I've always admired the Italian brand MSGM for their devil-may-care approach to print mixing. When it's so wrong sometimes it can be so right. Right? There were such great color combinations with their Spring '14 collection, I started playing with watercolors and, boom! these happened. All images from Style.com. Layouts by yours truly. Related articles ROY G BiV Brand Envy: MSGM Mixing Prints at MSGM Spring 2014 Continue reading

Have you watched Top of the Lake yet? Created by (my favorite!) Jane Campion and Gerard Lee, the PBS miniseries follows Tui, a young pregnant girl who tries to kill herself in a lake and the detective (Elizabeth Moss), full of dark secrets herself, who tries to solve the case. Set in a small town in the New Zealand countyside as haunting and dark as it is beautiful, Campion does an amazing job connecting Tui's story to the pervasive sexism that undercuts women's relationships with men, both familial and strange. One of my favorite storylines is the group of women who move into an encampment of train cars on a plot of land called "Paradise". These women, scarred and bruised... Continue reading

Another week, a new batch of things to stimulate my braingrapes. Here's what I'm crushing hard for right now: 1. Designer Tia Cibani sent her models down the runway with beautiful be-ribboned braids piled on top of their heads. I have been wearing my hair like this ever since! 2. It's just barely fall but I'm deep in the Spring '14 collections right now. Odd but cool color combinations are everywhere for Spring and I'm particularly taken with the shades at Jonathan Saunders. 3. Oh my, this ring. I would like it on my finger right now. 4. As you might imagine, desk decor at Anthropologie headquarters is a bit competitive. I've had the same look going for a while... Continue reading

Ilse Murdock is a New York based artist who did a whole series of pieces made with bottle caps. Who knew there were so many colors, sizes and shapes? Look really closely at these: there are so many surprises and details to explore! Continue reading

I spend a good part of my work day scouring books, blogs and the deep corners of my brain for inspiration. In the concept designing part of my job, I find seemingly disparate images all over and start to trace a connection to make something tangible. What with the internets and all that collective unconscious flowing around, I find that what I'm into is not all that original. I don't mean this in a self-deprecating way, I actually like it. People are always complaining about how computers are destroying meanful connections but I don't really see it that way. Out in the ether, there are people that make you feel like less of an island, people who see things the... Continue reading

These organic and sculptural pieces from Canadian jewelry designer Gabrielle Desmarais are wonderful aren't they? Continue reading

I'm in a little bit of a post-Iceland lull these past few weeks and thinking a lot about "the big issues" in life. It's funny, even though I am in my mid-thirties I still have the sense that, any moment now, my real life is about to start. I think I am letting too much pass by me, waiting, waiting for someone to tell me that life is happening now, all around me. The good life can't always be about the big things, like a trip to Iceland. Sometimes it's the little things- the pink velvet petals of roses in full bloom, a perfect cup of coffee, a lazy weekend cuddle with a fluffy orange cat, that make life grand. Continue reading

On Friday evening I found myself sketching and painting various Icelandic candies. Clearly I'm still very inspired by my trip! Continue reading

You can't spend a week talking about Iceland without a post about Reykjavik. The northernmost city in the world (!), what Reykjavik lacks in size, it more than makes up for in character. We completely fell in love with the city and quickly shifted into its rhythm. Here are a few of our favorite things... Color everywhere. A smart way to brighten up dark winter days. Street art all over the place. Everywhere you look, there's amazing art of the street, from murals to mosiacs to mirrored waterfalls. Coffee! Reykjavik is a coffee city and none is better than Kaffismiðja Íslands. It's dreamy. Quiet. For a city, Reykjavik is incredibly peaceful, except of course, at 3 am on a Saturday... Continue reading

About two days into our trip, The Mr. and I noticed something curious about Reykjavik: there were cats everywhere! I'm not talking mangy feral cats either; these cats looked plump and well groomed, as if they had been fed on a steady diet of salmon skin and skyr. There were cats in every garden, on every stoop and we watched one even use the crosswalk to get across the street (naturally, the cars stopped for him)! It was cat paradise. And any cat paradise is also Kayte paradise. I googled, "cats of Reykjavik" one night and sure enough, lots of people wonder about the cats. On a recent visit, Haruki Murakami became enthralled with the many felines prowling about. People... Continue reading

Hard to say but easy on the eyes, the The Snæfellsnes Penninsula is a little leg that juts out of the southwest coast of Iceland. We drove to the penninsula, again with Reykjavik Excursions, on a very windy Wednesday morning. It's a long drive but the view from the bus was breathtaking. We got out a few times to admire glacier-capped Snæfellsjökull, a 700 year old volcano made famous in Jules Vern's tale, Journey to the Center of the Earth. Next, we stopped at the beach to look for seals. There was only one and it was so far away I could barely see it with binoculars. Silently, I started to worry: was this day going to be a bust?... Continue reading

