Happy Holidays!!!

Happy Thanksgiving to all!  Porter and I are staying local this year, working diligently to transform the loft into a Frontier Holiday dream land.   As part of the theme, we figured an updated H crest was in order, so I set to work with my watercolors.  19th century shotguns, it turns out, are quite easy to paint.  Pine sprigs are not.

May your bellies be full tomorrow and may the sales be grand on Black Friday!  Holiday gift guides and holiday decor photos to follow in the coming weeks! 

German Americana | Burg und Schild

As much as American guys love classic American workwear, the Berliners certainly don't hate it.  Red Wing boots galore there.  Burg und Schild was the first store we visited in Berlin and one of the coolest.  Bomber jackets, motorcycles, oodles of good man stuff.  (Photos by Porter Hovey)  

Burg und Schild

Rosa-Luxemburg-Str. 3 (in Mitte)

D-10178 Berlin

Harvard-Yale 2009

At Washington & Lee, my college, major binge drinking was practically required on Fridays (as it is all all colleges).  That would've been fine if we didn't have to face the cruel rituals of Saturday morning: rise at the crack of dawn, throw on a sundress/pearls/seersucker suit/bowtie, perform legitimate grooming, hike up to the ruins in time to throw your hand around a plastic frat cup of Jack Daniels before the football game started, ignore the start of the football game, continue to drink Jack Daniels and then go back to the dorm to sleep.  Very. Tough. Stuff.  

I didn't expect such fanciness outside of the South, but I sort of figured that those Crimson kids and Bulldogs would put themselves through similar rigors and dust off the ole sport coats for The Game.  A few of 'em did - but mainly the Yalies. I've always had a particular affinity for Harvard - I went to summer school there and they have the world's best letter emblazoned on everything, but while Harvard ended up winning the game (in the last seconds), Yale won for style (and binge drinking talent).  Photo evidence follows:

Wahoo!

Cornhole - The Other Game of the day

Our friend Caitlin bonds with a new friend over their love of circle sunglasses...

...more of the Other Game...

We made him show off his duck boots...

(Photos by Porter Hovey)

The Mad Men Verdict Is In!

Yep. That little photo of her in a Jackie do, smokin' away on the steps of the Williamsburgh Savings Bank with a pram full of blankets and ciggies did the job.  She won Banana Republic's Mad Men Casting Call and will have a little walk on role in an episode during season 4!  Thank you - sincerely - to all of you who voted and voted and campaigned for her.   Hello, Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce!  So exciting!!!

Check out her interview on the AMC Mad Men Blog.

Auctions | War + Peace

The folks over at The Magazine Antiques kindly asked me to guest blog this week, highlighting some of my favorite pieces that will hitting the auction block in the coming days.  Per usual, the result was utterly feminine and sweet.  In the end, I went with a Militaria-meets-Martinis theme - an apartment full of furnishings for a man who fights as hard as he drinks.  Not sure if a true alpha male fighter type would spend time drooling over Lalanne elephant candlesticks, but hey, they do look great.

Disptach from London/Royal Tunbridge Wells | Addiction Illustrated

Libras tend the be very aesthetically driven and being a very aesthetically-driven libra myself, I've always used this as a great excuse to continue my collections.  The need to surround myself with items of beauty is not greed or gluttony, it's simply what the stars had carved out for me.  The sun and the moon aligned in such a way that rabid pith helmet and velvet slipper consumption became my destiny.  My friend Steve, another libra, was born to live out a similar, yet much more pricey prophecy in London.  He simply cannot stop buying beautiful vintage sports cars.  He just added two to his collection, including this little all original 1970 XKE S2 Jag which he will use to drive himself to the Goodwood Revival. It's a hard life, Sven. Very hard.

(Get a load of that gear shift! My god. And the wooden steering wheel...and the perfect leather, etc. etc.).

Prague Acquisitions | 1950s Czech Hunting Book

We found this wonderful 1950s Czech hunting book in the little used book shop where we picked up the falcon school chart below.  It opens to the map above, detailing where native game could be found through the former Czechoslovakia, followed by countless photos of those species, humans hunting those species, and then humans filling their homes and bellies with them, as well.

Well Hung | Walton Ford at Paul Kasmin

For even fancier, larger "school charts," pop to Paul Kasmin for the opening of Walton Ford's new show tonight (runs until December 23).

