Voodoo

We got together at Dave’s Halloween party, and he died in an avalanche in Whistler in March. 

I was briefly living in Kelowna. 

He was living in Whistler. 

We knew each other for years. We were in the same scene if you will. 

Steep runs, 

deep powder 

and 

adrenaline. 

Both of us painfully shy and awkward, 

too timid for anything beyond a nod and a “Hey.” 

The Halloween party was loud – 

there was some thrash band – 

and clumps of people I’d never seen before. 

I stood against the back wall, 

fur-clad with leather pants and a crotched bikini top. 

He approached me from out of the shadows. 

“We’re supposed to be together,” he motioned his hand at us. 

He was fur-clad, with tight leather pants and shirtless. 

Rock and roll wallflowers guarding the nearest exit. 

Shortly thereafter, we were at my place making “rock star nachos.” 

And shortly after that, I was stopped short by a huge Hendrix tattoo on his right shoulder. 

He stayed with me for a few days. 

We listened to music, 

played air guitar to Hendrix, 

laughed nonstop 

and had a glorious time. 

He was tender, corny, polite and beautiful. 

We made plans for Spring when I’d move back to Van. 

But he died before it could happen. 

I often think of that Hendrix tattoo; the first time I saw it, 

his beautiful smile, 

and our Spring that never happened. 

Last night, I dreamt of him. 

We were riding bikes and had stopped at a crossing. 

He leaned over to me and whispered, 

“I’m going to die soon.” 

But I already knew.

Blackberry Mojito Recipe

What to do with blackberries?

Make blackberry syrup,

then make a blackberry mojito!

Last year, I spent two days cutting down blackberry vines in my yard. This year, they're back in full force. I read that dumping boiling water on the roots will kill them, but I haven't tried this yet.

I'm trying to live off my land as much as possible this summer - I have blackberries everywhere - they're food, might as well eat them - or drink them!

Here's how to make a blackberry mojito. I adapted Natalie's recipe from Tastes Lovely and Dana's recipe from Minimalist Baker to suit my taste.

INGREDIENTS

• 2 oz rum
• 2 oz blackberry syrup
• soda water
• 7-10 mint leaves
• 1/2 lime (quartered)
• 1 cup crushed ice

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Grab a  highball glass 
2. Add mint leaves, lime wedges, rum and blackberry syrup. 
3. Muddle with the base of a wooden spoon if you don't have a muddler. 
4. Make sure the limes are muddled and the juice is squished all through that goodness. 
5. Stir it up a bit. 
6. Add crushed ice. 
7. Top with soda water and garnish with a wedge of lime. 

Stir it up from time to time as you're cocktailing - it keeps the melting ice flavoured with the blackberry mint lime rum goodness!

Check out my Pinterest for more cocktails.

A DECADE OF BIJOU LIVING

silk moth in a jelly moon Hornby 2018

A decade—ten years—sounds like a long time. I don't really have any concept of time—it's either "now" or "not now." I live in the moment—the adhd posse will relate.

Bijou Living started ten years ago, on May 5, 2008. I started writing to share cool things, give tips/techniques, and journal my thoughts and feelings. Where have I been since my last post? 

Life happens...

• 
  

2016

divorce

California

start pottery

soul searching

old love, new heartbreak

good friends

laughter

peace

2017

happiness

inspiration

closure

confidence

laughter

sensuality

love

gratification

peace

Jan - Apr. 2018

achievement

stamina

good friends

soul searching

peace

...

Leslie, at The Bloomerie (Arbutus and 12th), saw my pottery on Instagram and contacted me to purchase some pieces. Donald Yim saw my pottery at the Bloomerie and called me for an interview. Here's the fun video we did! 

The soundtrack most definitely steals the show...

January 2018 saw the first major retrospective of Thomas Kakinuma's ceramic art, and I'm proud to have been involved in it. 

Remember my Kakinuma post ten years ago? The Kakinuma family reached out to me in 2015 as they'd read the post. We met shortly after, and a beautiful friendship has evolved.

May 26, 2018 - I'll be selling my studio pottery (my work) as part of a small conglomerate of West Van potters (there are only 16 of us). We'll be at the West Van Community Centre from 10 to 3. You can view what I'll be selling on my Instagram. Please come say hi—I'll tell you the story behind each piece.


I'm locked out of my Facebook. I post regularly on Instagram, head on over that way - Instagram - Stories is where I share the behind-the-scenes stuff. Chat later, Stacy ✌🏻

check check one

Please come visit me on Instagram, Tumblr, Pinterest and Etsy. 

