The Catalog Tales of Gary and Elaine

Gary, I can tell you’re chewing something and I told you the mossballs are for our guests!

A friend has lent his support to my latest initiative with a list of web suggestions that will take hours or perhaps days to get through, but he singled this one out and I couldn't work out why from it's rather unassuming title of Catalog Living.  If you require explanation in order to coerce you to follow the link, expect captions that reveal the motivations of the fictional characters (Gary and Elaine) that allegedly inhabit the constructed worlds of interior design catalogues.

File this one under 'keep here for safe keeping'.

Turning Passing The Time Into A Career

I have been tempted during my recent sojourns into the world wide web of international design to start a new blog that could be singularly devoted to the worship of 'things'.  It would not be the first of it's kind by any means (I strongly recommend this one, and this one, and this one), but it would give me the chance to share with you some of the things that have been making my heart skip a beat in the wee hours of the many a recent morning.  For now, my discoveries are dutifully recorded in an Excel spreadsheet, but hopefully, before too long Materialist Australia will be a fully functioning retail store, and with it a companion blog to release those discoveries from their monochromatic temporary home into a technicolour wishlist.  I might even invite people to vote for what they want me to import... or at least invite them to comment on my impeccable taste in 'things'.

But this one couldn't wait.  I suspect it will never be viable to import them, but aren't these rings simply smashing?  Made from the pages of [your favourite book], set in resin and polished to a high gloss finish, these rings take literary nerditude to a whole new level. 

Make mine The Faraway Tree, thanks.  Or perhaps Catch 22... because I would love to walk around with my finger wrapped in an enigma wrapped in absurdity.

Web Gadget to End All Web Gadget

A Little Junkie Chic For Your Neck

I just stumbled across this website/online store. Aside from being a cool artisan slash designer 'enterprise' (sound familiar?), Wire and Twine sell scarves made... by hand... by KELLEY DEAL!

I heard an interview with this lesser-loved Deal once in which she described her life as full time carer for her aged mother. When I see these objet d'craft, I can't help but imagine a drug-ravaged, but still pretty rock star busily handcrafting her way through mid-life in an attempt to escape the daily grind of administering sponge baths and mashing vegetables. Then again, maybe it's a rehab thing.

Anyway, there are only three left, and I suspect they are the last three for a reason, but owning one would be like owning your own bespoke little piece of rock memorabilia.

Here's A Cool Thing... Eames House

I think I'm going to need one of these... I just wish it was a dollhouse and then I could waste hours sourcing miniature Eames furniture and staging beat poetry evenings with lego people sipping Fimo soy lattes.  I could probably make cravats too.