PLOT by Osko+Deichmann for Brunner

Great modular seating solution for large spaces. I like the brighter colorways above rather than the fairly drab bit the models are sitting on below.

Designed by Germans, manufactured by Germans.

via contemporist

Elfandiary's Draw Diary

Unreal. What an amazing insight into the process, and what amazing work with those markers. The artist is Elfandiary from Indonesia. Aduhai.

via Juxtapoz

Stencil Portrait by C215

Another beautiful piece by French stencil writer C215 in Barcelona. This guy is fast becoming one of my favorite visual artists, period. His work gets some of its context from where he places it (the street), but it also adds so much life to his subjects.

Gotta be my artist of the year for 2012, because it's December, and that's what people do in December, they talk about the best things that happened over the course of the last year. I'm supposed to make like a big list called "THE 127 BEST ARTISTS OF 2012" according to my SEO guru, but fuck it, y'know? C215 wins.

image via C215's facebook

The Newrosis 2012 Sneaker of the Year

I was gonna do a whole big list, but I wrote like 20 posts this year so I'm pretty sure you can see all the shoes I liked without much effort, even by internet standards.

Anyway, without further ado, the Nike Air Force 1 Year of the Dragon II. With the venerable cut of the AF1, you get a classic shape that is, at this point, up there with the Shell-toe and Chucks in the pantheon of sneaker immortality. What this model adds is all about the details. The colorway is reminiscent of a Korean or Chinese Buddhist temple, as is the pattern on the insole and the dragon on the tongue. It is, in my opinion, a 9.9/10. Selling on Ebay right at this very moment for about $200.

pics via nikeblog.com

Digital Paintings by Carolina Rodriguez Fuenmayor

A quote from the artist, a Colombian art student, which I think you'll agree we can all relate to:

"I am currently an Art student at the Pontifical Xavierian University in Bogota, Colombia and from that aside I'm a small chick, very small, who lives the way small people do and that eats and create small things, that it also has a purpose, a very healthy purpose, fight and bitter the existence of those who are different, the tall ones, and with that I mean, conquer the world to then have the power over the pituitary gland of the human race and replace them with the gland of some random chicken or something scientifically correct." 

For digital paintings, I really like how soft and brutal the images are. I guess, like most people my age, I expect Jar-Jar Binks and Gollum, or Tron; stuff that's really clean and precise and 150 dpi. This work is really personal, and I guess I'll have to reassess my narrow-ass view of the digital art box.

Kudos to you, you pint-sized Colombiana.

Images via Juxtapoz 

Manchester City 2-3 Manchester United

As they say over on that magical isle, GET IN. #ORVP via Red Mancunian

Assault Rifle Sunglasses

You know, it has become apparent to me that I have been reposting a fair bit of content from the Laughing Squid. This may lead to speculation by some that I am lazy on the internet. Not true! In fact, I quite pride myself on my ability to devour massive amounts of the online world, absorb the nutrient segments into my blood, and discard the bulk as solid waste out of my cyberanus.

It just so happens that the editorial staff at the Squid and I subsist on a similar diet, and I am going to take this opportunity to tip my hat to that mob over there. You do good work.

Right, well tell me these assault rifle sunglasses, designed by Jeremy Scott and Linda Farrow, aren't just the fucking shit. Unfortunately, they're available at Colette, which my readers will know is a by-word for the French what the fuck expensive.

Yeah. €380. For machine gun sunglasses. God I hate Colette.

McNairy x Timberland Boots

KithNYC has these beautiful mud-stompers from Timberland available for $245-$265 at their online store.

I don't have much to say about them, other than I would not wear them for their intended purpose, which is presumably to go sloshing about in puddles or tromping around in snow. Instead, I would wear them to a fancy dinner party or to church and otherwise keep them dust- and dirt-free. Because that's what we do with our nice things in my house.

Ed Fairburn

Ed Fairburn is a guy who makes beautiful drawings of faces on maps. It occurs to me that it's a good thing this post is accompanied by the illustrations themselves, or that sentence as a standalone would be somewhat underwhelming.

