top image is mine (breakfast one october morning)
bottom images: 1. Untitled, 2. Untitled, 3. Untitled, 4. Untitled, 5. Untitled, 6. film: at blackbird
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today, i’m feeling the darker days and flat light in october. it’s been grey, chilly and rainy in new york the past few days and i think that has a lot to do with it. i like the feeling this weather gives me – time to bundle up, pull out the wool, stop going sock-less. but i’m also hoping for a bit more sun and bright fall colors in the coming weeks.
and i’ve got some news! many of you already know this, but i haven’t talked about it around here yet.
i’m moving to london.
!!!!
i know. it feels strange to say that, even now, when i’ve known for a few months. i’ll be moving in a few weeks, in the middle of november. i’m moving for work — my firm asked me to do a rotation in their london office, and i accepted. while it’s not permanent (i will be there for a year, possibly a bit longer), it still feels pretty huge. i’m incredibly excited about it, but nervous. but as a wise friend so eloquently put it recently, “the things that make you smile and make you nervous are the very best things.” they are, indeed.
so, i have a little project up my sleeve that has come out of this move, and i hope to share it with you here in a couple of weeks. in the meantime, i’m looking at flats online and dreaming about the many restaurants and cafes that i’ll visit, and the neighborhoods where i’ll take photo walks. not to mention the fact that i can finally pick up a copy of ‘tender‘ and visit places like this. i’ve always been sort of an anglophile, so i know that this will be a good move for me.
i’ll miss brooklyn terribly, but i will be back after my rotation is over. in the meantime, i’m soaking up every last bit of NYC that i can, while looking forward to an exciting year ahead.
i hope your weekend is tops, and i’ll see you here next week. and thank you for all of your wonderful comments and emails this week. cheers!
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hello hello.
i think it’s time to finish sharing photos from my trip to portland and seattle (although i do still have more pics that i will post here and there). my time in seattle was short, but i tried to do lots of fun stuff while i was there. i spent an afternoon walking around and snapping photos with anna and jon, my wonderful seattle tourguides. and that last photo is from breakfast with molly on my last day (where this was taken). we got pastries from honore bakery. well, i got 2 different kinds … i had been eating like a crazy person all week, so i figured there was no need to stop then. they were both amazing – the kouign amann and a canelé. i’m drooling just thinking about them. what a memorable morning. i hope to be able to spend more time in seattle one day soon.
also, hello to all of you who came here from decor8 blog. i appreciate all of your nice comments and emails. unfortunately, i’m so behind on answering emails right now that i wanted to answer the question that most people asked me right here. what sort of camera do i use?
for digital photos, i use a canon digital rebel xTi with the kit lens or, most of the time, a prime lens (a canon 50mm f/1.8). but most of the photos i’ve been sharing here over the past few months are film photos (you can tell if the photos are film by looking at the tags of a post). for my film shots, i use a pentax k1000, with a 50mm f/1.7 prime lens. i use a variety of different film types (most often, it’s fuji 400H or portra 400nc). and i take medium-format shots with my diana+.
i hope that is helpful. and i hope the rest of this week passes quickly, because it’s another tough one. but looking at the photos above from my trip have put a smile on my face.
hope to be back here tomorrow for friday flickr faves.
cheers!
dan siney (photographer from vancouver), in pyramid power, issue 6
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i think i’ll make this a regular habit around here: a quick post sharing a bit of printed material that is currently inspiring to me.
have a great day.
