dining chair revival

We have had this set of 60's Danish dining chairs hanging 'round for months now, just waiting for some love ...

 The seats were originally done in woven rattan, but all 4 were pretty badly broken, and re-caning is a bit beyond us despite our enthusiasm for restoring and reviving.

So stripped them all last week, and gave the frames a good sanding and re-oiling while we podered our alternatives ...

We found a supplier of nice narrow seat-belt webbing, and couldn't resist giving it a try ...

And what do you know?  They look amazing (in our opinion, anyway), AND they're really nice to sit on, too.

Now it's just the fun of answering the "What are you planning to do to finish those chairs?" questions ...
Thankfully, once people sit on them the 'get it' ... so the chairs are in the shop and waiting for a new home.  In the words of Murdock from the A-Team, "I just love it when a plan comes together!"

bring it on ...

Cold nights are the best ... we've been cleaning up a few fallen trees and we are ready!

tagging with a purpose ...

On a sentimental note, we used to travel to China a lot for work (past life), and were just remembering the predominant graf style over there.  We'll spare you the full onslaught of our collection of phone number photos for now - here's a typical example from a favorite overpass in Humen, Dongguan Provence.

 
Guess the priority over there was more than just getting everyone to remember your 'street name' ... they want you to know their number too!  Possibly the eastern equivalent of RSVP, or maybe just the 'budget billboard'. 

paste ups

Love a good paste-up ... way more fun than a half-assed tag.  This set on Mitchell St in Northcote are nice ...

Referring to the great boobs that were sadly removed from this wall a few months back ...

... and we couldn't go past an old school classic piece ...

... among the gumtrees

As much as we are born and bred city folk and love Northcote dearly, it's the weekly visits to the country estate that keep us sane - no sirens, no tram noise, and lots more nature.  We have had this vintage fire-guard for years, reminding us of where we'd like to be.

We feel like our farm is getting close to being just as cute ...

... or maybe it's just an excuse to keep collecting furniture - that extra loungeroom that we need so our spare chairs and sofas have somewhere to hang out ...

If it wasn't such a long drive I think we'd go back there every night ... there is nothing like that peace and quiet! 

Aside from the crazy birdlife of course. 

Stay tuned for a full tour of the farm in future posts ...

vans ...

Ever since getting my first kombi van back in '93, I wouldn't seriously consider driving any other type of vehicle ... nice high ride and great carrying capacity ... and road trips are way more fun in a van.

But can you beat those Californian vans for proper '70's cool?
Check out 'Vans and the places where they were.' for some really nice pics.

just wow ...

Nobody can deny that there's an art to good storage, but Swedish artist Michael Johansson has made it ART.  We saw a few of his pieces featured on 'What's blogging my view' (Janne, a Norwegian blogger with a GREAT eye), and had to follow up.

Johansson combines collecting and curating and colour-coding and compacting so well ...

For those of us with a nasty habit of accumulating more than we can accommodate, his work is pretty inspiring, and the mix of scales is cool too.

Sadly, though we share some of his principles in filling our garage with our finds, the lack of open space around our stacks means we're not quite at exhibition levels yet.  Great stuff though!

windmills of our minds ...

Cath's a big fan of those 'Southern Cross' windmill pumps that are scattered thru the dusty paddocks of rural Australia - most country drives we take involve a few 'out the window' blurry snaps of great, rusty bits of iron.  We had occasion to head up towards the NSW border a couple of weeks ago and spotted pretty much the biggest we've ever seen, just outside Shepparton.

Impressive as it is, it rides the 'tourist attraction' / 'functional machine' border - still super beautiful though.

It's next-door neighbour definitely falls into the category of 'nice spot to stop for a devonshire tea' ... not that we're judging.

Will collate a few of our pics of the 'proper' windmills and post them soon.

return of the mantis ...

Guess it must be the change of seasons - though it kinda feels like summer's still here - the praying mantis posse is once again descending on our garden.

They are definitely the kookiest bugs we see in our neck of the woods ... and a lot less harmful than the locust plague Victoria's being smitten with ...

position vacant

Just heard the news of the passing of Mr Malcolm McLaren this morning, at 64 years of age.
Probably best known for his fashion collaboration with Vivienne Westwood in the early 70's via their stores 'SEX' and 'Let It Rock', and his subsequent engineering ot the punk movement in London, he was an archetypical music entrepreneur.

I was a late arrival to (but big fan of) the Sex Pistols, and the aesthetic McLaren gave them ... but I have to say that the work I loved the most (and played to death - sorry mum and dad) was his fusion of B-Boy hip hop and world beats, the fantastic Duck Rock album.

A totally kooky and cool collection of music ('Buffalo Gals', 'Double Dutch', 'Soweto'), it's a record we still play in the store now ...and as for his appropriation of Haring's NY street art style ...




Though he hasn't had too much relevance for you genX and genY kids, he gave us older folk a lot of joy during the 70's and 80's ... might be a nice time to look up some his past work ...

Thanks Malcolm ... it may not all have been art, but it was a lotta fun!