Aster + Sage
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Caught My Eye

March 12th, 2010

photo by Chelak Maxim

Captivating portraits by Russian photographer Chelak Maxim.

See more here.

Try It: Play With Squares

March 11th, 2010

Nice: looking at a pretty picture.
Nicer: your own picture [no guarantees about it being pretty].
This exercise will have you forming relationships with totally inanimate objects, you just wait and see…

Tear two colorful pages from a catalog or magazine. More colors are better.

random catalog

Use a paper cutter or a pair of scissors to cut the paper into strips, then 1″-ish squares. The size isn’t all that important.

Start arranging all the pieces on top of a sheet of white copy paper.

organizing squares

As long as you’re not recreating the pages as they looked before you cut them up [you sneak!] any arrangement is fine. Just try to organize them in a way that’s pleasing to you.

organized squares

Once you’ve got all those squares laid out on the paper, move it aside [don't mess up the squares, leave them as they are] and get a new sheet of copy paper. You’re going to fill this paper with squares but none will overlap [see photo below]–  this version will be an iteration [another version] of the first sheet of squares.
This means you’ll have to choose individual squares from the first sheet and glue them down in a neat, linear grid. Look at the first sheet, choose a square that most looks like the area you pulled it from, and glue it down. Repeat.

organizing squares

Here’s what you’ll find– you start to form a relationship with the squares you pull off the first sheet of paper and attach to the new sheet. Is this the right square? How does it look with the one I just glued down?

I highly doubt that your finished project will look glamorous, or make sense to any unwitting bystanders, but this was an exercise in process.

squares are all arranged

It’s one thing to see something and get a great feeling, but the idea here is to actively engage in the process of making something. Because we knew from the outset that the final project is unlikely to be a thing of beauty, it’s a heck of a lot easier to let go of preconceived notions and enjoy the process.
I hope this gave your mind a little 7th inning stretch.

[Postscript: When I was posting this I noticed I must have used the reverse side of the 2nd catalog page-- I don't see those pillow colors anywhere]

Caught My Eye

March 10th, 2010

poster by Aesthetic Apparatus

Something about those swirls, those colors, they’ve got me mesmerized.

See more from Aesthetic Apparatus here.

Caught My Eye

March 9th, 2010

World Cup Poster 1966

Who could resist? See more World Cup posters here.

Heard it from a Yankee

March 4th, 2010

Aster+Sage will be in the May/June issue of Yankee Magazine. Photos will appear here shortly [it's March already, so May's like... 2 weeks away, right?]

Try It: Look for Color

March 4th, 2010

I’ve got a little exercise I do when everything around me’s looking kinda bland. In fact, the blander the better.

A wintry landscape is perfect but you can try this anywhere, indoors or out.

It’s pretty simple. I start by looking for anything that’s red. Once I’ve seen all the red there is to see, I work my way through the rest: orange yellow green blue purple.

Here’s what happens.

I’ll think to myself ‘there’s nothing here that could be red’ and I start to look… and almost inevitably I will see something red. Though maybe it’s more orange… and it begins a conversation in my head about whether it is red…or orange.

After I’ve found all the red stuff I move on to the next color.

It’s not so much an exercise about color. It’s really a way to see how much I didn’t see before I started looking.

So try it right now: look around you and find everything that’s red. Make sure to determine if what looks read is really red to you, not any other color (If you don’t, making your way through all the colors gets lame really fast) and then move on to orange.

See anything new?

P.S. I included this photo in case you’re really at a loss for something to look at [click on it to make it bigger]. But the real world is a far better place to try this out.

nyc vendor cart

Animals, Animals

March 4th, 2010

Trinket Black Cat PendantTrinket Black Animal Head Pendant

Here’s the newest pendants I’ve added to our online store. More to come tomorrow.

Whew! It may not look like much, but posting new products take a lot of back end work. Time for a coffee break!

Click on the photos to get more info.

Caught My Eye

March 2nd, 2010

Can't We Live Together?

Oh, the joys of Twitter!

That’s where I met Jamie Shelman, fellow RISD grad. And that’s how I ended up with this gem in my mailbox. I mean my real, certifiable, a postman comes to my door daily and drops off mail kind of mailbox.

Actually, this pertains to you too. Every order I ship out gets a little Jamie Shelman card in with their order. Wholesale and retail.

They say the USPS may cut out Saturday deliveries, but won’t that make the other 5 days of the week a little sweeter? (I only seem to get bills and junk mail on Saturday anyway.)

Follow Jamie on twitter at @hmstrjam and while you’re at it, follow me too @linda_astersage

Caught My Eye

March 2nd, 2010

Selleck Waterfall Sandwich Official Logo

Official Selleck Waterfall Sandwich logo… see photos of Tom Selleck and a sandwich in various watery outdoor locations here.

Caught My Eye

March 1st, 2010

See more of what Daniel A. Becker does here.