Have you seen Unhappy Hipsters?

Over the last week or so the design blog world has exploded with the excited chatter that can only accompany a new find. Well, two or three weeks ago two women launched Unhappy Hipsters from an undisclosed location somewhere in the US.

The authors have so far remained anonymous but ought to have landed a book deal by mid next week. What is Unhappy Hipsters? In a word, delicious.

The take photographs from Dwell magazine and then caption them. Hilarity ensues. Here are a few of their gems.

The octopus was full of judgment.

(Photo: Mark Compton; Dwell, October 2009)

Everyone always leaves.

(Dwell, April 2009)

Trapped by the tawny palette, he struggled through yet another brown knit scarf.

(Photo: Randi Berez; Dwell, September 2005)

It became their routine. And so the evenings stretched out before him: still, gray, and gravel-strewn.

(Photo: Dean Kaufman; Dwell, November 2006)

You can come out when you can properly explain the differences between Modernist architecture and postmodern ornamentation.

(Photo: Craig Cutler; Dwell, February/March 2006)

I think this is a scream of course. But what say ye? Is Unhappy Hipsters a hit or a miss?

Who's old enough...

To remember this?

From Tower B to Stone Forest

In 1983, I lived in the building in the center of this photo. That's Tower B of the Litchfield Towers complex on the campus of the University of Pittsburgh. I lived on the seventh floor and it was my first experience living on my own.

The Tower B was 22 stories tall and it was home to nearly 900 freshman. There were 40 of us to a floor and all 40 of us shared a single bathroom. As I remember it, there were ten sinks, ten toilets, eight showers and eight urinals. Oh such times were they.

A great friend I made in those early days of the fall of 1983, was Jerry. Jerry lived down the hall and together we figured out a thing or two about what it meant to be out on our own for the first time. Through the years, Jerry and I drifted apart and I hadn't heard from him in about 20 years when Facebook landed on my lap about a year-and-a-half ago. As is true for a whole lot of people from my age group, Facebook has been a real boon to reestablishing contact with friends for way back when. Jerry and I found each other a couple of months after I joined up and it's been a real pleasure to reestablish contact. I love reading about his daughters and he seems to get a kick out of what I do here.

The other day, he wrote me a note that was prompted by something I'd written about bath design. He told me that he and his wife had designed their master bath around a pair of Stone Forest vanity sinks. They'd fallen in love with those sinks and made a room to accommodate them. Now that's my kind of people! He hasn't told me which Stone Forest sink it was that they love so much but there are certainly enough to choose from.

Stone Forest makes contemporary, sculptural sinks, vanities and bathtubs from stone, bronze, bamboo, copper, iron and hardwoods. It's their stone projects that really capture my imagination. Each of these pieces is carved from a single piece of granite, marble, onyx, basalt, sandstone, travertine and what ever other stone they can get their hands on. The work the do is amazing. Here's some of what I'm talking about.

The sinks are a real achievement, but check out these tubs. Man!

I'd be curious to know how well these bamboo sinks hold up over time. I don't have any first hand experience with them. I think they're really beautiful. What do you think gang? Would you use a bamboo sink?

Jerry, you've done really well for yourself over the years but I have to tell you, I envy you your sinks. It's quite a distance from that awful bathroom in Tower B, but it's been a pretty cool journey.

You can see the rest of the Stone Forest collection on their website.

When Scientists Attack! The Times Online list of 30 best science blogs

David Nolan here again, and I was going to just provide a link to a 30 strong list of Science Blogs composed by Times Online, that can be found in their Eureka Zone. WOW! I thought Paul gets some great comments over here at Kitchen and Residential Design. Their list generated a heated response from what appears to be enraged scientists and science writers, given the size of the words they are using and the imaginative phrasing. Nothing like a Global Warming Denialist blog to get scientists of all types in an uproar!

How did the Times Online include the offending blog in their list I wonder? Surely they must have read "Watts Up With That?" by Anthony Watts before they included it. Maybe Times Online is trying to get a bump in web traffic to charge more for advertisement. Enraging your readers might not be the best methodology to increase traffic, but it certainly makes for interesting reading.



If you do read the comments in the Eureka Zone, here's a definition of an abbreviation used:

AGW (anthropogenic global warming) - global warming caused by the actions of humans, not natural causes.

The reason I wanted to post the list though, is to bring a little something different to the loyal readers of Kitchen and Residential Design. I love when Paul breaks down scientific information in his posts so that everyone can understand and relate to it in their everyday life. A lot of science blogs have writers who do the same thing, and just as well.


My favorite from the list is by Ed Yong called Not Exactly Rocket Science. Ed Yong published a book by the same name, as pictured above. He focuses on new discoveries and has an easy-to-understand writing style, while not dumbing down the details or leaving out data. I find it refreshing to read about science from the perspective of an educated journalist helping me to understand complicated ideas and theories, rather than bone-dry drivel delivered down a researcher's nose at me.

Check out the list if you like. The "Eureka Team" is looking for reader suggestions on other science blogs to compose a "Best 100 Science Blogs" list. Let's see if we can get Kitchen and Residential Design on there. I would love to read the comments then!

Is this child abuse?

Is this meant to be some kind of a punishment for misbehaving children?

Instead of threatening to bake them into pies a la Hansel and Gretel, do you threaten your kids with "Behave or I'm going to buy a Jonathan Adler Junior blue zebra carpet!"

I can only imagine how much this stuff costs. Here's an idea, if you're going to spend a lot of money on your kids furniture and accessories, why not buy something with real value instead of just freak value? Am I so wrong?