brockton, MA from June 6, 2009 – January 3, 2010. I'm so there....

crow vending machine

This is an old one, even for me, but it's just such a sweet project I can't resist. I'll keep it short so you can just check out the project itself.

The New York University graduate student offered the birds coins and peanuts from a dish attached to a vending machine he’d created, then took the peanuts away. Klein designed the machine so that when the crows searched for the missing peanuts, they pushed the coins out of a dish into a slot, causing more peanuts to be released into the dish. The Binghamton crows quickly learned that dropping nickels and dimes into the slot produced peanuts, and the most resourceful members of the flock began looking for more coins. Within a month, Klein had a flock of crows scouring the ground for loose change.

Dress

Saw this post on Make about a thousand weeks ago, but only recently clicked on it at home—all video content blocked at work :( and it led me to Electric Foxy (which is awesome) and described by writer/founder/whatever Jennifer as:

Clothing is a core part of our expression and offers ways for us to communicate who we are and the context in which we live. Technology enables a richer connection with people and our environment and offers a new platform for communication and expression. By merging the intimacy of clothing with the empowerment of technology, electricfoxy garments strive to enhance our lives and offer a much richer language for self-expression.

As you may have gathered from my work since leaving CSM, I'm less interested in the technology aspect as I am the human connections and communication involved in clothing and fashion, but nevertheless I still find sites like this fascinating.

Back to the original spark for this post, I finally ended up on Exercices de Style's website to see their Walking City kinetic dresses. The video over on Make Zine does them no justice. See some still images below and then click to see the videos here. I love the way Ying Gao talks about air and clothing. That's something I really relate to.

Ever since Justin & I went to Montreal in December, I've been dreaming about that city, but now I'm even more intrigued.....

handbags

Outsapop is a rather recent addition to my bloglines, and she posted this about a project called Counterfeit Crochet where everyone crochets replicas of designer handbags. Across the board, I love the crocheted versions more, not because they are designed better or even are aesthetically more pleasing, but they are just so much more visceral, I can't resist them:

And of course, I couldn't resist the Coach example:

A Top Handle Pouch of all things! Ha!

This project also reminded me of the old Mary Ping project Slow and Steady Wins the Race, a favorite of mine in graduate school. In the eighth installment she remakes several designer hand bags all in white canvas....not quite as visceral as the crocheted bags, but something lovely about stripping them down to their essence and removing all the graphic identifiers. The Dior:

Anyway, the Counterfeit Crochet project led me to Stephanie Syjuco's own website and to all her interesting projects there. I really should write a whole post about her work....take a look around her site. I think Personal Protest is my personal favorite.

Learning

Over the last couple months PSFK has posted about various learning related items that I found really interesting....

Sophie Howarth was a speaker at one of their conferences and she runs a small shop called School of Life which runs classes about how we should live. Not only is the website just lovely (truly an aside), the classes sound amazing. Last fall, Alain de Botton ran one of the "Holiday" classes called Heathrow Airport with Alain de Botton that explored the idea of Heathrow airport as a destination instead of a point of transport. Another of my favorites are the Meals they put on. All strangers eat together....just check out the links and look around. You won't be disappointed.

This one might be defunct by now, but The Temporary School of Thought (definitely closed upon further investigation). PFSK describes the school as:

Classes take place in a beautiful townhouse and range from “infrastructure for anarchists” to book binding, laughter workshops, bicycle maintenance and gardening. Everything is free, the event is dedicated to the admirable ideals of mutual learning and skill sharing rather than making money.

This last one is less a class and written about as more of an enterprising approach to getting new work, but I think it's also an interesting concept in learning. John Morefield is an ot of work architect who has set up a booth at a local farmer's market in Seattle offering architectural advice for 5¢. Really, he's gathering contacts and referrals for new work, but what I think is interesting is the learning experience the shoppers at the farmer's market are getting. Think about how nice it would be to be able to pick the brain of someone in any profession...chatting with a plumber or train conductor or someone who works in a food processing plant. Think of how much interesting info you could absorb. It's sort of like having someone in the family who does a job like that. I love this idea!