June 7, 2008
My best friend got married a couple of weeks ago, and had this great idea for me to take post-wedding pictures around Doylestown of her and her new hubby. Originally the plan was to take these pictures with them in their full blown wedding gear, which would have looked absolutely magical, but Joy wasn't ready to completely ruin her dress just yet. Plus the ground was soaked from the previous night's rain. Bad news for a 5 foot train.
Warning: adorable mushy "we are newlyweds and oh-so in love" pics to follow!
June 4, 2008
The other day I made the cutest snack ever, observe:
I was reading veganyumyum and was inspired to make something cute, symmetrical, and pretty. That's hummus, shredded carrot and marinated dill tofu on crackers if you were wondering. Yum!
April 21, 2008
On Friday night, Josh, Joy and I had a spectacular dinner at Wild Ginger, a vegetarian (mostly vegan) Pan-Asian restaurant on Broome Street (I think it's technically in Little Italy?). I had the Bi Bim Bap which was an amazing layering of coconut brown rice, seaweed salad, spinach, mango salsa, avocado, strips of seitan, and a few more ingredients that I'm forgetting. When mixed together, this crazy vegan concoction was absolutely bursting with flavor and texture. Best meal I've had in a long time. I want another Bi Bim Bap right now, and only partly because I do love saying the name.
The aptly named "Galaxies Forming Along Filaments, Like Droplets Along the Strands of a Spider's Web" in the Tanya Bonakdar Gallery. Yes we were allowed (heck, we were encouraged) to walk through it.
March 10, 2008
Quick trip to the MoMA yesterday. I've never been there before and was surprised to stumble upon quite a few masterpieces including Van Gogh's "Starry Night," Andrew Wyeth’s "Christina’s World" and Marc Chagall's "I and the Village." Among said masterpieces were all sorts of intriguing exhibits, several of which shown below.
(not an exhibit, just a shot of the floor beneath us)
The third floor was stunning - it was comprised of early/mid 20th century German graphic design paired with Bauhaus-looking furniture. Everything was beautifully simplistic, flat in color and minimal in form:
(this concludes the Plakastil/Bauhaus room)
It was really neat to see Picasso's "Girl Before a Mirror" in person, as I had become aquatinted with every single INCH of it throughout this project. The colors were more vivid than I imagined they would be.
The "Technology Floor" aka the 6th floor was not my favorite but it was incredibly interesting. Maybe I was just tired from standing for 4 hours (I'm a huge wimp) but I did appreciate all of the innovations, contrivances and such.
February 16, 2008
I should mention that I was finally able to see The Bean (or the more properly named "Cloud Gate") in Chicago's Millennium Park recently. Designed by Anish Kapoor, this enormous bean provides an amazing reflection of the city and the people in it. Though when we saw it, The Bean was slightly covered in snow and we were constantly being pelted with freezing rain (Chicago-style) so we didn't stay long.
A smudgy Bean
The crazy view from underneath
We also, of course, had to check out the Giant Faces (which are actually fountains when the weather isn't 40 below zero) next to The Bean. They were designed by Jaume Plensa and inspired by the people of Chicago. Pretty cool.
Also during our Chicago visit, Josh and I experienced one of the best meals of our lives at Arun's, which we later learned was considered by Patricia Schultz to be one of the 1,000 places to see before you die. And rightfully so, our entire experience at Arun's was downright magical. The walls are covered with intricate, beautiful artwork, painted by owner Arun's brother Anawat Sampanthavivat. Each of the 12 dishes we tried were little works of art themselves, and just as delicious as they were beautiful.
I had to save the little fish carved out of carrot with the "please don't eat me" look, yes I took it on the plane and he is till living in Josh's refrigerator as we speak. Only quite dehydrated at this point and looking a bit gaunt.
January 3, 2008
The last time Josh and I were in NYC we walked what seemed like the entire square footage of Chelsea, visiting art gallery upon art gallery, taking breaks only to eat. We saw a lot of fascinating art and amazing sculptures. Here are some of the highlights.
