some neat stuff to look at…

so… we’ve all been on tour for a while.

and that’s my only excuse for the dwindling posts. matt’s been doing a good job of keeping the flame burning, and i’m hoping to jump in and help him carry this burden.

this post is just a quicky. some art/design stuff i had in my favorites…

bookshelves:

“30 of the most creative bookshelf designs”

what i like best about looking at these is that it makes me want to start building my own furniture.

here are some favorites:

and while we’re on the topic of interior design…

hotel rooms:

these are all painted by san francisco locals at the hotel des arts.

next are some rooms at propeller island city lodge in berlin:

flying bed

4 beams

mirror room

upside down

gallery

padded cell

gruft

two lions

here are some other similar hotels:

Arte Luise Kunsthotel

Gladstone Hotel

Hotel De Filosoof

Hotel Fox

Hotel Max

browse those for a while.

scott

photos from burj dubai

remember when ninjagarden was talking about TALL BUILDINGS???

well… i was looking at darkroastedblend today, when i ran across some pictures that were taken from the top of the TALLEST MAN-MADE STRUCTURE ON EARTH!

that first one makes me want to roll a katamari.

scott

UAE Likes Their Tall Buildings

So, I came across an article about an 80-story, energy-efficient, rotating skyscraper that is being built in Dubai. 

I also remember watching a program on HGTV about world architecture and Dubai is home to the world’s tallest building, the world’s tallest hotel and, soon enough, the world’s tallest structure.  It seems like a lot of buildings in Dubai are still being competed and they are all claiming that they will be/are the world’s tallest.  To keep it simple, I included the winner’s on HGTV.  Also, Iowa is home to the 10th largest structure in the world, the WOI-Tower, which is in Alleman.

Tallest Hotel: Burj Al Arab

World’s Tallest Building: Burj Dubai

ninjagarden

an earthquake and a wedding

these images are soooo cool!

i guess the photos were taken in sichuan, china. and if you can read chinese, you can learn more HERE!

scott

Again, the Japanese

Japanese homeless woman evicted from closet

TOKYO, Japan (AP) — A homeless woman who sneaked into a man’s house and lived undetected in his closet for a year was arrested in Japan after he became suspicious when food mysteriously began disappearing.

Police found the 58-year-old woman Thursday hiding in the top compartment of the man’s closet and arrested her for trespassing, police spokesman Hiroki Itakura from southern Kasuya town said Friday.

The resident of the home installed security cameras that transmitted images to his mobile phone after becoming puzzled by food disappearing from his kitchen over the past several months.

One of the cameras captured someone moving inside his home Thursday after he had left, and he called police believing it was a burglar. However, when they arrived they found the door locked and all windows closed.

“We searched the house … checking everywhere someone could possibly hide,” Itakura said. “When we slid open the shelf closet, there she was, nervously curled up on her side.”

The woman told police she had no place to live and first sneaked into the man’s house about a year ago when he left it unlocked.

The closet is part of a Japanese-style room, one of several rooms in his one-story house where the man lived alone — or so he had thought.

Police were investigating how she managed to go in and out of the house unnoticed, as well as details of her life inside the closet, and if she had taken anything else besides food.

She had moved a mattress into the small closet space and apparently even took showers, Itakura said, calling the woman “neat and clean.”

nataliebeth

two great items featured this morning

first, a video of optical illusions. very cool, and kind of stressful to watch.
it’s only two minutes long, though, so give it a try!

so cool, right? i love the dinosaur, and the classic, same sized red striped things.

second, this really beautiful piece of street art in greece.
found at wooster collective.

nataliebeth

europe trip: chapter 20 (mostly just collections)

kicknz and his videogames are taking over! time to compete!

april 25

april 25th was a beautiful day. we went to pret a manger, got a couple of posh cheddar and pickle artisan baguettes, and went to lincoln’s inn fields to have a picnic! hold up a minute! let me tell you about pret a manger. these guys are pretty cool. for instance, at the end of each day, they donate all their left over food to charities for the homeless and hungry, and they deliver this food using electric vans. all their food is natural, their eggs are free range, and their tuna is dolphin safe. they also exclusively use wind, wave, and hydro-electricity, and don’t air freight their supplies. AND they hate franchises.

after the picnic, we walked about 30 paces to the front door of sir john soane’s house. old john was an architect during the first part of the 1800s. like lavar burton, his style was wild, but he specialized in the neoclassical. he was well known for his use of light sources, and he put mirrors EVERYWHERE!!! his house started out as just #12 lincoln’s inn fields, but as his collections of antiques, paintings, and architectural garbage salvaged from old buildings continued to grow, he bought the two neighboring buildings and turned all three into ONE VERY BIG HOUSE!!!!!!!!

like so many other stupid museums in this world, we were not allowed to take any pictures inside. however, it was free to get in, and if you guys ever go to london, you should at least take a peek. my favorite room was the painting room. all four walls were covered top to bottom with paintings, and three of the walls (not the one with the door) could open, like shallow cabinets, revealing more paintings, both on the inside and on the parts that swing out. and one of the walls, once open, could open once more, revealing paintings hanging across the way in another room. i wish i could find a picture of this, cuz i don’t think i’m explaining it well, but it was cool. he did a lot of hidden cabinets and openings like this throughout the house, but most of the security gaurds weren’t willing to show us what was on the other side.

the basement was partly turned into a crypt filled with roman urns, funeral busts, and the sarcophagus of seti I, and partly turned into a set of rooms named “the monk’s parlour”. this ‘parlour’ was built for padre giovanni (aka father john) to use. however, this padre never existed. he was just a fictional character created by soane. but the padre didn’t just get a couple measly rooms, he also has a grave in the backyard. the headstone reads “alas! poor fanny!”, because it’s actually the family’s dog, fanny, who is buried in the grave.

i’m sure there’s more i could write about this house, but i will not. instead, i’ll post a few pictures found on the internet. please notice all the mirrors.

dining room.

library. connected to the dining room.

breakfast room.

breakfast room ceiling.

some stairs.

minus one seti

just more junk.

etc.

this is part of the monk’s parlour.

speaking of architecture… check out bldgblog, a fun site i will steal things from in the future.

OKAY!!!! now lets move on…

after saying our farewells to johny, we went to the british museum. this place is GIANT! we weren’t even going to TRY to look at everything, so we found a list of ‘must see’ items, and narrowed our visit to just the rooms those items were in. after the museum, we didn’t really do anything. maybe studied or something. who knows!?

now lets look at too many pictures…

this is after the picnic. we are so happy because our bellies are so full.

inside the british museum

and the other part. i should have taken one of the middle too, i guess…

i have been getting into clocks recently. this guy runs via marble power.

just some clock parts.

this is an old japanese clock. it uses weights. not sure how that works, actually.

our first stop was in egypt, to see the rosetta stone. however, this is a better picture.

…

then it was off to easter island!

large bird head

gettin’ in to trouble!

a royal garuda

now for the MUMMIES!!!

cool mask!

ewwwwww

grosssssss

kitty

speaking of cats. here is a japanese cat being attacked by rats. the rats are taunting it with baby mouse bait.

cool mask!

this is bird-jaguar. the old mayan peoples had cool names!

and cool monkey pitchers!

scott