(Last night at the show, my friend introduced me to Artforum publisher Knight Landesman who in turn introduced me to...Walton Ford!  We chatted taxidermy.  He doesn't have any.  But that's ok, because the Museum of Natural History lets him come in and sketch from the archives, he said.  Of course!  The show was pretty incredible. If you haven't seen Ford's paintings in real life, you must.  They're absolutely epic wall-sized beauties).

     

(The Royal Managerie at the Tower of London - 3 December, 1830, 2009)

Paul Kasmin Gallery

293 Tenth Avenue (at 27th Street)

Prague Acquisitions | School Chart

We found this great old school chart from 1910 at a cute little used book shop across from our hotel in Andel.

A Break from Bohemia | Dressin' Like it's 1890

Today's NY Times shows the gents how Alexander McQueen, Ann Demeulemeester, Woolrich Woolen Mills and the like can help them dress like they did 120 years ago - all in tintypes by David Sokosh.  So cool.

(Note: As much as I go on about my love of men's boots, they are an accessory most certainly only meant for their original purposes - hunting, mucking, riding - not urban prowling or marching through the office. About a year ago, I saw a a gent exit Ralph Lauren corporate HQ on Madison Ave. in virtually that exact outfit from the top photo. It was quite a beautiful costume, but a costume, nonetheless. That said, I think we ladies can get away with modified versions of it all. We're lucky that way).

Prague Acquisitions | 1940s Boys' Magazines

Throughout our lives, our parents waged an ongoing battle:  mom's love of buying and saving magazines vs. dad's love of throwing away magazines.  While on their honeymoon in Paris, mom stocked up on French mags (so much cheaper there!), dad became enraged and those newlyweds nearly severed the union a week in.  

Porter and I inherited our mom's magazine lust and have expanded the fetish into all printed matter.  And for vintage printed matter, Prague was nearly orgasmic.  Wonderful little used book shops are scattered all over town and we found treasures in each and every one we investigated.  Military themes and deco/Bauhaus fonts galore.

We picked up these great looking, politically incorrectish magazine/pamphlety things from 1947.  They seem to be a Czech version of something like Boys Life, with little DIY tips, news of the day and comics.  Interestingly the cover image above was one of many, many items about Native Americans we came across.  Must've been quite a hot topic back in the day.

These comic strips appeared on the back covers...

Prague/Berlin | ShakeIt Photo Evidence Pt. I

Taps at Cafe Indigo...

Where Istanbul was a trip in which we photographed each other in profile in front of fancy buildings, this trip was one in which we photographed each other staring off into the distance while wearing 1,345 different accessories.  In this case, it's a British wool striped bobcap from J.Press. I wore a Swedish military Elmer Fudd hat much of the time, as well...

Porter in a beret I found online from some European army surplus shop...

This little Anastasia Romanoff-ish jacket is from (shhhh!) Forever 21!

Devon + Dorset Regiment schoolboy scarf from J.Press...

Cafe Indigo

A crazy eyebrow at Lokal...

In Prague, they don't just do cobblestones, they do colored, beautifully patterned cobble stones...

Looking atomic energy in the face at the National Gallery's Collection of Modern and Contemporary Art...

Prague/Berlin | ShakeIt Photo Evidence Pt. II

A stack of books at the library... (actually Matej Kren's amazing Idiom at the library)...

The shabby view from the Russian Embassy...(Port's leather tote is from those wonderful Bray Brothers at BillyKirk).

Wavy ships at the National Gallery's Collection of Modern and Contemporary Art in the functionalist Veletržní palác.

Cukrkavalimonada

The barman at Olympia...

J.Crew schoolboy blazer and Hamilton 1883 shirt at Cukrkavalimonada...

Cafe Indigo

Early Christmas...

Gratuitous glamour shot from the roof of the Dancing House after lunch at Celeste... (my sweater's from the boy/man side at Rugby, though it's not on the website right now).

Wall of booze at Lokal...

Cafe Indigo

Fonts at the library...

More from the National Gallery...

Existential dilemmas at Olympia...

Windmills on the way to Berlin.

Prague/Berlin | Photo Evidence Pt. I

We're back! Prague was extraordinary for junk shops, out of this world beauty, carbo loading, jaw droppingly cheap beer (a component of the carbo loading), an exchange rate that nearly had us doing cartwheels and weather that was very fittingly Eastern European... 

 

Porter, on the lookout from the road up to Prague Castle...