April 2016 - In French they say, 'Je suis fatigué'. Fatigué is a good word to describe the state of my inspiration over the past year - or in English, fatigued.  My inspiration feels frightened. An inspiration that needs to be coaxed out of hiding and tenderly guided into the dawn of a new land.

I'm just getting revved up. I'll be in LA for the month of May hangin' with my cousin's cat Wes. Taking the PCH down from San Francisco and chillin' the heck out. Lunch reservations at Chez Panisse, helping out a friend at the Rose Bowl Flea Market, night viewing of the Stahl Residence, and dropping by my old Alma Mater the Pickwick Vintage Show on May 29th - stoked about that - I can shop it this time, (for crazy lady in Vancouver clothes).

Here's a checklist of what I've been pondering as of late:

Fashion - the elderly Chinese ladies of Vancouver (per usual), Incredible String Band, and a smidgen of Hole (MTV Awards 1995). Hey, I've met quite a few guys in Vancouver lately with great style. There's Jacob over at Nordstrom (near the Chloe bags), Nigel at Gravity Pope and Mohammed who was at Gravity Pope but is now at Blanche MacDonald. If you're into men's street style go check out the kids hanging out on their 10:30 smoke break in front of BCIT downtown then watch them drive off in their Maseratis and Bentleys at 3:30.

Architecture -  There have been 787 demolition permits issued in the District of West Vancouver since 2010 - 174 in 2015 alone (population of West Van is 43,000). You know I left West Van in 2014 - or was it 2015? I left because I was frustrated by the mowing down of all the West Coast Modern homes. Well, turns out the District has voted unanimously to curb the size of McMansions. Here are the minutes of the meeting from December 2015. Too little too late in my opinion. The City of Vancouver issued 267 demolition permits in the first three months of 2016. If Mayor Gregor Robertson is tooting the greenest city horn - let's challenge him on the effect of the demolition cycle on landfills. I lived in Pt. Grey for six months (story in my next post). It was like a ghost town - no community, no neighbours hanging out in their yards shooting the shit, no cats rolling on the sidewalk, no sound of children playing in their yards. I moved eight blocks East and what a change! I was walking down Second last night and a group of people were having a glass of wine - they invited me to join them -  I did!

That being said how long do you think this house two blocks over from me is going to sit vacant?

My friend @bijouliving has the raddest apartment. This sunroom is a dream. 😍 #apartmenttherapy #decor #bohemian #indoorplants #decorinspiration #personalstyle #70s #sunroom #designideas #designsponge #vancouver #vancouverbc

A photo posted by Dana Landon (@itsmydarlin) on Apr 27, 2016 at 7:11am PDT

Interiors - I moved again in February - four times in one year.

Music - I have some playlists up on YouTube if you want to check out what I've been listening to.  Electric Moon, JJUUJJU, Federale, Moon Duo, A Place to Bury Strangers, Roy Harper, Bridget St. John, Magic Carpet and of course classical Indian music.

image via coding horror

Personal - Remember those Choose Your Own Adventure books from our childhood? I'll leave my adventure to you. Perhaps you've been following my other pages, perhaps you know my real adventure or perhaps I'm living vicariously through one you've chosen. Whichever - know this - everyone deserves a love story.

Design - I was contacted by the family of Thomas Kakinuma - the midcentury BC ceramicist that I've written about. They'd read a blog post I did and wanted to gift me a piece of his work. I went to their beautiful home and what's transpired is a wonderful friendship and a possible show at the UBC Museum of Anthropology (two year curation time but we're working on a small show in a different venue). You can see some of the images of his works I was able to photograph at his home posted over on my Facebook page.

Random - I've been so deeply moved by all the spiritually profound stolen images defaced with free hand font floating around my feeds. Please read this journal article On the Reception and Detection of Pseudo-Profound Bullshit.

Thanks for sticking around - I really value your readership! 

Oscar Niemeyer Chaise Lounge

Oscar Niemeyer Chaise Lounge images via R 20th Century

Originally published July 6, 2013.

Oscar Niemeyer made cool furniture as well as buildings? Of course, he did. Seems like most architects are also budding furniture designers (Frank Lloyd Wright, Ron Thom). Niemeyer passed away in December 2012 - 10 days short of his 105th birthday.

The Rio Chaise Lounge was designed in 1978 with his daughter, Anna Maria Niemeyer.

Features a bentwood frame, woven cane seat, and leather headrest pillow with weighted straps.

The image shown is a 2001 reissue for sale on 1st Dibs.

1978 original for sale at $28,000 in 2013

1978 original sold at auction for $22,000 in 2008

1978 original unsold at auction $5000 in 2003

images © R 20th Century

Dining dilemma

I've had at least five dining tables in the past ten years. 