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keeping with the restaurant theme around here this week…
the sandwich pictured above might possibly be the best sandwich i’ve ever eaten. i know. hard to believe? well then, you should head to saltie (378 metropolitan avenue, williamsburg brooklyn) as soon as possible, and try it out for yourself. i promise you won’t be disappointed.
i had been wanting to try saltie since they opened just a couple of weeks ago. a friend’s enthusiastic recommendation was all it took to get me there a few sundays ago for lunch.
the sandwich above is the ’scuttlebutt’, which is made on house-baked focaccia, and is layered with sliced hardboiled egg, feta cheese, tomatoes, arugula, olives, capers, and some sort of pickled veg. it was perfectly put together, and it had a salty, smoky, briny flavor that was spot-on. i basically licked my plate.
there is also good, strong french-press coffee and lots of other food offerings, including an egg sandwich with fresh ricotta and eggs that i’ve heard good things about. i want to go back and try the car bomb, which is saltie caramel ice cream & guinness float. the baked goods also look fantastic – i bought something sweet to take with me, and i barely made it down the block before i had finished the entire thing. i don’t remember the name of the pastry, but it’s the one with the currants and whisky enclosed in a flaky crust. blew my mind. seriously.
this place is the brainchild of caroline fidanza, who i’ve mentioned here before. her writing in diner journal is always entertaining and after eating at marlow & sons numerous times, and making her recipes from diner journal, i trust that anything she touches will be delicious. i wasn’t disappointed.
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a few links for you today, because it’s been awhile:
+ can’t stop watching this amazing levi’s commercial (watch with volume)
+ a restless transplant
+ father’s house, randolph, vt
+ + karen o, where the wild things are
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hi there. it sure feels good to be back here today. i had a pretty awful week last week, one that i’d prefer to forget about immediately.
and what better way to forget about an unpleasant week than to talk about my trip to delancey when i was visiting seattle?
the phrase “labor of love” keeps popping into my head whenever i think about molly and brandon’s place. it’s a little cliché, yes. but i think it’s because i know how hard they worked to make this restaurant a reality, and how hard they still work to make it the place that it is. writing about it is tough; i wish i had molly’s way with words to aptly describe how i feel about it. but i will say this: to see 2 people follow their dream so completely, and to make something that is so utterly theirs … well, it’s one of the most inspiring things i know of. when i first heard that they were opening a pizza restaurant, i had a vision in my head about what it would be like. i imagined it would feel as if you were in their kitchen, chatting over a bottle of wine with some cheese and pickled veg. and you know what? that’s exactly what it feels like to me after visiting a few weeks ago.
and the food! oh my, the food. i had dinner with some new friends, anna, alexandria and jon. what a fun dinner we had. we started off with a special starter that night – the wood oven-roasted clams with garlic, shallots and parsley. they were perfectly sweet and briny. earlier that day, upon hearing that brandon had found shishito peppers at the market, i told molly how much i love the way a certain NYC restaurant prepares them – tossed with olive oil, blistered in the oven and then topped with a sprinkle of lemon juice and sea salt. well, brandon made my night by suprising us with a plate of perfectly-blistered peppers. i’m smiling right now as i think about it.
and then: the pizza. brandon has really done something special here — it’s one of the best pies i’ve ever had, hands down. we ordered the margherita and the padron. the crust is a revelation – perfectly chewy and blistered, with a flavor that made me say to my dinner companions, “this is what pizza crust should taste like.”
finally, we split molly’s bittersweet chocolate chip cookies with grey sea salt. i was in heaven …. just perfect.
the space is warm and inviting, and it was wonderful to be able to meet their good friend sam after we had exchanged emails about photography earlier this year (he was filling in as host that night). after saying our goodbyes, we walked out and looked back at the glow of happy people through the windows. and i got goosebumps looking at that scene — brandon carefully watching each pizza going in and out of the oven; molly calmly working in the kitchen and smiling warmly at people as they came through the door.
congratulations molly + brandon. and thank you for the most memorable meal i’ve had in a long, long time.
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i took a train from portland to seattle, and i put on some good music while i stared out the window, and it was amazing. the top 2 photos were taken through the train window near puget sound as we moved along the water northward. it was one of the most beautiful travel experiences i’ve ever had – a perfect day for sun and fog and filtered light and gulls flying alongside our train.
and then i arrived in sunny seattle, which i hope to tell you more about soon.
but work has turned into a bit of a nightmare this week. i hope to be back here soon with more to share (including photos from delancey!).
in the meatime, please read this. my heart is broken and jen has written a wonderful tribute. i couldn’t agree more.
a good day to you.