Fueling up at Paul, the cute French bakery chain around the corner from our hotel in Andel.

Port in Mala Strana...

The Czechs do good fonts...

Maturity at the great Museum Kampa...

That pirate's dagger could probably come in handy - the cops warned us that this was certainly the wrong side of the tracks, an area to be avoided by all except French speaking children...

 

On the Charles Bridge...

At Lokal, which became just that.  Those head-sized pilsners cost $1.50. (Can't find a link online, but it's right next door to the Traveller's Hostel near the Old Town Square)

On the Charles Bridge...

Leaving Prague Castle...

Early arrival at the National Theater for opening night of the Nutcracker.

(Besides Lokal and the wonderful Cukrkavalimonada, Prague's restaurants tended to be a little dated or touristy - like a sea of choices in which people had gone nuts sponge painting walls to add texture and then added bad chairs - so we opted to head to Berlin for a quick little jaunt on Thursday (more on that in the following post)...

Prague/Berlin | Photo Evidence Pt. II

Old Town Square...

Mala Strana, right off the Charles Bridge...

At St. Vitus Cathedral at Prague Castle...

Cinnamon hot chocolate and cappuccino at Cukrkavalimonada. 

Muching trdelnik in Old Town Square on the final day...

OFF TO BERLIN | Aw, the lovely, crack-of-dawn train ride through the Czech countryside to Berlin. 

Tram riding through the former East Berlin. The Wall fell 20 years ago Monday.

We were so proud of ourselves for making it out of the hotel by 5 a.m. that we forgot to look at the return schedule until 5:54 p.m.  The last train left at 5:55.  Oops.  This captures the state of things - and the 30-degree temps - around midnight.  But luckily Berliners need much less sleep than New Yorkers and we stumbled upon the totally cool, Dan Graham-designed Cafe Bravo at the KW Institute of Contemporary Art in Mitte where we drank gin drinks with basil. Completely fun.

And We're Off...

Ok, folks. We're off to the airport. Will try my best to do some periodic posts of Prague while we're there, but stay tuned to photos galore upon our return! Hope everyone had a happy Halloween!

The Windmill Movie

Alexander Olch makes smart ties - and has made one absolutely brilliant film.  The Windmill Movie - his beautiful documentary about his mentor and Harvard film professor, Richard P. Rogers - premiered on HBO last night.  Dick, as he was called, died from metastatic melanoma in 2001 and left behind over 200 hours of film, including hours and hours of footage of his wealthy, preppy family frolicking on Hamptons beaches, drinking by a windmill and playing tennis.  He spent decades trying to tell his family's - and his - story honestly through his own eyes and words, but it took Alex, and the distance he had from it, to finish it.  The first part is told by Dick through journal entries, but those stopped in the '70s, so Alex seamlessly filled in the rest.  In the process, we get into the soul of the man.

It's about WASP dysfunction, WASP guilt for complaining about dysfunction; a film maker's artistic struggle to be honest about his own story, another film maker's struggle to be honest about someone else's; relationships with women, be they mothers or lovers; and how grappling with the concept of immortality can be harder than realizing one's own mortality.  It's really, really good.  Dick would be proud.

(Also -- last night's reception was totally fun with sickeningly good food from BONDST.  Metropolitan/Last Days of Disco/Barcelona Writer-Director Whit Stillman was in the crowd, along with the adorable designer Erin Fetherston and Gosford Park's Bob Balaban among countless others).

Alex said that it will be available on demand for the next month or so and that HBO will be replaying it around the holidays.  You must watch!

Justification for Gluttony

If your significant other ever starts to complain that you don't need one more #@#$$%&*^$# [insert fetish object/collectible here], just show him/her this photo of the weapons cabinet in the Arsenal Museum of the Zlatoust plant and they'll have to acquiesce. 

Another doozie from the Prokudin-Gorskii Collection.

Photography Tsar

Much like French financier Albert Kahn, Tsar Nicholas II was keen on capturing native peoples and places in color.  So, on the eve of the first world war and the Russian Revolution, photographer Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii talked Nicholas into backing his plan to capture the Russian Empire on digichrome glass plates. Between 1909-1912, and again in 1915, he completed surveys of eleven regions, traveling in a specially equipped railroad car provided by the Ministry of Transportation. The entire survey is available through the Library of Congress.  Above: an interior shot of the Borodino War and History Museum outside Moscow.

For more examples of the Albert Kahn collection, check out the recent posts at Ancient Industries.