This is partly because I've moved six times in the past five years (and you've been with me for each one). What was purchased for one area only fits in one location. 

This is what leaves me torn. I need a new table - again. I want to invest and get something I can keep from this day forward, but seeing as we rent, who knows what will happen? 

Our last movers trashed our teak bedroom set, smashed most of my BC ceramics, broke my alabaster table, and gouged the top of my stump table with a six-inch crevasse. 

What do I do? Of all those tables, our card table was the most versatile, and the size was right for each dining room. I should look for one of those old wooden ones.

If I had 'my own' dining area, it would go something like this:

Florence Knoll's oak or walnut-topped table.

or the Wegner CH002 table

"Oh, hi, we just look cool."

Jonathan Adler's Sputnik chandelier

Hoffman for Thonet cane back chairs

mixed with Wegner's Wishbone chairs

It's not in my dining area, but the Womb chair would be there. 

Now I'm into the flax colour. 

Good thing I didn't get the purple velvet one four moves ago!

Here's one of those card tables I just found on Craigslist. 

Thirty bones and a "leather top" - too bad those fantastic chairs aren't included.

Terribly Planned Circulation

I'll tell you something about renting. 

You get to live in many different neighbourhoods and eras of dwellings - a pseudo-try before you buy. 

As you know, we were renovicted from the place we moved into just seven months into our lease (a long-term rental, my ass). 

We were turned down for about six or seven places we applied to rent - who knows why? Besides, I don't really care. 

We finally got accepted into one - we moved all our stuff over on the 31st, and within 30 minutes of stepping foot in the place - in the daylight - I gave our notice to get out. 

Our total stay was thirteen hellish nights. What a pen of filth. 

Viewings only after 6pm! 

After 6pm because it's dark and you can't see the filth. 

Anyway, this dump of a building was built in 2009; I hadn't lived in anything newer than 1965 since I was nineteen and living at home with my parents.

I'll never live in anything 'new' again. 

Speaking of such, how can people line up to buy condos that still need to be built? 

They've never even sniffed out the place. By sniffing out, I mean precisely that - smelling it. 

An educated nose knows the smell of particleboard and cheap flooring. 

An educated nose knows the scent of cheap. 

How do people put their trust in some developers they don't even know? 

Developers are business people. 

What do businesses care about in the 21st Century? The bottom line. 

What's the number one rule in business? Buy low, sell high. 

So, to all those people I saw lined up on 41st and Cambie today to buy an unbuilt condo on a major traffic artery - all the best to you and yours.

So, where is home now? 

Well, I had a Quebecois/Portuguese friend who used to like to call me a WASP; I adamantly disagreed - and even more so now that I looked it up. 

I don't have an Anglican or Protestant bone in my body and horses. 

Besides, horses and I have a mutual understanding - they don't like me, and I don't like them - but we're cool. Let's say I'm back at the beach (the other place was on 8th and Cambie). I haven't lived more than two blocks from the beach in eighteen years. 

What's that saying, once you leave, you can never go/get back?

squished

Here I sit with all my furniture from our place in West Van. Stuff bought for our place in West Van. How do you make things fit in a space you didn't intend to put it? I wanted to check out some of my interiors books to see what they had to say. That's what got me writing this post. Reading a chapter entitled Planning for Space*got me thinking about how all these new condos lack precisely that - a plan for a comfortable human space. Take these eight points on well-plotted circulation, for example:

1. Can you get to the bedrooms without passing through the major group area?
2. Can guests get to the bathroom without passing through a bedroom?
3. Can you move through the kitchen without interfering with the cooking operations?
4. Are hallways wide enough for two people to pass each other comfortably?
5. Are entrance areas large enough to welcome guests to the home without dumping guests straight into the middle of a party?
6. Are staircases wide enough to permit the passage of furniture?
7. Are doors well situated to allow for traffic flow and comfortable furniture arrangement?
8. Does the home have a "heart" - where people automatically congregate? Are paths to that area unobstructed?

 agh

Now, please memorize these points. Only rent/buy something after you ask yourself these questions. Landlords and developers - the same goes for you. It's in your best interest to keep happy, long-term tenants. That being said, although the layout sucks, I think the new place is going to be entirely satisfactory. You know I'll keep you posted.

On a similar note, I went to park in front of one of my favourite little Vancouver houses today and noticed it looked neglected. Well, it's been listed for sale—$899,900.00. It's probably 100% original, and it's listed for its property only. I've posted photos of its amazing dark purple hydrangea bush on Instagram.



* Faulkner, Sarah. Planning a Home. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1979.