The artist has this to say about his work:

"A short series of figurative studies, plotted and drawn over a collection of Bartholomew maps. Through this body of work I study both the physical attributes of the terrain and the features of my chosen subjects. I search for opportunities to synchronise the two, finding similarities between the patterns, before drafting out the portrait and building the tone."

via laughing squid

Zundert, Netherlands Bloemencorso (Big Ass Flower Parade)

So a bloemencorso is a flower parade, which is basically like the Rose Bowl's sashay around the streets of Pasadena, only it is in a small Dutch town called Zundert and the floats are goddamned insane. These are some pics of past winners.

I am in absolute awe of the top image. I don't have the imagination to draw something like that, let alone sculpt it out of millions of dahlias, and that makes me jealous as well as awed. Jealawed. Don't even try to steal it, it's copyrighted.

I added a video of this year's affair at the bottom of the post, but it is over an hour long and the commentary is Dutch, and it becomes apparent pretty quickly that you're sitting at your computer watching a recorded broadcast of a parade that is being remarked upon by people who aren't speaking English, which is unacceptable, so you don't have to click on it if you don't want to.

Kurt Cobain's Top 50 Albums

As a child who grew up in the 90s, Kurt Cobain (and, I suppose, Krist and Dave) was a seminal part of my musical education. Nevermind came out when I was...well I was old enough, ok? Anyway, it was eye-opening and fantastic and all that shit, but more than that because I found Kurt so fascinating I listened to a lot of the bands that influenced him, which is why I find this list intriguing. Have a look.

PS: What, no Pearl Jam?

image via laughing squid

The Pointer Tenzing II Is a Shoe, I Promise

The Pointer Tenzing II sounds like a name for a German submachine gun or a ghastly suburban condo development that advertises itself as a loft community even though they're cheap fucks who just don't want to pay for drywall.

It isn't either of those things, though. It's a shoe. A damn fine shoe, made by the good people at Pointer. This model is equipped with the finest leather/suede combo upper and rubber sole, along with brass eyelets and fancy laces.

Shoe. Not gun or condo, shoe. Available for $136 at KithNYC.

Democracy Day in America a Success for Minnesota

I don't like to get political on my internet space very often, but I feel it is incumbent upon me (no pun intended) to acknowledge the fine work that the sensible people of Minnesota did yesterday at the polls. While the rest of the world fixated on a race that was, quite frankly, never really in doubt in my opinion, the lords and ladies of the Land of 10,000 Lakes had other fish to fry:

1. First and foremost, we defeated a constitutional amendment that would have defined marriage as being between a man and a woman. Now, as rhesus monkeys and panda bears have yet to be given the vote, one can probably surmise that the goal of this amendment was to preempt any future attempts to legalize gay marriage. It should be noted that gay marriage is not legal in Minnesota right now, but you can bet your sweet ass that someday it will be. The purpose of this amendment was to pitch a taller roadblock on our way to the inevitable. Kudos to 51.3% of you, my fellow Minnesotans.
2. Another constitutional amendment would have required the presentation of government ID in order to vote, which would likely disenfranchise at least some Minnesotans. The goal was to prevent rampant voter fraud, which dilutes each Minnesotan's vote, according to proponents. Unfortunately, this rampant voter fraud (113 convictions after the 2008 election, mostly felons) failed to outweigh the potential disenfranchisement of over 215,000 people who do not have government ID that matches their current address.
3. #FourMoreYears. My Republican friends like to gloss over the fact that the banks collapsed under Bush, not Obama, and that the 44th President has overseen programs that saved massive American industries such as banking and those car thingys. He was dealt a shit hand and did the best he could. He also put an end to the war in Iraq and set a date for us adjourning from Afghanistan. Mitt Romney and his chameleon-esque election policies were never the answer, and despite his best efforts to fuck things up on that stage in Denver, the President of the United States remains Barry O.