And for a taste of modern Russia, check out my cousin Thomas flipping pancakes and speaking Russian in Petrozavodsk during his study abroad break from Oxford last year (the video only works on PCs).  

Austrian POWs

An elderly Tajik man in an area that is modern Uzbekistan today

Russian settlers in the borderlands of Southern Russia near the Caucuses and the Caspian Sea

A guard in traditional Russian garb monitors five inmates stuffed into a zindan, a traditional Central Asian prison

A Dagestani couple in the Caucuses 

A tea weighing station

Camp 1912

A Bashkir switch operator poses by the mainline of the railroad, near the town of Ust' Katav on the Yuryuzan River between Ufa and Cheliabinsk in the Ural Mountain region of European Russia.

Interior of a Uzbekistani textile mill ~1915

School House Rocks

P.S.1 opened up its fall exhibitions yesterday, which were quite cool, but regardless of what hangs on the walls, it's always so fun to pop over to Long Island City just go and see, well, the walls...and the old wooden floors and school house lamps and linoleum tiles...

This video installation, part of the 1969 exhibit, flashed over a record-covered floor by Christian Marclay.  (A very, very aggressive guard had yelled at me for iPhone photoing, so I had to attempt more stealthy techniques as we progressed through the museum.  With this one, I tried so hard to sneak the photo that I ran out before actually looking to see who made these films.  Art appreciation at its finest).  

MOS' Afterparty - sort of like running around under a Wild Thing...

Inside Leandro Erlich's totally amazing Swimming Pool...

Ebay Shopping: Mid 19th C. Brass Sailor Belt

I don't even think this needs introduction.  It's totally @#$%^&* wonderful.  Bids sit at £14.99 with nine days to go.  Good luck!!!

The Thames in Gasparcolor

One of the great selections from the BFI Archive shot in 1935 using Gasparcolor, a color film system used primarily for animation in the '30s and '40s....and here for making ship yard scenes look like picture postcards.

My Weekend, In a Painting

I spent a good part of Sunday sitting on my zebra skin rug, completely bundled, yet frozen to the bone, trying to paint and conceptualize a series of images that would eventually fold into a log cabin. Half way to completion, I became horrified with the realization that the end product would be a whopping 1.5 inches high - and ultimately, a failure. Hernan Bas must have had a blurry vision of this about five years back.

I've added him and a few other completely on-the-radar artists to my Artists to Adore sidebar.

Hernan Bas, Posing With Antlers in 100 Year Old (Haunted) Cabin, 2004, Mixed Media on Board, 79 x 61cm, Saatchi Gallery

Map Quest: Boetti's Planisfero Politico at Sotheby's

Alighiero Boetti’s 1969 work, Planisfero Politico, goes on the block tomorrow as part of Sotheby’s London’s 20th Century Italian Art Sale (Lot 24). The following statements will be like a swift kick to the stomach of modern art lovers – but I wish my grade school art (or geography) teachers would’ve used Boetti as inspiration for a few mapping projects. Countries! Flags! The resulting projects would have made our parents so proud, without the £220,000 to £260,000 investment.

Polo: The Nomadic Tribe

Assouline is making it very difficult to avoid coffee table book splurges this fall.  Besides the wonderful look into the post-fire Deyrolle, they're taking us on a worldwide tour of Polo love in Polo: The Nomadic Tribe, the beautiful new book from photographer Aline Coquelle.  Here we get a peek of the sport of kings in Morocco.

Polo: The Nomadic Tribe, $120 from Assouline

Boots in Dubai

Dubai

Mongolia

Pakistan

Snowy polo in the Alps

Legs and spurs in Argentina

Elephant polo in India

Hamilton Shirts, Ready to Wear after 125 Years

Hamilton, Houston's - and America's - oldest custom shirt maker, launches its first ready-to-wear line today.  To help show off these luxurious, yet slightly more down to earth duds, they enlisted a few accessory (and fine shirt)-lovin' bloggers.  That's me in the corner making Coco "take off one thing before you leave the house" Chanel crazy in my driving gloves, bracelets, ascot AND pith helmet.  ACL's Michael Williams, All Plaid Out's Max Wastler...and fellow Nebraskan Paul Underwood (formerly men.style.com and now Urban Daddy) are in there, too. So fun!

