The Towel and The Shower: We Need Them Both

As a new Mom I now cherish the time I have to take a shower. I can't imagine not being able to enjoy these quick few minutes every day (OK, usually every day) but for a long time showers didn't exist.

Here is one of the earliest showers from the early 1800s that worked by dumping the same bucket of water over you again and again. I'd probably prefer the even earlier version of the shower, which was to find a waterfall, to this, but innovation has to start somewhere. (see left)

By the mid 1850s when plumbing started to move into houses the shower got closer to what we recognize as a typical shower. (see right)



One factor of the shower that makes it really good is the towel. You can't beat wrapping yourself up in a super soft cuddly towel after a hot shower as an inexpensive way to treat yourself to a little self indulgence. Well, you can beat it if you have a right-from-the-dryer-warm towel, but who has the extra time for that too?

In honor of showers and cuddly towels I offer you my choice in towels, which are from Restoration Hardware. Now, I have to admit part of this selection is also the colors that Restoration Hardware offers. They are subtle but still colorful and add a little life into any bathroom. Getting new towels is also cheaper than a bathroom renovation I might add when you're getting sick of the same old look. Even if you don't go for a color, the classic white towel always has it's place too.

Restoration Hardware towels in color Juniper

A cool bathroom but it could use some color

Classic white

Neutral towels do the trick to keep this bathroom's colors warm

Slate blue - my favorite

Just a little towel can do the trick

A light gray is just off the classic white

Now I kinda want to get new towels too.

How Far We've Come: The New Macs

The new iMacs are out! The new iMacs are out! My husband and I have been waiting for the new iMacs to arrive for a few months now so I am super excited to finally put down the plastic and get our new computer set up in the office.

We were secretly hoping Apple would've made a screen size between the small and large since we work with a lot of design files but we'll just have to live with the beautiful 21" (Oh, and a half inch, sorry, 21.5") screen. As much as I'd love the 27" that will have to wait until we win a scratch card.

Check out how far Apple has come - the power of good design:

The original Apple computer which sold in 2010 for $210,00 at auction

Remember these?

and the old screens

Yep, it's cool.

And how cool can a sleek computer make your office space look? I'd put it in the very category, desktop or laptop. Here are some ones that caught my eye for some good inspiration:

See ya at the Apple store.

Make Dinner Look Good At Least

It's springtime, finally, but I need one more pot roast dinner before I can say goodbye to the chilly nights. I'm using a new recipe for tonight's pot roast so I have my fingers crossed but I'm saved every so slightly by the fact that I know it will LOOK good because I used my Creuset dutch oven.

One of the best kitchen investments is Le Creuset cookware. The enameled cookware has been around since the early 1920s. (Here's a bit on Le Creuset History.)  If you're a serious cook you can appreciate the difference these pots make in your cooking. But even for the casual cook Le Creuset cookware is fantastic because you can make your meal and serve it in the same pot, and your table setting as well as kitchen shelves are all the better for it.


I have a slate grey dutch oven that I got from William Sonoma that I use for everything. (My brother recently made bread in his!) The original Le Creuset color is flame orange, but here are some other cool colors that will make you want to get one in your kitchen if you use it or not.



Color fennel from Sur La Table



Cobalt blue at Amazon.com



The ocean color available at William Sonoma 

The new cassis color available at William Sonoma

The original flame color from the Food Network Store

Here's to good food and a good looking table.

The Mall - Do we love it or hate it?

I went to the mall this past weekend. I don't like malls. I don't like the idea of being inside on a gorgeous day or the fact this is what has become of the American downtown. However, I am a sucker for tearing through a to-do list in a few hours with my car parked in one spot the whole time, so you gotta do what you have to do.

The particular mall I went to, Stamford Town Center, is not exactly the best of the bunch but I admit some malls can have cool architectural moments. Regardless of the particular mall though, this last trip brought me back to thinking of how shopping malls even started.

The Austrian architect Victor Gruen is known as the father of the American mall. He designed the first enclosed shopping mall, Southdale Mall (great boring name) in Edina, Minnesota, which opened in 1956 and it was a hit. After World War II people fled the cities for the suburbs, able to get from here to there with their new automobile. No longer were shopping trips made to downtown where shops gave the streets some hustle and bustle. Downtowns fell nearly silent as everything people needed was available in the suburbs in one sprawling indoor building with a huge parking lot surrounding it.

Gruen was not the first to think of the idea of a bunch of shops in one place but he was the one that designed the shopping mall as fully-enclosed and with the more suburban destination feel that we think of when we picture a typical American mall.

Southdale Mall today 

Some of examples of old "malls" are The Grand Bazaar in Istanbul, built in the 15th century 

and Oxford England's Covered market, which opened in 1774

The idea is the same but it's the execution that makes a difference. These older malls keep a sense of the city street though they are inside. They are more interesting and you don't have to remember where the fountain is to find your way around.

The shopping mall is not going away no matter what we may think, love it or hate it. Check out this link for some images of the 2011 European Shopping Centre Finalists.

Ex Libris: Cabinet of Natural Curiosities

A few days ago I was at The Strand bookstore in Manhattan and a copy of "Cabinet of Natural Curiosities," caught my eye on the display table. The book had a rediscovery a few years back and understandably so. The original illustrations were hand painted, similar to J.Audubon's illustrations of birds, but even the printed versions in the modern copies of the book are so detailed they are still worth a picture frame.

The book dates back to 1731 when a man named Albertus Seba, (1665-1736) a pharmacist from Amsterdam, commissioned illustrations of his collection of insects, animals, plants, and other "curiosities," some real, some not so real. The result is a set of intriguing images that makes for a pretty strong contender for your next coffee table book, with the added bonus of not having to worry about feeling guilty for not reading the book too.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with my copy yet but designer Steven Gambrel did a good job with one in a powder room:

What I found most interesting about this book is the "cabinet" part of the title. 

Back in the day, WAY back in the day, cabinets of curiosities, or cabinets of wonder, were collections of things that were, well, curious to the beholder. Mostly rich men and royalty in Renaissance Europe had these cabinets but some merchant class men had them as well. Ferdinand II, the Archduke of Austria had a collection focused on paintings of people with deformities. John Sloane's collection of plants and artifacts became the basis of the British Museum. In America Thomas Dent Mutter's grotesque medical collection formed another museum. 

The word cabinet is also interesting to mention because it was not used to refer to a piece of furniture as we know it today, but rather a room. So a Renaissance man's cabinet of curiosities could literally be a room used to display his choice objects, another link to our modern day museums. 

Though I wish I had the space for a whole room, I'll just have to stick to finding a little corner somewhere to start my own collection of odd ball items, that is, my "cabinet of curiosities." (I'll have to have a fancy drink in my hand and a raised pinkie finger when I explain that one to my next house guests.)

Buy a copy of Cabinet of Natural Curiosities here