I'll have the wheatgrass with a side of wheatgrass

Today's post is so random I'm still trying to wrap my head around it.  I wanted to tell you all about my fantasy dining experience in MIlan, but then I got all distracted by a crazy wall in the restaurant, and well, the rest is about to be history: Let's start with a make-believe dinner party at Home Made:

I bet you're thinking that between those tricky 2-D / 3-D wall lanterns and the big fluffy hanging lamp I can pack up my bags and call it a day; after posting such perfection, why bother showing anything else? Well, here's why:

The pig or the wall?  The pig or the wall?  Which to discuss, I feel so Sophie's choice.  Let's get the pig out of the way, I'm going to go wall crazy on you in a matter of minutes.  So, Pig.  Yes, that pig is pure hot pink perfection (and I don't even like pink!) I'm wondering if there's some pig shaped mold out in the world that was used to form this.  If so, where is it and can I borrow it for just, like, half and hour?  La sigh.

I'm so in love with the way that Home Made is so fancy but still seems completely laid back.  I love beauty but pretension makes me squirm (or kick and hit) so this place looks like a great landing spot.

Now, on to the amazing plant wall.  It's so dramatic and textured and colorful yet so simple... and attainable!  It reminds me of Patrick Blanc's vertical gardens, which I have been drooling over for some time, yet had NO idea how to wrap my green thumbs around such a huge knock-off task.  Regardez:

and just to make you cry:

I have visions, crystal clear visions of my dining room wall covered floor to ceiling in one of Patrick's walls but I have neither the funds to afford a personal commission (can you imagine?!) or the hydroponic skills to engineer such an installation.  My daydream always ends with a very real visualization of dirt covered floors and water damaged walls.  And a grossly high nursery bill.

The wall at Home Made seems so much more, well, home make-able:  1.Find someone who can identify plants and ask them what the heck those are. 2. get some white shelves. 3. get some white planters.  4. Arrange, enjoy.  Right?  Must be!

Just incase you're tempted by the grassy green walls but aren't quite ready to purchase 87 white planters, here are a couple of other options for bringing the dirt and worms in: 

Nomad Grass Lounger by Matt Gagnon

I really hate that picture (doesn't it feel so photoshopped?), but it's the best way to see the whole thing.  I like this one more:

I really love how home made this feels.  So many objects of my affection feel so produced.  You feel like you have to have your masters in industrial design and a friend of a friend at a manufacturing plant in Tokyo just to even think about ever creating your own.  This feels very real, and like something the hubby and I could make with a trip to home depot.  I actually think this could be really cute sitting in a yard.

One more grass goody:

Take Care Umbrella Stand

I love this idea, which also feels very make-able to me.  But it really bothers me that the grass in this photo is not perfectly green to the roots.  They are trying to sell this product, photoshop that bitch... but not as much as the photoshopping in the bench picture.  Gosh, I guess I'm not hard to please at all.

So, there you have it.  A wandering rambling tour of a bunch of grassy trendy foody stuff.  Wasn't this almost as fun as that time we ran through the grassy Labyrinth with Jennifer Connelly while David Bowie was trying to kidnap our half-brother?  Almost?

Impress Me

Why must there be a constant celebratory parade of birthdays and barbecues and fun all summer long? Obviously I'm incapable of self-regulation because here I am, after another evening of injudicious imbibery, feeling a little... lackluster this morning. So, now I have this pathetic need for entertainment -- I want to be dazzled -- and Good God, I don't want to think very hard. Thinking hurts. Here, neato fun table!

The tattooed Yakuza coffee table from Reddish, with its coyly unmarked "feet," definitely belongs in the home of an ink-stained scenester.

I need more crazy patterned goodness... but I am never one to be impressed by the mundane. Thank you, Front Designs, for catering to my hazy whims.

UV imprinted wallpaper, for commitment-phobes everywhere, shows its pattern only in sunlight. If only tattoos worked the same way! This reminds me of my husband's college apartment that revealed strange and intricate dayglo scribble-covered walls only when viewed under black lights, of which there were many. Needless to say we moved into my apartment, beautifully decorated (to my impoverished 18-year-old mind) with the obligatory iron-barred futon, giant tacky Chinese fans, and even gianter (but FREE) Beatles poster. I can still feel skeevy Ringo's eyes tracking my movements across the room. I'm so glad I don't live there anymore.

Moving on to more of Front's awesome offerings:

Wallpaper again, this time with a pattern formed by mouse nibbles -- the roll was scanned and inverted so only the indentations showed the pattern. Ouch! Too much thinking, but how cute is that little guy? My cat would love to meet him.