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lots of photos today … these are the last ones from portland. next up: seattle!
i also have a few ideas up my sleeve for some different (non-vacation) posts this week. depending on my work schedule, i hope to share them with you later in the week.
a few people emailed me asking for a list of places i ate in portland. i’ve shared a few photos of these places, but i do love lists (and talking about food), so here you go:
+ clyde common (lunch, dinner, and late-night eats. tops.)
+ kenny and zuke’s
+ the food carts in portland are amazing. my favorite: ziba’s pitas (photo above)
+ pok pok
+ laurelhurst market (stephanie gave me the heads up about this place, so my friend tripp and i went here for dinner. it was excellent. he said it was one of the top two burgers he’s ever eaten. my steak frites were delicious. it’s a great space – a butcher/meat market during the day, and a restaurant at night. go here!)
+ pearl bakery (i had the chocolate bouchon based on molly’s recommendation, and the gibassier based on youngna’s recommendation. both were amazing)
+ ken’s artisan bakery (the croissant!)
+ sahagun chocolates
+ bijou cafe (breakfast)
+ byways cafe (breakfast)
+ pine state biscuits
+ as for coffee: stumptown (of course) and another brand, courier coffee (you can get it at half and half cafe)
this list gives you an indication of how much i managed to eat over the course of my stay in portland. it was great!
see you tomorrow for some seattle pics. have a great day.
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hello. above, some medium-format shots (taken with my diana+) for your friday morning.
i never know what i will get back when i take pics with this camera … i’m not crazy about all of these but they still make me smile.
i liked this feature on a new book about design, called ‘dark nostalgia’.
i have to run, but i think i’ll see you back here over the weekend. i still have lots of photos to share from my travels! i’m also going to do some book shopping this weekend, chili-tasting, and pizza-eating in brooklyn. i hope yours is full of good stuff, too.
thanks for all of your nice comments this week! cheers.
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while in portland, i was very happy to meet up with some online friends, 2 photographers that i admire very much – stephanie and abby. i shared breakfast with abby at byways, a quirky restaurant in the pearl that had delicious food and the best mugs. and then i had a really fun lunch with stephanie at clyde common – everything we ate was so good, but i do think the french fries with harissa were a highlight for me (as well as that ninkasi IPA!). both stephanie and abby were such a pleasure to hang out with.
also pictured above are 2 good places that i visited in pdx, recommended by stephanie and abby. first, half and half — a small coffee shop that served courier coffee (youngna, it was great!) and provided a great place to sit and read a book. also, frances may, a nicely curated shop carrying men’s (and women’s) clothing.
it makes me really happy to have made lots of new friends via this blog and flickr, and it’s even better to be able to get together and chat with them over a meal. such good stuff.
a happy october to you (i do wish this year would slow down, don’t you?)
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isn’t portland photogenic? i thought so.
some stuff pictured above that i really liked…
+ the international rose garden at dusk
+ spending a hot afternoon browsing at powell’s books (this place is a bit overwhelming)
+ pastaworks! (what a market…)
+ visiting beckel canvas, the place where eena bags are made
+ the greens in portland seemed to be deeper and darker than what i’m used to … it might be that pacific NW light
+ the old cars parked everywhere in portland neighborhoods (i have so many photos of these and can’t wait to share them all – by far one of my favorite things about portland)
+ so many good breakfast spots (my favorite meal), and a great beer bar downtown
also, i know that some of you were wondering about how i process slide film. well, i’m not an expert here so if you have more info, please feel free to leave a comment and share. but i have it processed along with my negatives – it’s developed using a different process (E-6, vs C-41 for regular negatives). and then the slides are scanned onto a CD for me (i don’t have a scanner yet myself). it’s really no different than negatives as far as developing goes. the main difference that i notice is that you need to be more careful when you shoot with it (it’s less forgiving with regard to exposure). also, you can cross-process slide film with some really great results. hope that helps!
i’m having fun re-living my trip with these photos … thanks for joining me. see you back here for more tomorrow.
