There are three things worth knowing about Magic City, described as a cross between Mad Men and The Sopranos. Currently airing and being talked about in the States the series has not reached our shores yet. The three things are: 1. According to his twitter feed Xavi Alonso, the red-headed Spanish footballer is checking the series out. He is part of the best national football team ever. Spain won the
Very nice, simple work here from HAM featuring, apparently, ‘unexpected moments from the contented lives of a pig, horse and rabbit’ . HAM is the project of Jo, a farmer’s daughter from the Shires and a graduate of the Ruskin School of Drawing. Her range is 100% British made and includes aprons at £18, tea towels at £9, cards at £2.75 for one and £8.95 for four and prints at
Bwani Junction, the Scottish band who painted the Forth Rail Bridge blue in their video after being refused permission to play live on the bridge, will be appearing at the Thistly Cross Festival on Saturday 30 June 2012.Other bands playing at the farm near Dunbar, East Lothian include Meursault, Woodenbox, Remember Remember, Found, Fatherson and Kitty the Lion.Thistly Cross Cider was started in 2008 as a collaboration between farmer, Ian
Oliver Burkeman is an award winning journalist, now based in Brooklyn, whose regular column in The Guardian explores popular psychology and self help culture. His beautifully written and genuinely helpful new book – The Antidote: Happiness for People who Can’t Stand Positive Thinking – questions the merit of relentless positivity in the pursuit of happiness and indeed the pursuit of happiness itself. Burkeman introduces the book in this excellent animation
Robert Burns, poet, songwriter and Scottish icon, spent his last seven years in Dumfries in Scotland’s south west. It was his retreat from the Edinburgh literary world that had brought him, only a year before, contemporary fame. It was in Dumfries he wrote his great songs, Auld Lang Syne, My Love is like a Red Red Rose and John Anderson My Jo. It was here he had his children and died
‘Disneyland for design geeks’ is how Denmark has been described. On the outside Finn Juhl’s house with its unassuming exterior couldn’t be further from Cinderella’s Castle but inside the Danish architect and furniture designer has worked his magic in this early example of open plan living. The floor plan has been designed meticulously so that each room has its own clear function but you can always see the next room
Charles Lowther and the rest of the team behind the excellent George and Dragon in Clifton have this month opened the gardens and cafe at Askham Hall in Penrith, Cumbria. This the first stage of a project that will next year see the beautiful Grade 1 listed house offer rooms, restaurant and spa. For now you can visit the gardens with their colourful terraces, herbaceous borders, formal lawns, kitchen gardens
Coat hooks, like calendars, are modest household items which seem to inspire a sort of mania in designers to come up with ever more stylish and innovative prototypes. The ones featured here should allow the design conscious to hammer home their aesthetic credentials the minute anyone steps into their home. Be aware however that when you hang more than one coat on your hooks you no longer see the design
Even with the optimism of youth a child might not expect Albert Einstein to be the best pen pal yet… in between sleeping for 10 hours a night, developing theories of relativity and being the most famous scientist on the planet, the physicist found time to reply to some of the children who wrote to him. From the charming Dear Professor Einstein: Albert Einstein’s Letters to and from Children comes the following exchange
Ok so it’s just an ad, and a Coke ad at that, but it’s got that so simple yet so clever thing going on the way the best ads do…