(and I am going to edit this once I have all the names of the artists, right now my notes are in a place I did not leave them)
January 20, 2008: edited!
This Carlos Amorales exhibit, titled "Black Cloud," was featured in the Yvon Lambert Gallery on West 21st Street. The entire room, including the ceiling, was covered in paper butterflies. 25,000 of them I believe. In the back there was a dark room blocked off by a curtain with a film of said butterflies playing on repeat, disturbing music filing the room. I have no idea why!
Ugo Rondinone
"Big Mind Sky"
Matthew Marks Gallery (522 West 22nd)
Though this statement seems a relatively common theme in art galleries, I wasn't expecting to see it written on the wall of this giant clay head display. Very few of the clay heads looked sad (maybe they represent all of the emotions the artist is unable to feel, or something).
An interesting paragraph from artcal:
"The exhibition consists of twelve new sculptures shown here for the first time. Each measuring nearly nine feet tall and named after a month of the year, these new works are the artist's first freestanding figurative sculptures. Modeled in clay, then cast in aluminum and painted, the hand of the artist is felt strongly throughout. These sculptures are the fourth and final group in Rondinone's series of mask sculptures, which he calls Moonrise."
These insanely realistic sculptures by Duane Hanson were featured in the Michener Art Museum last year, and I was pleasantly surprised to stumble onto this exhibit again in New York (Van De Weghe Fine Art on 23rd). Pretty depressing, but so cool.
A little perspective:
Folert de Jong
"Les Saltimbanques"
James Cohan Gallery (on West 26th)
These sculptures, made from styrofoam, polyurethane foam, and latex,
were without a doubt disturbing, but at the same time playful and animated. De Jong describes the toxic insulation materials paired with colors like pink and baby blue as "one big moral contradiction."
January 1, 2008
I'm in Florida right now, but I had to take a break from hanging out in 80 degree weather to share this picture, which we stumbled upon while walking to a french cafe in Sarasota. This note was taped in the window of a toy store, and quite frankly, it's adorable:
August 21, 2007
I like to talk about food. Vegan, ethnic, or otherwise healthy, I think it's all very riveting and I just love sharing my thoughts and adventures with you, lovely reader, in hopes that you might be entertained or maybe inspired to try something new. So that's what this whole post is about, food (but artsy design posts are coming very soon!) Josh and I went to visit Josh's friend Jeff in NYC on Sunday, and we went with an agenda. Our first order of business: Doughnut Plant. Ever since we saw "Throwdown with Bobby Flay: doughnuts" we knew we just had to try these intriguing "tres leches" doughnuts that are, apparently, extraordinary. And let me tell you. They were. Holy crap are those some good doughnuts. Poor Jeff was feeling quite sickly after 2 of them, but Josh and I were good to go. We came ready (to eat). Next we stopped in "The Pickle Guys" for who knows what reason, and got a quart of pickles. The guys working there were hilarious and super nice, but I just couldn't get that excited about pickles. After trying a couple I still thought, it's just a pickle. We walked around then had brunch at a mediocre brunch place, went to a pretty cool museum and saw some Ideo stuff. But most of the museum was closed.
Dinner was very exciting. After some research, I decided we needed to try out HanGawi
in Manhattan - thanks to this AWESOME BLOG. HanGawi serves vegan Korean food, and inside it may have been the most beautiful decor I've ever seen in a restaurant. We left our shoes at the door, per our hostess, and sat down on cushions at our ground level table. There was space under the table though, for our legs, I guess so we wouldn't have to bear sitting Indian style through dinner (I wouldn't have minded). We ordered some mung bean pancakes and pumpkin soup, which were both exceptional. I ordered the Acorn noodle salad for dinner (I was kinda full already). At first it looked like the salad consisted of plain soba noodles, but they were so amazingly nutty and delicious, not at all plain! There was also Jicama, or pear I'm not sure, and cabbage and whatnot throughout the salad. It was crisp, flavorful and delicious.
