eames house blocks

There are a lot of toys perched on high around the house and in my studio, the majority of which are off limits to little people. Cruel, I know. If only there were a happy marriage between horrendous kid-approved stuff and my precious vintage treasures...

Enter the newly released Eames House Blocks by the marvelous folks at House Industries. With this set's cool design and solid construction, we may just have stumbled upon a thing of beauty that's actually built to survive drooling and chewing. Happy days are here again.

While the price ($175) isn't exactly cheap, I think I may just make an executive decision and bypass the purchasing committee on this one. After all, as Charles himself said, "toys are not really as innocent as they look. Toys and games are the preludes to serious ideas."

hello, elloh!

I have a sort of love-hate relationship with Etsy. So many knock-offs of other people's original designs and hundreds upon hundreds of cookie-cutter versions of cutesy, fadish, here-today, forgotten-tomorrow stuff made from the same tired patterns and fabrics. If you have the patience though to sort through the crafty crap, there are some real original gems to be found.

Case in point the marvelous drawings by elloh (aka ellen lohse) paying tribute to an eclectic assortment of pop culture, literary and cinematic favourites from yesterday to today.

Just arrived in my mailbox this week is this sweet homage to two of my most favouritest people - Charles and Ray Eames.












There's so many wonderful prints to choose from, it was hard to pick just a few to show you. Check out her etsy shop for other gems including odes to Flight of the Conchords, the A Team, various Hitchcock movies, Willy Wonka, the Darjeeling Limited, Mary Tyler Moore, To Kill a Mockingbird and on and on.



Don Draper AND Han Solo!!!



Nobody puts baby in a corner!


Breakfast at Tiffanys

calling all pacific pallisades grannies

Wherever I travel, be it through the physical or cyber world, I'm always on the lookout for certain hard-to-find vintage treasures. Up til now I've had some great luck tracking down or stumbling upon many of these coveted design items but there is one that continues to elude me. The Revell dollhouse designed by Charles and Ray Eames in 1959 complete with eames furniture. In what may be the single greatest miniature tragedy of our time, the house never made it past the R&D phase though there are rumoured to be prototypes floating around out there. The thought of it keeps me up nights.













I did inquire at the Eames Office when we visited a year or so ago, but they claimed to be equally in the dark. Where's a pacific pallisades Granny/former industrial designer with forgetful tendencies and a large attic when I need one?