At 8:30 am, we boarded our Reykjavik Excursions bus and headed out of the city for points our South Shore Adventure trip. The natural sights in Iceland are amazing. Just when you think you're seen the most incredible, most picturesque scene on earth, the bus turns a corner and, oh look, there's a bigger mountain, a more stunning cliff, a cuter gaggle of puffins. Our first stop was the tiny village of Eyrarbakki, right on the coast. Leave it to Icelanders to make metal siding look quaint. I love the wacky colors people choose to paint their houses too. From Eyrarbakki,we went to Sólheimajökull Glacier to touch the tongue of the glacier. Walking towards the glacier, it's pretty easy to... Continue reading

Just a short 5 minute trip from the harbor in Reykjavik, Viðey Island is a tiny little paradise, an oasis of quiet and calm. Everything in Iceland is quiet but Viðey is especially so: you can hear the bumblebees buzzing past your ears, the rustle of the wilflowers in the breeze, your thoughts become magnified and clear. Aren't Icelandic horses beautiful? I could look at them all day. There are two art installations on the island. One, by Richard Serra, is a series of basalt columns called Milestones, arranged strategically around the island. Serra’s pillars are intended to frame certain views of Viðey and Reykjavík in the distance. They invite visitors to venture and peer between the pillars like frames,... Continue reading

"Why Iceland?" A lot of people asked. Because I hate summer in Philadelphia and my outlook on life was going south. Because the Mr. and I needed to get away for real. Because Iceland has always fascinated me with it's call of untamed nature, late night clubbing and wacky design aesthetic. Because Bjork and Sigur Ros and Mum and Kron Kron shoes. Ok, you're with me here right? Iceland is amazing. We arrived on a Saturday afternoon, groggy but so, so thankful for clear skies and 65 degree weather and immediately headed down Laugavegur, the main drag, in search of brunch. Our Airbnb apartment wouldn't be ready for a few more hours. On our way, we spotted a water fountain.... Continue reading

Oh dear, where have I been? For once I have a good answer: Iceland! The Mr. and I traveled to Iceland at the end of July and we were smitten. In fact, I think my brain is still hovering somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean...in honor of that, I am making this week Iceland week! Each day, I'll post a bit about our trip, show photos of the places we went and even give you some travel tips. Off we go! Continue reading

I've been making things. Experimenting with freeform quilting and embroidery. Here are a few bits of what I have been working on. Continue reading

In which my Hidden City Philadelphia photo safari continues! The Mr. and I had so much fun on our tour that we invited some new friends to join us the next weekend. First up, Germantown Town Hall, a gorgeous Beaux Arts behemoth that has been abandoned since 1998. One of the most fascinating things about visiting these vacant buildings is the state they are left in, as if everyone who worked there just vanished, leaving behind piles of papers, ancient conputers and cabinets filled with files. What happened when the Town Hall closed it's doors? The entry of the Germnatown Town Hall is painted an arresting shade of seafoam grey, the great detail of the moldings and domed ceilings a... Continue reading

Get ready for a big photo safari; this is going to be a three parter because I have so much to share!! The Hidden City Festival in Philadelphia is a tour of nine sites throughout the city that normally wouldn't be open to the general public. The tour offers a vista in the vast history of our city, a glimpse into a synagogue built into a 19th century storefront in South Philly, for instance, or a private literary athenaeum on Washington Square. The festival teamed the historical sites up with contemporary artists, who created work in some way inspired by these places. The result was miraculous, educational and incredible fun. We felt like we were on an amazing treasure hunt... Continue reading

Antonio Marras has long been one of my favorite designers. He works independently of trend, lives on the coast of his homeland of Sardinia, far from the fashion capitals, and has a very poetic approach to clothing. I was recently scrolling through the Resort collections for 2014 and may have (ok I did) squealed with delight when I saw Marras' presentation. I love the idea of showing a collection as a collage. And, cats! Antonio Marras, you have made me very happy today. Continue reading

I missed a couple months somewhere this spring but "Read. Watched.", my account of books and movies consumed this year is back! If I want to get to 50, I'm clearly going to have to do some late-year cramming. Read: My books for May and June were all over the map, from self-help to classics, biographies about crazy Belgian kings and autobiographies about crazy families. 1. I love a good memoir and so I tore through the pages of Her Last Death by Susanna Sonnenberg, the story of a woman's relationship with her philandering, drug-addled, compulsive-lying mother. 2. After reading We Wish to Inform You that Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families, I got onto an African history... Continue reading

Gucci Spring Summer '13 via Dazed Digital Continue reading

Denim, blue jeans, dungarees, chambray. Classic and distressed, patched and stitched. It never gets old. on left: textiles by Maki Yamamoto on right: Madewell Rivet and Thread collection left and right: Liberty for AG Kathryn Clark's foreclosure quilts on left: Chimala denim workshirt for Madewell on right: a perfect Canadian tuxedo image from 45rpm Spring '13 lookbook on left: great outfit from A Portable Package on right: distressed denim from Kapital Paneled shirt by Folk, available at the Joinery on left: another image from 45rpm Spring '13 lookbook on right: Mikaela on Stockholm Street Style Continue reading