Oh-So-Rite

It's a good thing I don't live in San Francisco, because I would probably be about 30 pounds heavier and have to buy a whole new wardrobe. Particularly if I lived in the Mission District, near Dolores Park, home to the makers of best ice cream EVER, Bi-Rite Creamery and Bakeshop. They use local, sustainable and/or organic ingredients and have some hugely creative flavors like Salted Caramel (so yum), Ricanelas (cinnamon with snickerdoodles), Balsamic Strawberry, Creme Fraiche and my personal favorite, Brown Sugar with Ginger Caramel Swirl. It is truly amazing stuff and will forever change your ice cream expectations.

Their cups and spoons are biodegradeable, and they used strictly metal spoons for tasting (because you WILL want to taste a few flavors, at least) to reduce waste. But have they thought about the carbon footprint of desperate New Yorkers flying in to pick up a pint of Roasted Banana (created by roasting organic bananas with brown sugar until tender and caramelized) or Honey Lavender? Have they?!? Clearly this can only be solved by the opening of a New York sister store. Hey, a girl can dream.

Otherworldy Inspiration

From our visit to the Monterey Bay Aquarium this weekend, some interesting almost abstract-painting-esque photos of colorful marine life. The jellies will never cease to be amazing to me. We also saw otters, sharks, seahorses, pipefish and the unbelievably weird leafy sea dragons. The never-still pipefish and seahorses were much harder to get a good shot of!

Relaxation

Back from a nice trip down south for an all-girls celebration of my grandmother's 82nd birthday. Lots of wine and laughs with family. Plus, she lives on a gorgeous island, with lots of big old oak trees, palms, deer, alligators, egrets, bobcats and miles of sandy beaches.

Photos above from christies.com

Beach Botanicals

While exploring around the lighthouse park area in Montauk, I took some "specimen" photos of a few interesting plant tidbits to sketch for use in patterns and designs.

Back from The End

We had a blast in Montauk and, as usual, the weather was mercurial, shifting from glorious blazing sun to thick-as-pea-soup fog.

Vintage Dutch tins

My only souvenir purchases on our Amsterdam trip, I was so incredibly psyched to find these; I had been eyeing some vintage tins on e-bay a while back but there's nothing better than coming across something totally unexpected and wonderful like these. The rectangular one is so great in all its pink/green/gold swirliness and the kooky farmers cylinder is very reminiscent of Alexander Girard, one of my all-time favorite designers. I found these in a cute store called Juffrouw Splinter. The girl told me she had just put them out on the shelves that day, so it must have been destiny...

Dutch style

On our recent trip to Amsterdam, we noticed tons of inspiring bits of typography everywhere - here are a few favorites. Everything about the city and its habitants seemed well-designed, charming, friendly.