And yet another brain busting surface dreamed up by Front:

The pattern here was created by bugs that chewed tracks through the wood, leaving impressions (wink, wink! nudge, nudge!) of their ways and means. This one's kind of funny to me because I spent much of my time in Hawaii desperately fighting the bugs that did this very thing to my furniture, my photographic prints, and worst of all, my negatives. I'm about to scan those negs in right now and say I MEANT TO DO THAT. It's all about intent, right?

My last ditch effort to dazzle my poor tired swollen head:

Charred furniture from Maarten Baas's Smoke series bears all the marks of its time in fiery flames. Apparently Baas burns the pieces and yanks them before they crumble to the ground, but not before little bits are broken off and cracks form in the wood. This appeals to the erstwhile gothy side of me, the side that still gets really excited when Bela Lugosi's Dead surfaces from the depths of my shuffled itunes (which are mostly rap, if you must know. I have a weakness for dirty booty jamz).

Yes, that chair is hot, but its conception is even hotter:

Fire always cheers me up.

Long Weekend

Don't you all wish it were still the weekend instead of smelly, yucky Monday?  Well, you're in luck!  We here at the influential Design Crisis head-quarters have deemed this a long weekend in observation of our record-breaking Texas Heat.  (not since 1920-something have we had 37 consecutive days of triple digit heat, with no rain, might i add).  So be it long weekend, so it was written so it is done.  What should we do with this extra day?  Why, take a dip of course:

Mind Blowing Pool at La Purificadora Hotel, Puebla, Mexico

Exterior, La Purificadora Hotel.  

After swimming, my second favorite weekend activity is to peruse design magazines (perfect weekend: design magazines pool-side), this weekend I curled up with my fave: Elle Decoration UK.   Apparently the Brits like to swim too and they chose to rub it in my face by delivering pictures of some of the swankiest pools I've ever ever seen.  Here are some of my top pics from the issue.

Blood Red tile pool at the Hotel Unique, Sao Paulo, Brazil

I am so so curious to see what this pool looks like in real life.  Of course I'm only budgeted to stay in Brazil's swanky Cidade de Deus, but, perhaps I could hop the fancy glass fence.

itty bitty pics (sorry) of Therme Vals Spa, Vals, Switzerland

I love how clear the water is in the first picture, I know, it's a pool, it's supposed to be clear.  But I really really like clear water so whatever.  Those Alps in the background aren't too bad either.  I'm not sure what's happening in the last picture but I am willing to guess that it is very calming and relaxing.

2 views of Badeschiff, Berlin

Again, I love clear water.  There is no way in hell you would ever get me to swim in that yucky lake that surrounds Badeschiff's open air pool.  I love the idea that you could swim in this man made wonder and totally pretend that you are being all out-doorsy.  Interesting note:  the pool is made from shipping containers, so, yay, it's totally green (faux-outdoorsy AND green?  I wonder if I have to wear a flannel bathing-suit to get in?)

Infinity Pool at Mystique, Oia, Santorini Greece

I know it's kinda hard to tell what's going on in this picture, but I'm pretty sure it's amazing and magical.  First of all, there's an infinity pool.  There is nothing on earth better than an infinity pool.  Yes, I am so easily amused that if some silly architect tries to trick me into thinking that the water goes on forever, I feel as though I'm living in a giant posh paradise.  Also, again we see a pool near a real body of water:  nature without all the yucky nature encounters:  perfect!

These 4 pools actually weren't in Elle Decor, I just thought they looked like a nice place for us to spend our long weekend (and look, bonus eye candy without the $9.00 cover price! rose garden: promised, delivered.) 

Clockwise from top left: Azucar, Veracruz, Mexico; Rockhouse Hotel, Negril, Jamaica; Floris Suite Hotel, Piscadera Bay, Curacao; Laluna Morne Rouge, Grenada

Don't you just adore the striped ottomans at the Azucar Pool?  I think I could make myself feel right at home laying on those bad boys.  Also, since these last 4 are in Mexico and the Caribbean they all feel a bit more attainable. Well, at least I like to trick myself into thinking that.

I can't help but wonder, if I take back this 3-day weekend I just granted us all, and actually did something a bit more productive, would I be able to afford to visit one of these private alcoves of paradise rather than just fantasize and tell you about it?  Perhaps we could all go and have the world's most well-designed pool party?  Who wants to set up the evite?