ShakeIt Street Fashion | Biker Jacket

Porter and I have been rabidly searching for appropriate outerwear for our Prague trip.  I was coming up short, so I stole her vintage bomber jacket and we set out to find her something new in the biker/aviator realm.  After ample due diligence across all non-gut-wrenching-price point stores, we found this baby at...(shhhhhh) American Eagle.  The leather, which is soft and supple as can be, actually came much lighter than this, but after a few coats of brown Kiwi shoe polish, it's looking almost Earhart-esque.  The glasses were $10 on the street.

(I realize it's not really street fashion when you take a photo of your sister/roommate sitting in a cafe, but go with it).

A Phoenix Rises: 1000º: Deyrolle

Photographer Laurent Bochet has extraordinarily captured the terrible aftermath of the February 2008 fire at Paris’ most beloved cabinet de curiosités, Deyrolle.  The resulting book, 1000º: Deyrolle: Deyrolle from Assouline commemorates the official reopening in September.  While worse for wear, these animals and specimens get to be immortal twice.  

 1000º: Deyrolle, $160 at Assouline

All images © Laurent Bouchet and Assouline

ShakeIt Street Fashion | Sweaters, Elbow Pads and Fair Isle

A microscopic burst of street photography on Lexington Ave. after downloading the ShakeIt fake polaroid app on my iPhone. 

This guy had excellent elbow pads on his tennis sweater...

And Porter picked this fair isle dress up at the thrift store in our building for $20.

Spring Break!

Ethnic perfection from (L to R) Carolina Herrera, Fendi, Paul Smith (who whipped up my favorite show of SS10 with his homage to the Gentleman of the Bakongo, those brilliantly dressed Congolese dandies), Roksanda Illincic, Dries Van Noten and Isaac Misrahi.  It's worth booking your trip to Cape Town (or any number of exotic locales) just so you have an excuse to buy the clothes.

Designers also haven't forgotten those who enjoy traveling to more austere urban locales (ahem, Prague!!): (L to R) Aquilano Rimondi, Balmain, Dennis Basso, Loewe, Balmain, Costume National, Burberry Prorsum

(All images from Style.com)

Tunes | Noah and the Whale's 5 Years Time

The other day, some cruel soul in Manchester stole Noah and the Whale's trailer.  These four adorable folky, Wes Anderson/Noah Baumbach-loving Brit boys are now short six electric guitars, one electric keyboard, a drum-kit and a phenomenally long list of other items. Give it back!

HHH Shopping Guide | Posting Pink

{1} La Perla Cocoon Lace Triangle Bra, Net-a-Porter, $255

{2} Carine Gilson Chantilly Lace Bra, Net-a-Porter, $290

{3} Beckham Bra by VPL, La Garçonne, $75

{4} Pintuck Balcony Silk Bra, TopShop, £16

{5} Dolce & Gabbana Leopard-print balconette Bra, on sale at The Out Net, $80

* * *

Some people really enjoy giving 'em a feel, and we ladies NEED to give 'em a feel.  Do you self exams and get your mammograms! Save your boobs and save yourselves - so we can all keep the overly priced (yet wonderfully indulgent) luxury bra industry in business 'til the end of time.  

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Talk to your doctor to make sure you are doing all you can to detect breast cancer as early as possible. Early detection greatly increases your chances of surviving breast cancer. While you are at it, forward this to your best friend or wife or sister to make sure she is doing the same. For more information on screening, treatment and donating please contact the National Cancer Institute and the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

Savile Row on Lexington Ave.

Attention New York men!  (Oh, the things one could say after that exclamation...).  If it's been awhile since you've had a chance to pop to Londontown for Savile Row treats, Savile Row has come to you for the next three days.  Norton & Sons' head cutter David Ward and shirtmaker Stephen Lachter will be seeing clients at the Affinia Hotel at 50th and Lex from Oct. 1-3.  Click here for more info and to make an appointment.  If the shirts are good enough for Old Blue Eyes, they're good enough for you. 

A Cautionary Tale from Johnny Bond

Kids, this is what happens when a guy meets up with a gal at a tavern. Listen and learn.

(This one's for you, LK)

An East River Runs Through It

For the guys (or gals) who don't have friends with cars or money for zip cars to take them to places where trees and naturey bits line the water's edge, they can risk hepatitis and cast a line into the East River to hopefully pull out a prize-winning dinner.  The 1st Annual Brooklyn Fishing Derby begins Thursday from the shores of Red Hook all the way to Long Island City.  Sign up at the opening party at Dream Fishing Tackle 673 Manhattan Ave in Greenpoint from 6pm-9pm on Thursday.

