Washi Calendar

One of the things I will miss about 2007 is turning the page on the first of every month and experiencing the delight of another beautiful illustration on this Washi calendar. I hope I can find something similarly pretty to look at every day of 2008. I will eventually frame some of the pages of this. I loved every single month but my favorite image was of March. Nikhil and I got married in February and I was so happy to see this beautiful image when we returned from our wedding in India.

Linotte

I love this watercolor, ink and pencil illustration by Anke Weckman of Linotte. I saw this on her etsy store.



I was happy to find her through Smosch.

Michael Schmelling / M.I.A.

These rockstar photos of M.I.A. are taken by Michael Schmelling. I got curious to see his work after reading about him on the Heading East blog. I am looking forward to her concert in a few weeks. Did I mention something about dancing recently?

Lylou

I like the pretty fabrics and colors of Lylou bags. I especially enjoyed looking at the photographs.

Bhangra and other things

I love the cover photo for the Basement Bhangra CD which released today and I just bought it off itunes. The bhangra beats are bringing on quite the dance party around my desk. The cover is designed by Chiraag Bhakta and I like his mix of collage, handwriting and retro Indian imagery in the rest of his work. He also designed the Pardon My Hindi site (which I love) and they are selling a very cool henna inspired silkscreened print.



I need to go dancing. I don't know what exactly it is but some bhangra tunes make me so nostalgic. I think it might be the faint memory of intensely happy dancing to this very energetic music. I wonder what Ranjit has to say about that.

Paul Samohvalov

I love this photo by Paul Samohvalov and I love so many others. It's hard to pick just one or two images that would sum it up. The lighting and compositions are so striking and end up creating some incredibly engaging narratives.

Camper

It's always exciting to see what fresh, new and pretty things await me on the Camper site. The shoes are undeniably unique, beautifully styled and comfortably functional. I have always liked their design and branding.



The Casa Camper Hotel in Barcelona is innovative and embodies the same happy, healthy, nature-embracing philosophies that make Camper such a warm, inviting brand. I looked it up and I liked what Treehugger had to say about it.

Tiny Azure

Eiko Yamaji of Tiny Azure makes these beautiful pendants with delicate, little etchings. The Hana pendant below has wild flowers locked into the resin, behind the lotus etching. These are available through the Tokyomade online shop.

cop.copine

The clothes at cop.copine are just the right amount of urban and edgy and their unique fabrics and textures make some beautiful and sometimes beautifully assymetrical shapes. I have liked their clothes for some time but they don't officially sell in LA and not in very many places in US as such.

Stamp jewelry

I tend to like the look of flat, frosted/matte gold pieces, like in the earrings and pendants of Stamp Jewelry, by Clare Stoker-Ring.

Rick Owens

Today, I was craving some gray-love, something slight and minimalist and fluid and perhaps assymetrical. And then I saw Rick Owens' collections.

Carol Young

I read about Carol Young in the current issue of Readymade magazine and I like the clean, comfortable silhouettes of her Undesigned collection. She incorporates recycled, organic knits and other eco-friendly materials. I really like that skirt.

Kawase Hasui

While posting about Tadashi Ura's work, I somehow started thinking about my love for Japanese printmaking and how a great deal of it was triggered by this one trip to the Japanese Art Pavilion at the LACMA. They have a wonderful collection of prints by Kawase Hasui, and a lot of them happened to be on display while I was there. I caught myself smiling while looking at one of the prints. I was completely enraptured. There began a deep love affair with Japanese printmaking and the work of Hasui in particular. The following semester I took a Japanese Art History class with Prof. Kendall Brown who had just finished writing Kawase Hasui: The Complete Woodblock Prints. That was one happy set of coincidences. I wrote a paper on Hasui at the end of the semester and Prof. Brown appreciated some of my very personal insights, that attracted me to Hasui's work. He was kind enough to mention my name in Visions of Japan, a somewhat shorter version of the Hasui book he had written earlier. The latter contains 100 of his prints, arranged chronologically and hence makes for a great art book (and a visual treat) for any collection.


River Bank, Komagata
Kawase Hasui, 1919

Image from LACMA's online collection.

Tadashi Ura

These Ikebana illustrations for Wow 10 are amazing. Tadashi Ura's body of work is very inspiring. I couldn't even pick any favorites so I am posting just a couple of these Ikebana drawings. Tadashi has a brilliant portfolio of other artwork and I loved each piece.



Images from the artless blog.

Lichtfaktor

The CR Blog posted Forest, the beautiful, light film by Lichtfaktor.

desktop color

Uten.Silo by Ingo Maurer & Dorothee Becker, Light Village paperweight by Hisashi Hojin.

Aptos

left is a photo Nikhil took at Cabrillo College, right is a curio cabinet at The Farm Bakery in Aptos, CA.

summer

Silkscreened cards of an earlier doodle.

(on etsy)


© 2007 nidhi malhotra

TBWA/HAKUHODO

The navigation was just a minor, little hiccup for me, but well worth the inspiration while browsing through the beautifully illustrated flash site for TBWA\HAKUHODO. I want to work in Japan. Any takers?

Airport

It's nice to look at old (digital) albums and find photos I don't remember taking.



Taipei Airport(?), 2004

Jil Sander

I love the airy strokes of color in the Jil Sander Spring/Summer 2008 collection.