Scary bath tub!

THG gets a lot right. The sink I fell in love with yesterday is a case in point. But Lordie when they go off the tracks the go whole hog.

This is that same tub in white. It looks even worse, don't you think?

I love Canada

Talking to MrsBen in the comments earlier today has had me thinking about my early experiences with hand pumps and why I find the image of them so compelling. The answer goes back a few years.

In 1969, the nine members of my family piled into this station wagon and pulled a boat into the great land of the north.

We were in for an adventure, a cabin in the woods. A cabin in the woods on the shores of huge lake. I was four and although I don't remember the drive, I do remember being there for the first time.

I can't believe it, but I just found the driveway on Google Maps.




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In 1969, that was a dirt road and things like power and sewer lines were but a dim memory.

Every summer after that we'd pile into the station wagon and go back. We had no plumbing and no electricity but what we had was wilderness and each other. I don't have any interior shots of the cottage, but if I did, you'd see a kitchen sink with a hand pump. The water that came out of that pump was from the lake and was for washing only. Drinking water came from another pump about a hundred yards down a path into the woods.

These are my siblings and I on the beach of our lake in about 1971.

Even now, the region of Ontario where we'd go is remarkably isolated. And to us, living for a couple of weeks at a time without plumbing and electricity was a badge of honor. All credit goes to my Dad for that. From an early age we learned that not having modern conveniences wasn't really that big a deal and it made us appreciate them when we did get back to civilization.

This is my sister and my youngest brother after a big day spent trolling for northern pike and small mouth bass.

Being in another country at an early age taught us a thing or two about seeing the world as more than the small part of it we knew. As we got older we'd trek out of the bush for long enough to visit places like Ottawa, Toronto and Kingston and see first-hand that not all Canadians lived like the subsistence trappers we knew from the back country.

This is my Dad and youngest brother in 1969. The three boys on the end of the dock are my brothers Matt, Tom and me. I'm in the center.

Those early experiences embedded in me a profound respect for wilderness, for modern conveniences and above all for Canada. I can never thank my parents enough for introducing us to a world we could have never known otherwise.

The guy on the right in the previous photo is now the guy on the left in this one. The little guys surrounding him are three of his sons.

I don't think anybody thought about generational legacies when we piled into the car in 1969, but that's precisely what's happened. I don't think there's been a year since then that "our" lake wasn't swum in by someone who shares my last name. I haven't been back in years but hearing my nieces' and nephews' stories about their adventures and discoveries is an absolute thrill. It reminds me too that I need to go back.

This is my grandmother on a hike at some point in the '80s. She is in her own 80s at this point and though she didn't share our appreciation for the lack of electricity, she was always up for an adventure.

My siblings have families of their own now, and every one of my nieces and nephews has an indelible mark placed on them by that place and their marks match mine. It's good for the soul to know what it's like to pump water or to go to sleep to the sounds of the whip-poor-wills and loons or to catch and eat your own dinner.

So thank you Mom and Dad, thank you wilderness and last but not least, thank you Canada.

"Our" lake a couple of years ago.

Happy birthday Michelangelo

535 years ago today, the world was graced with the arrival of Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni. He was born to what would now be a middle class family in Caprese, in the region of Tuscany.

No one could have known at the time, but Michelangelo and his peers would change the course of human history. The body of work and thought left behind by these men is staggering.

His David is arguably his most famous and lasting work, but it's not possible to spend any time in Italy without seeing his footprints.

My favorite Michelangelo project is the Campidoglio in Rome. The Campidoglio is a Piazza that marks the spot where ancient Rome was founded and where it's governed today.

The Campidoglio is a sloping trapezoid and Michelangelo pulled off an incredible act of forced perspective when he designed the piazza.

This is an engraving from 1568 by Étienne Dupérac that shows Michelangelo's solution. Everything hinged on the shape of the pavement. The spoked Easter egg at the center makes the piazza appear to be perfectly rectangular. Like everything from the Renaissance, the shape he designed was rife with symbolism. It's said to allude to the constellations though what it really represents will never be known. Pope Paul III, who commissioned it, was sufficiently suspicious of the motives behind the shape that the pavement wasn't completed until 1940.

So happy birthday sir. I for one am thrilled that you once walked the earth. I have a sneaky feeling I'm not alone in that.

All images from Wikicommons.

Sink lust?

You can have the faucet in this photo, but check out this sink.

It has a coordinated bathtub too, but I'm all about the sink.

This bathroom was at the Paris trade show Maison et Objet last January, and everything here is from Tetard-Haudidquez-Grisoni, also known as THG.

What do we think? Yea? Nay?

I keep coming back to this stuff from THG. I think the idea of French bath fixtures feeds a deep-seated need I have for tap handles like this.

Haughty I know, but boy oh boy does that amuse me.

Jellio is more than Gummi Bear chandeliers

This chandelier made the rounds of the internet this week and after the fifth time I saw it, I followed the link back from whence it came.

The chandelier is the product of a company called Jellio, and Jellio makes childhood-themed furnishings for adults. Ordinarily, I resent these kinds of forced marches back into the deep recesses of my youth, but these guys are onto something. What they're onto is that the vein they're tapping belongs to me and just about everybody else who was born before 1970. Three cheers for post boomers! Not that there's anything wrong with baby boomers but get off the stage already.

So even though I can't imagine using some of this stuff in a project, it's nice to know Jellio's out there.

This is a magazine rack made from two interlocking monkeys. They're straight from a Barrel of Monkeys and it's just subtle enough that I like this genuinely.

These babies are what sold me.

They are vases that are oversized handle grips from a sting ray bicycle. Oh man! They even have detachable streamers.

Remember the wood and steel xylophones that were sold as kids toys? Do they still make stuff like this?

Anyhow, here the shape has been turned into a coffee table. No sound, but something like this just might translate into the right room.

This is another coffee table and it's pretty self-explanatory.

What makes this eerily authentic is that its a soft foam core covered in vinyl, just like car seats used to be. Excellent.

I grew up in a house with six boys in it. We made a lot of models over the years and I'd all but forgotten that whole process until I saw this.

That wall hanging is based on the shape that chrome parts for a model car came out of the box. It's brilliant actually. Call me crazy, but something like this would actually work in the right room.

Jellio also does custom work and here's where they convinced me of their skill and genius.

This is a Hotwheels mosaic.

It's made from what else but Hotwheels.

I'm glad you're out there Jellio, keep at it. Check out the rest of their wares on their website.