Mocc Trial

Native Americans - and in many ways, probably all soldiers from pre-guerrilla times - went to battle in grand costumes not because they wanted to show off for their enemies, but because they wanted to show off for god. If they died that fateful day, at least they'd be dressed to meet their maker.

One could use a similar philosophy to justify spending $500 for house slippers.  Dress up for yourself, dress up for God.  You never know when accidents are going to happen.

Custom Choctaw moccasins from Native American Eagle River, $492.

Little Giants, the Wall and the Deep Sea Diver

The incredible puppeteers from Royal de Luxe in Nantes take over the streets of Berlin on Oct. 1 to depict the city's reunification on the 20th Anniversary of the fall of the wall.  

Berlin, in the eyes of writer/director Jean Luc Courcoult, was once a swamp inhabited by giants.  One Little Giantess lived with her uncle, the Big Giant, who gave her a boat which she loved to sail.  But one day, sea monsters rose up and tore the city apart and then built a wall, separating the Little Giantess from her uncle.  

Furious, the Big Giant throws himself into the river and spends his days in search of a hidden geyser on the ocean floor.  After years, he found one and dragged it beneath that wall.  The geyser exploded, and with it, that wall...bringing him back together with his niece.

The puppets marched through Nantes in June before their big trip to Germany. 

(All images courtesy Royal de Luxe)

What a Difference a Soap Dish Makes

Going to Home Depot with no particular purpose is like going grocery shopping while ravenous.  Oh, I should pick up some Miracle Grow and dish soap...maybe some tile cleaner...wow, sparkling clean tiles would really look much better with this new faucet...and a white door...with green trim...and a new door knob.  

The door got its treatment the moment I arrived home on June 14...and then came the faucet.  It all seemed so simple -- if the old one would only come off.  Brute force, WD-40, AK-47s wouldn't loosen those plastic nuts holding it in place.   So, I re-hooked the water supply to the old faucet, claiming defeat.  No water.  Greater defeat!  So, instead of doing the recommended thing (calling a plumber), we've been using only hot water from the new chrome version, which flopped, jerry-rigged and forsaken on the left side of the sink for the past three months.  Until Saturday.  Perhaps it was the change of weather or just the cumulative effects of all the brute force, but the nuts popped off and opened the door to bathroom heaven.

Now the chrome/ceramic faucet is in place, spouting hot AND cold water.  It's joined by a soap dish and towel hook from Moon River Chattel, offering my hemp hand towels (also from Moon River Chattel) a nice home from which to hang.

Acquisitions | Peal & Co. Ankle Boots

During college, I interned for CNBC's show Power Lunch.  Some little internship angel must've been floating over me because while all the other non-paid plebes were stuck in Fort Lee, NJ running around with tapes for the whole summer (I did that, too), I got to:

- Field produce a segment at Le Cirque (and eat a meal in a special "viewing booth" right in the kitchen)

- Attend the MLB All-Star Game at Fenway (we did a special edition broadcast from the stadium on the business of baseball and a producer and I were tasked with asking all the players their investing advice -- Ken Griffey, Jr. told us that his mom makes those decisions)

- See hundreds of computer geniuses attack a veritable king of computer geniuses.

For the latter, we were doing a live show from one of the tech conventions at the Javitz Center.  As host Bill Griffith was interviewing Michael Dell, I was told to start handing out free CNBC tee shirts.  Free things at conventions make men (and women) act like wild animals on meth amphetamine.  Michael Dell finishes his interview and receives a tee shirt from one of the producers, just as the supply for the masses has run out.  So, instead of going on their way, the masses turn on Michel Dell and start grabbing for his.  He pulled his shirt back and walked away.

If you want to witness a slightly more polite and refined version of this, head to the top floor of Brooks Brothers at 44th and Madison for the men's 70% off sale.  There's some incredibly beautiful stuff -- including these Peal & Co. boots ($200!).  I also picked up some Peal & Co. brown and white spectators ($150!) to wear with jeans next spring. The prices online aren't nearly as good.

Go to (Stump)town

Those great Stumptown coffee roastin' guys from Portland opened up shop right off the lobby of New York's beautiful Ace Hotel earlier this month.  Porter and I got to tour the hotel and the still-under-construction Stumptown space a few weeks back...before the marble and all the tchotchkes (which Erie Basin owner Russell Whitmore helped pick out).  It's great lookin'...and the java's amazing.  Be sure to check out The New York Times' review.

