I've got (almost) nothing

I have to admit, everyone, I actually only planned my posts through the end of last week.  I had sorta kinda hoped that Erin would be taking over as head mistress of Design Crisis while I was at home nursing my new babe.  Alas, twas not yet to be and little Mystery Pants is still camped out in mommy's belly.  It's cool, we're keeping busy.  But, as a result, I'm drawing a bit of a blank when it comes to today's post.  I did find this radical video, directed by DC fave, Banksy for American Institution The Simpsons:

And just to keep the Banksy theme going, here's a shot of Banksy's most recent work to pop up on the streets of London:

Yep, that's all.  If I'm here on Thursday, and I bet I will be, I promise to blow your dang pants off with some spectacular design.  Or at least write something funny.

Hotel it on the mountian

Whenever I think of hotels the first thought in my mind is that scene from Revenge of the Nerds 2 where they stay at the hotel coral essex, throw a wild party and change the sign to read hot oral sex.  ha ha, it makes me giggle.  Unlike the hilarity of the classic film hotel, the hotels I've been dreaming about lately are so insane awesome I've been crying a river of tears.  I've also been wondering:  is it OK to plan a vacation just to visit a hotel?  Do I really even need to worry about the city when the lodgings are so posh?  I'm almost ready to stop funding on my remodel just to go on a global inspirational tour... but not quite.  Until then, I'll be virtually vacationing right here with you.  Enter, the first column in my world-wide hotel expose, first up:  the Hotel Fox in, of course, the design holy land, Copenhagen.

clockwise from top left: room 408 "Cultivated Nature is More Fun" Eike König and Martin Lorenz Frankfurt - Germany room 407 "Strong enough / Forte o Bastante" Speto – Brazil room 121 "Sleep Seasons" Rinzen – Australia room 409 "Heidi" Benjamin Güdel –  Switzerland

We've all seen plenty of (really amazing) hotels who've employed the work of famed designers to decorate a room or floor or lobby, but this project differentiates itself by using street artists.  Over 1000 artists submitted applications to design their own room, the owners (funded by, ahem, Volkswagen) selected the creme de la creme.  And now I want to go there and live for a week at a time in each room.  This room jumped right out at me:

I'm planning a black and white (and lime!) bedroom for myself so the above, room 206 sent me into a decorating frenzy.  French street artist (get this), WK interact, designed custom wallpaper for this sexy room. After playing shut in for 3 or 4 days, I'll probably want more color, so I'll move down the hall to this swanky pad:

This room personifies everything that is right with design:  stuffed animals, check; raccoon, dog and llama wallpaper, check; sacred heart motif with low-level lighting, check. I think I could just as easily achieve this look if I packed a suitcase and moved into Hope Perkins's warped little mind.  Actually, this room was designed by Miami based artists Sam and Tury of friends with you.  Who are you guys?  I love you and thanks for being friends with me.

If 206 and 214 are all booked up, I'd love to stay here:

room 217 by German artist Birgit Amadori, featuring layers of wallpaper and handpainting.  More contenders:

"Sleep Well" Room 106 by French Artist Geneviève Gauckler.  (I wonder why it's in english??)

I'd have a coin toss for any of these beautifully sterile rooms:

counterclockwise from top left: room 306, "pico pico" Kim Hiorthøy –Norway room 414, "Complexity - reliability" E-Types – Denmark room 502, "hearts, the royal wedding" Nicola Carter and Luise Vormittag - UK room 317, "monday" Kim Hiorthøy – Norway

Looks like I like this Kim Hiorthøy girl, I think I smell a future post coming on

Here are some last looks:

room 509 "King's Court 1" Birgit Amadori - Germany.

All that wallpaper is custom, which brings the heartbreaking factor of this room up to about 752million.  

room 302 " Harmony’s Helm" Friendswithyou –  U.S.A.

Right now I'm learning the hard way that tile isn't so cheap and neither are giant gold gilded bull heads, go figure.  I think a trusty plane ticket is in order.