arttarte's Profile

Love it, though I'd probably want a slightly more orderly pattern than the one pictured above. I can understand why others might consider it hazardous because of snow or mosquito breeding, but luckily those are two rare occurances in Oregon (unless you get a weird winter, but the bugs at least are sprayed for yearly).

I enjoyed the article (and his dorm room) quite a lot, but I couldn't help but think that he reads like some Wes Anderson character come to life (down to the "melon" colored trousers), he almost seems too coiffed and caricatured to be real.

I'd say your title question, "do supermarkets offer the best choice?" can be met with a corollary, "do wine shops/alcohol-specific retailers offer the best choice?" In both cases, the answer is no, it's highly dependent on where you are and what the general market environment is like.

Like a commenter above, I too moved from a place where you could get wine in a grocery store (Portland, Oregon) to Minneapolis, where it was a shock to not be able to buy wine and beer along with my dinner ingredients, and to (*sob*) not be able to run out on a moment's notice to grab a bottle of something if it's Sunday.

However, I always felt like Portland showed how large retailers could have wine/beer for sale, while small specialty shops thrived and remained competitive. It wasn't just because big grocers weren't stocking anything drinkable so wine shops would pick up the slack, in fact, I've had fabulous experiences with wine stewards at stores like Fred Meyer that would carry a nice depth and breadth of selection at decent prices.

And for every store like that, there's another of the same size that carries cases of loss-leading plonk. Of course, for every awesome super-knowledgeable well-stocked independent wine merchant, there are ones where you question how they remain in business. It's a spectrum, always.

Would supermarkets and wine shops be able to coexist in other markets? It's hard to say, but it seems like up and down the West Coast no one is complaining, merchants or customers. Personally, now that I am going without the ability to choose where I'm going to buy my wine (unless it's between the liquor store down the street or the specialty wine shop 8 miles away), it makes me appreciate having had the freedom to buy it virtually anywhere before.

I dislike how quickly many are to point out that it's a computer-manipulated photograph. So what if it's been Photoshopped? It's not as though the artist simply cut and pasted one pose to collage together an image. The model had to be photographed in very precise poses and then those pieces had to be carefully stitched together in post-production to give the illusion that it's one complete photo. The work is flawless in that regard, because it truly gives the impression of many people making up the furniture. Beyond that, the other technical aspects of the photos are great, and the subject matter is provocative and (dare I say it?) downright cheeky.

ChristopherB is spot on about current prices vs. what they were in the actual mid-century, even adjusted for inflation. My mother and my aunt bought my grandparents a Harry Bertoia Bird chair (with ottoman) in 1968 for $90. If you use the government's own inflation calculator, $90 in 1968 would mean roughly $550 in today's dollars. Certainly not the $3,000 price tag it fetches in stores like Hive.

Oh blah blah blah. I got my shih tzu from the shelter and he happened to be purebred. Dogs with fancy pedigrees do end up being left homeless, too.

While I'm not complaining too much as a fan of dogs, and Obama, I do feel like there could have been at least some attempt to make this post design/home related. As someone with a pet, I agree that a dog can make a house a home, but this reads much like a general news article that I saw pop up on a number of sites today. I'd have appreciated some links to previous posts about pet home design (there should be lots, September was dedicated to the topic!)

Haha, I love how some people apparently didn't read her write-up about how she has a sleeper sofa.

What a fabulous job making such a small apartment seem spacious! I like the idea of a sleeper sofa since I have a studio of similar dimensions and my queen sized bed dominates the whole thing. A necessary evil, unfortunately, because it's a special mattress.

A definite thumbs up for you!

Hi Seshat, thanks for breaking the ice!

I followed along with the last Fall Cure, and then my boyfriend so kindly got me the book for Christmas so I was all amped up to do it this time around...but already kind of feel like I'm failing! Week One is coming to a close and I haven't done much except for read the chapter. I work two jobs (a day job and a freelance art gig) and was finishing up my taxes this week, so my itty bitty studio still looks like a whirlwind of junk. It's not a great excuse, but already I'm finding it hard to budget my time appropriately and hope I can start turning things around.
I realize that instead of posting here I should probably take this time to get to work, right? Heh :)

cassiopia-

check out the Chop meat counter at City Market (735 NW 21st Ave). It used to be the old Viande Meats outpost-- but it sounds like they'll be opening a new location where the Laurelhurst Market (3155 E Burnside) used to be come spring, so keep your eye out for that if you're on the eastside.

I think a big part of it is being selective about the bandwagon styles. Trends come and go and inevitably come back again, so a few pieces integrated into the whole work well.

I like a lot of Orla Kiely's Target line because it reminds me a whole lot of the mid-century designs from Finland (Marimekko, Arabia/Finel) that I already have in my home thanks to my lovely design-forward mom who worked for a Scandinavian home boutique in the early 70's. So the Orla pear motif canister looks perfectly suited to sit on the counter with my Finel mushroom pattern bowl without appearing too trendy.

As long as you don't oversaturate your whole home with flavor-of-the-week design stuff, and buy what you like because you intend on keeping it for awhle, I don't see any problem in finding styles attractive that lots of other people do, too.