(Details on Porter's outfit: Her new, beloved leather tote from the wonderful Bray brothers at BillyKirk; Anthropologie turtleneck, YSL belt, Ralph Lauren cowboy skirt (mine from 7th grade), Jil Sander flats). 

Wednesday Morning Cartoons

Some amazing phenakistoscope GIF animation action via Morbid Anatomy. Ah, how amazing what high tech can do to low tech. (I can't figure out how to make it "blog sized"!)

As Seen on Fifth Ave...

Wolf men at Prada...

Mechanics lights at Anthropologie, $148 for various cage sizes

A grey, Ralph Lauren knock off bomber at Zara for something around $450 (a little steep considering the quality of the faux fur, but it does look great).  

A Still Life, Toby Mcfarlan Pond

Toby McFarlan Pond, an Englishman who shoots perfect Dutch-inspired still lives.  (It's a rainy Friday, not a day meant for complete sentences).

 

These bottom three illustrate The State of Luxury (things aren't so good) in the new issue of the always beautiful WSJ. magazine.

(All images by Toby McFarlan Pond)

Sneak Peek: Against Nature

A first look at my friend and co-New Antiquarian Ryan Matthew's beautiful new Victorian-inspired men's suit/accessory/denim shop, Against Nature.  He picked up these incredible albino peacocks (there's actually a pair) from the same guy who sold me my two fighting swans.

  

A selection of Ryan's baubles.

Various Ryan Matthew bags and totes, the latter of which are made from old mail bags and vintage braided leather belts.

More Ryan Matthew bags and a peek into the dressing room.

Ready-to-wear suits from the Doyle Mueser line from co-owners Amber Doyle and Jake Mueser.  They also offer bespoke services.

A Beauchene baboon skull, disarticulated and mounted by Ryan.

Against Nature

159 Chrystie Street (Between Rivington and Delancey)

Opens to the public on Friday

Photos by Porter Hovey

Gettin' Jai Alai

These high school gals certainly approached the "fastest sport in the world" with unbridled ferocity.  It's quite exhausting even looking at the pictures. Perhaps these are what inspired ole Ho Ho to give his inheritance to Sterling Cooper.

Images by the great Loomis Dean for LIFE Magazine, March 3, 1950

Tunes | Cigarettes et Whiskey

Actress and singer Baroness Léonia Cooreman (aka Annie Cordy) covers the Sons of the Pioneers' 1940s country classic, Cigarettes and Whusky, in French in the early '60s with crazy, crazy eyes.

Well Hung | Charlie Roberts at Richard Heller Gallery

Charlie Roberts seems to love charts, albeit, teeny tiny charts that visually play out stories and themes for the closest of observers.  300 of these little drawings, including this relatively large, scrap book-ier one (8.25" x 8.25"), will go up at Richard Heller Gallery on Saturday, September 5.

Richard Heller Gallery

2525 Michigan Ave. B-5A

Santa Monica, California

310-435-9191

Tunes | No One Does It Like You

Great song, insanely cool video directed by artist Marcel Dzama and Patrick Daughters.

Clubbing Downtown

On Saturday, our sweet, dear friends Joanna "Cup of Joe" Goddard and Alex "Sunday Styles" Williams tied the knot in one of New York's most spectacular venues - the Downtown Association building at 60 Pine Street.  Joanna, a mere slip of a gal, wore an off-white J.Crew halter, which looked wildly perfect with her ballerina body and side bun.  Alex wore a navy double-vented suit with his now trademark beard and glasses.  Her English uncle Hamish officiated the ceremony, which included a great '60s soundtrack, making it all seem like a scene plucked from a Working Title Films romantic comedy.  We spent the cocktail hour in the incredible Reading Room, which makes me want wood paneling in my apartment so badly I could cry (and don't even get me started on that ceiling!)

Porter has assisted photographers at a bazillion New York weddings; this is her favorite venue, hands down.

Porter befriended this guy who guards the fourth floor game room.

Films | The Circumnavigators Pt. 2

While the Germans are paying film homage to Fräulein Stinnes and her car, we Americans get to watch Hillary Swank fatefully try to circumnavigate in a plane.  The Mira Nair-directed Amelia also stars Richard Gere and Ewan McGregor and opens in the U.S. on October 23.