Stray Gloves
This winter, my family and I visited some places on the northeast coast of the US. We were met with blizzards, snow, subzero temperatures, and some nasty wind.
Cruising between New York, Princeton, Hillsborough, Washington, and Philadelphia, however, we relied on cozy restaurants with delicious food, a plethora of incredible museums, the toasty subway, and, of course, our clothing to keep us warm.
Having both my twin, Yana, and I working for outdoor brands, we had no shortage of weather-appropriate gear, but I couldn’t help taking pity on all the poor souls, who had lost their protective layers against the record cold in the East Coast this season.
Even though we are short on photos to complete the full collection of all the ones we saw, this lonely glove visual is a representation of the diversity of people losing their gloves: young, old, posh, poor, sporty, kitschy.
Because whoever you are, it just might happen that your gloves go astray.
Traffic Makers
They say America is where dreams come true. This might well be the case because, during our New York trip this year, our family noticed a correlation: vehicles are the ultimate symbol of people’s dreams.
From the little boy in Chinatown, who wanted to become a firefighter, to the girl, who was obliterating gender norms, becoming a policewoman; from the Italian family, who moved to Manhattan in search of stability and a better life, and ended up opening a pizza restaurant, to the smartass white boy, who wanted to be rich and independent, their rides speak a ton.
What they drive is who they are: whether a firefighter truck, a pizza delivery van, a school bus, or a Cybertruck, their vehicles represent their dreams and how far they’ve come.
And, sometimes, at New Year’s, they embody their owners’ holiday spirit.
Art Deco
When I first set foot in Lower Manhattan, I was immediately overwhelmed by how prevailing Art Deco style is in architecture.
In contrast to Europe, where buildings are such a mixture of historical art influences that it is rather hard to distinguish prevailing art movement, the cosmopolitan island’s architecture is very clearly Art Deco. I’m not only talking about the huge building blocks, however. The style is instead made clear through the countless little details, covering financial building entrances and residential halls, the ornaments, placed under windows, between floors, and the generous use of stone and marble.
Grand Central Station, the Chrysler Building, the Plaza Hotel, and the New York Public Library all have strong Art Deco influences, which come through as a particular feeling of grandeur, which, though made familiar by the movie industry, invokes a layer of awe, when faced with in real life.
Such a detail, with a nod to the late 1800s, for instance, was an old Cutler mailing system in the hotel we were staying in FiDi. The residents of what was once a gigantic apartment building used to put their mail in a designated opening on their floor, which was linked all the way to a big mailers’ box in the foyer, serviced by a postman.
Further such details are the financial building fronts, as well as the bodies of light in institutional buildings or signature restaurants all over New York and Philadelphia. To me, they serve as a reminder that, though time erases signs of movements and influences, it also has a way of beautifully and originally combining the best of the past eras.
Noticing this makes me cautious of what I put out into the world. Because, if, hypothetically, we could travel into the future, and there was a future to travel to, wouldn’t it be wonderful to see how our design has transformed the future streets of Manhattan into this incredible awe-inspiring place?
Ivy League
Since I was a child, I have always been torn between the world of academia and the one of art. Eventually, I made the unpopular, and maybe, to some people, insane, choice of pursuing art. I knew it was hard, but partially that’s why I went for it, I knew it was my chance, and I took it.
Even though I believe I made the right choice, a piece of my heart still belongs to science, craving a shot at ivy league: the old stone buildings, the crown molding, the wooden paneling, the free brunches, the smart friends, the broad, perfectly mown lawns, where people sit and think about the meaning of life and their research, the stone hallways, the dining hallways, as a matter of fact, all the hallways, the fireplaces, shitty window insulation, casually placed stained glass windows, the scope of self-improvement and growth, student discount until you’re 40, the chance to write down all your research, the merch shops and the opportunities that come with an ivy league diploma.
To me, and many others, those things are illusive, possibly even delusionally romanticized. But I got one thing out of my Ivy League bucket list and this is smart friends. I often joke I’m Ivy by extension, because I get to revisit the places of my romanticized higher education through the brilliant people, who actually made it in.
My consolation prize, apart from an incredible career in design, is that I get to delusionally romanticize the sh*t out of ivy league life, and the lawns I get to sit on, contemplating the meaning of things from a non-academic perspective.
Skyline
Technically, each city, town, or village, even the desert has a skyline. It’s the point of connection of multiple points, belonging to earth, to the first visible point of the sky, the non-earth.
But boy, does Manhattan put a new spin on the term.
Many people say it’s cold, concrete, non-human. And all of this is true. But chasing a warm fuzzy feeling is not the reason why millions of people visit the skyscraper island each year.
In my view, there are three factors responsible for its skyline’s appeal: layering, perspective, and reflection. All in the literal, and the metaphorical sense.
Firstly, layering represents the difference: between people, styles, building height, signs of passing of times, cultures, and materials: each ingredient in the pot represents the layers of the city.
When put together through the angle of space and time, this gives the perspective. This is the correlation of how things and people have, are, and will connect to each other.
And lastly, reflection. In a literal sense, it is represented by the sunset light, traveling through the surface of the skyscrapers or their image, swaying in the water, surrounding the island. Metaphorically, reflection is how each individual perceives reality and warps it through their own processing mechanism.
High Line, Summit One Vanderbilt, The Empire State, The Brooklyn Bridge, and The Staten Island Ferry are some of the most popular attractions in Manhattan. That’s because, in contrast to most cities, in order to feel New York, you need to see it from afar, you need to take in its skyline.
Suburbia
In Europe, suburbia is the extension of the city center, the sub-urban territory.
In the US, suburbia is a place where you can’t supply any food without a vehicle.
A place where one needs a big car, with a big tank.
A place where one relies on the neighbors for help.
A place where one drives to get to a workout.
A place where everyone owns a house and a garden.
A place where people hang seasonal wreaths on their doors and change them every three months.
A place that is not France but has French-style windows.
A place where houses and churches have a pointy tip.
A place with cozy lights and seasonal decoration.
A place where one can commit murder without being found out.
A place where at night one most clearly sees their own reflection in the windows.
It’s a place that’s so quiet one struggles to fall asleep.
A place where deer come to munch on the food supplies.
A place where one has one’s own porch and chimney.
In the US, suburbia doesn’t imply urban.
Tiles On Files
Have you ever wondered what makes tiles so popular?
Most traditionally, they are either square or rectangular, almost two-dimensional pieces of robust-ish material, which is used to cover unsightly surfaces for the purpose of easy maintenance and effortless cleaning. They are also an easy design feature to integrate, in order to inject someone’s personal style into a place through a particular shape, color, and, sometimes, texture.
Unlike Mediterranean-style tiles, New York tiles have a simple, classically rectangular shape, are placed in a variation of one or two colors, and are mostly used for their practicality: in diners, fast food chains, the subway, public toilets, and storage spaces.
New York tiles also signify different layers of social class: a big, thick tile out of precious material is often used on institutional buildings, funded by, and often named after, wealthy donors, while cheaper, smaller tiles tend to cover historically problematic areas, like the Times Square, or the Bronx.
As often happens with elements of design, the cheaper, previously widely accessible tile has become such a symbol of the essence of New York that hotels, restaurants, luxurious apartment buildings, and hip cafes have adopted the subway tile into their interiors.
Tiles are an integral part of the design of a city: practical, playful, and purposeful, they enmesh people’s stories with those of the places they cover.