The next night we went to White Orchids, a Thai place located in the Promenade Shops in the Lehigh Valley. I believe the restaurant had only been open a week or two, so things weren't running smoothly quite yet. The waiters were confused and the service was slow, but none of that bothered us. We had fun and the food was spectacular. Josh got the Panang Curry like he always does, and every time he gets it I give it a try and promptly turn up my nose. But this time it was actually good! I would even consider getting it sometime, only less spicy than Fireball Miller prefers. I had the Pad See'ew, and it was amazing. Just amazing. Wide (very wide!) rice noodles with some assorted veggies in an almost sweet sauce that tasted quite similar to Pad Thai. The only part of this dish that didn't blow my mind was the broccoli. In fact the broccoli was quite disappointing. It tasted straight out of the Redners discount produce barrel. But then again maybe eating Joshy's home grown broccoli from the backyard has spoiled me. Now that's some good broccoli.
August 16, 2007
There is the coolest furniture store in Emmaus called "The Main Street Gallery" which sits unassumingly off of (obviously) Main Street. Surprisingly enough you would never know this huge 4 story building exists unless you were looking for it, it seems to just blend in with the shops around it. Inside holds the most aesthetically pleasing furniture I have ever seen! Not that I'm an expert or even particularly well-versed in the field of furniture critique, but let me tell you, there was an argyle chair in every corner. At least one fourth of the furniture was plaid, and a good amount of it was Victorian style.
This is the "Alice in Wonderland" chair, as my mom called it
Last week was a kind of exciting food week, which included two trips to Balasia, and one to Vegan Treats. Josh and I also went to a tiny Vietnamese place in Allentown called Little Saigon... but that was just OK. Good, not great. The VT trip is what excited me, for some reason I was really really in the mood for a tiny fake cheesecake. And well, words just aren't necessary.
It was dairy-free paradise!
July 23, 2007
Josh and I just got back from Canada. It was fun and beautiful. We saw natural wonders, man-made wonders, several awesome cities, black squirrels, lots of tourists but alot more french people, cool clothes, and no mooses. Observe!
Niagara Falls (of course):
The tackiest city ever two blocks from the most beautiful waterfall ever.
The coolest hotel ever in Montreal, Hotel Gault. Extremely modern, simplistic, and chic.
One of the the best restaurants I've ever eaten in, whose name escapes me at the moment, prints their menus on paper bags and makes the greatest scallops atop a bed of sauteed carrots and mushrooms with arugula salad and basil garlic dressing I have ever had.
Josh in front of some neat looking Canadian Olympics building, which currently appears to serve little purpose, but I could be wrong.
Botanical garden, the cactus room.
and the Chinese garden.
Beautiful buildings. Inside the cathedral was pretty dim, which made it hard to get a good shot, but it was breathtaking.
This is one of the lifts we "rode unnecessarily 10 times a day". Josh stuck his head in every scenic shot of Mount Tremblant.
A fascinating dinner at the "plus minus cafe", with an even more fascinating waiter (not pictured)
Playing in the parking garage. I think this was the day it rained on our canoe trip :(
More amazing architecture and fun with cannons:
Pretty much the cutest shoes I've ever seen. I didn't buy them but I had to at least capture them on film before we left.
Waiting for crepes! And weirded out by the open window and people hovering over us shamelessly.
June 24, 2007
Well, I feel like I need to change the layout of my portfolio so that A) it loads faster, and B) 
doesn't get all messed up in Internet Explorer. Speaking of which, if IE happens to be the browser you use, give web designers everywhere a break and get Firefox!
I saw "Storm of Emotions" at Bethlehem's Southside Film Festival this weekend (very moving but not very informative). Though the promotional posters this year were very nice, nothing beats the 2006 design, which is what you see to the left. Beautiful.