So all in all, a hugely successful night for Minnesotans. The only black mark comes from the 6th Congressional District, where troglodytes and masochists conspired to give the good people of Greater St. Cloud two more years of representation from one of the most tragic caricatures in the history of United States politics.

Jesse the Body was an embarrassment at times, but he was OUR embarrassment. This clown epitomizes the failures of the Republican Party and its extremist offshoot, the Tea Party, as the parties of NO. Minnesotans are better than this, and we'll prove it in two years; yes, YES we will.

Nike "What the Max" Olympic Pack

So I missed the boat on this Olympic Pack of the venerable Nike Air Max line. The collection includes the Air Max 90, Air Max 2012 and Air Max 95 BB in Hyperfuse builds. I find it highly unlikely that anyone able to read this would not be able to figure out why it is called the Olympic Pack.

Rudimentary internet research has yielded the source of the shoes as a shop called mita in Japan. I swear I saw them for sale on one of my shoe sites, but I let this one sit on the back burner for a while and now I've gone all senile with the link.

Anyway, I did find the OG Air Max 90s here for the princely sum of $89. Quite a deal.

via EU Kicks

For My Faithful Readers: Random New Shoes!

Hey there kids, it's been a busy end to summer/beginning of autumn here on the internet. I have been getting paid to write (for actual American money) which, sadly, trumps my endeavors with regard to this blog at the moment. Rest assured, I am aggressively flogging this horse, and I'll get some good content brewed up for you before too long.

In the meantime, check out some new kicks from some of my favorite brands. Want more info? Learn to internet!

 

#SQUIRRELBOMB.

I take no credit for the photos, but telling you where I got them sort of ruins the scavenger hunt aspect of the whole affair, so suffice it to say I didn't take them, but I know who did, and they did a good job.

Neil Armstrong, Legend, Dead at 82

When people look back at the American Era in history, without question one of the grandest feats of the age will be the landing of men on the moon. Neil Armstrong, the first of those intrepid travelers to step onto lunar soil, has died today at the age of 82.

"Legend" is one of those words that has evolved into a bit of a watered-down cliche in modern times, liberally applied to athletes and people doing foolish things on YouTube, but make no mistake: the first man to set foot on the surface of a celestial body other than the earth is legendary.

In a time when humanity applies its intellectual gifts to developing more technologically advanced ways of cramming advertising down the throats of consumers, or to inventing new ways to lustily suck every last drop of oil from the ground so we can burn it, it is good for us to remember that we used to shoot for the stars.

Godspeed Mr. Armstrong.

Nike Air Force 1 Wolf Grey

AF1s with tonal grey upper along with hot pink and royal blue accents. This shoe is murdered out and I'm buying it, so get your grubby mitts off. It isn't available anywhere at any price. GO AWAY I SAY.

via sneakerfreaker.com

Banksy in London for the Olympics

Banksy has just posted two pieces celebrating the Games of the XXX Olympiad.  Big fan of the javelin missile.

The Shard

A "supertall" skyscraper project on the southern bank of the Thames, The Shard, AKA London Bridge Tower, has topped out at 1,016 feet just in time for the opening of the London Summer Olympics.  It has 72 habitable floors and is currently the tallest building in Europe, although Moscow has three projects in the works that will surpass it, if completed.

The tower features retail space, restaurants, offices, a hotel, private residences, and four floors of observation deck.  The website is really well done, and I recommend a gander at the 360 panorama of London town (though the resolution is disappointing).

Designed by Renzo Piano--who is Italian, in case there was some confusion--The Shard is a really striking addition to London's generally underwhelming skyline (not due to a lack of interest in blowing up the skyline, simply because the London council want to preserve the old and blah blah blah).

I've been watching this one go up for years, and I'm really pleased to see it come to fruition.  While detractors may claim that its 1984 monolithic aesthetic is a bit cold, I really enjoy the contrast with the rest of London; a modern obelisk in a historic city.

On the down side, there's...this video.  What the hell am I looking at here?  Is this another Tron remake?  Am I supposed to be awed?  Inspired?  Terrified?  Because I'm none of those things.  Just disappointed.