Corner View - Miniature Worlds

OK.  Another post about flowers.  Do you mind?  Terribly?  These are called "Kalanchoe Fedtschenkoi", or commonly, "Purple Scallops" and may be also known as:  "Bryophyllum fedtschenei".  That according to a label on the side of one pot.  I was a little ambivalent in the fall about having bought two pots of them.  (On two separate occasions, which might indicate to me that I actually fell in love TWICE.  Either that, or, they are utterly forgettable.) Whatever the case, which seems more likely the latter, post-purchase, I was not REALLY much in love.  I said to my husband, "I am not so sure about them.  That salmony pink of the leaves.  So not me.  The green that is not really green.  That frosty haze on them.  So indeterminate and unconvincing.  So sidling up to being beige.  Who wants a beige plant?  Sure the leaves have that nice sort of cookie-cutter flat scalloped edging. Those purpley stems are kind of engaging.  But they look rather limp, don't they? And spindly?  And o.k.....Blah."  I was so not feeling those plants.

And.....questioning......myself.

But then January came and little boring buds appeared.  The buds turned into, hmm, bells.  In time, the bells opened.

Do you know the Victorian story books that are full of little elves and fairies?

They have little flower hats and they are playing hide'n'seek beneath the broad sloping sometimes feathery leaves.  Or having siestas leaned up against some big fat stem.  Or picnicking .  Using the insides of flower blossoms as slides. And petals as umbrellas.  Funny little elves inhabiting miniature worlds.

These blossoms take me there.  In order to be able to see inside them and their delicate-but-tangy pink and orange coloration, and the tiny red pistils like fine paint brushes or eye lashes, spangled with poppy seeds, you have to make yourself very small.  Like an ant.  Or a ladybug.  And position yourself way below them.  They will never EVER look up at you. 

I think that that is kind of cool.  

Industrial Chic - Colorforms Kaka'ako, Honolulu

Do you like industrial zones?  Heavy equipment?  Sawdust and metal?

Maybe because I had little brothers, and a Dad who was happy to put a hammer in my hand,

 I love these out of the way places where things are fixed, and made, taken apart and put back together.

A place where guys are actually orderly and all their things have a place.  And they know where to find them without asking YOU!

I love these places when they are humming with activity but I love them especially at lunchtime, or on the weekends, when the activity slows and the workplaces go silent.  And a kind of peace descends on them.  They are nice places to wander where you will encounter very few other people and you can 

just listen to the silence and enjoy the neighborhood forms as they melt into abstractions.

It's in these moments that you notice what poetry they have to offer.  Sometimes they evoke scenes from Raymond Chandler novels.

They sometimes drop you back in time.  And sometimes little details turn into big surprises.

Like these baby coconuts.  Which are even smaller than in these pictures.

Have you ever seen a baby coconut before?  Aren't they beautiful and cute?

Sadly, over time off the tree they do not stay like this.  They shrivel up into crispy little brown things.  But think about it, how often do you find a coconut when you're going to get your car fixed?!!!!!

That's why I've always liked getting well off the beaten track.  Cause you never, ever know.........

Happy Weekend! Hope the Sun Shines for You

The stay-cation is nearly over, but the weekend has just begun!  What will you be doing?

Juxtapositions

Since I'm stay-cationing close to home this week, it seems consistent with the theme to share with you some "still lifes" from around the house.

It's a little odd to do this, because it makes me look at my stuff with someone else's eye.

I guess I definitely like things that are assertive and definite in their color and form.

Ceramics on right: Emma Katz

I definitely like all that is handmade.

Ceramics front and left: Marie Kodama; rear right: Drew Montgomery

I also love mercury glass and mirrors of any sort.  I love the way they reflect and throw light, I love the way they open and break up space, like in a Bonnard painting.  I love the way they refract light.  I love the way they glimmer.

I think I definitely like to bring the outdoors indoors with natural forms.

I've always been a bit snooty about women who collect dolls

but I realize I must be collecting them in other forms.  And how much I'm influenced by imagery from my early Catholic years.

Doll far right: Charla Khana

I love textiles and animals.

I love textures and patterns. 

And apparently after many years of schlepping things from one part of the world to another,

Little things still mean alot.   What do your things say about you?

Pegge Hopper

Do you know Pegge Hopper?   She is a Californian longtime transplanted to Hawaii whose paintings of Hawaiian women have become part of the Hawaiian mainstream culture and which are almost emblematic of the beauty and serenity of island life.  She worked early in life in Italy and I find references in her work not only to Paul Gauguin but also to the Italian pre-Renaissance painter Giotto.  Particularly in the simplicity of forms and compositions that she utilizes but also in the sensitivity in the details of the face, hands and feet which are so delicately and exquisitely rendered.  There is also a little bit of the Douanier Rousseau in her representations of tropical environments.  She has recently explored new formats and subjects.  This latest series of cats ("popoki") are very charming.  Mostly her paintings capture the dreaminess that the experience of Hawaii's soft air and gentle waters inspires.

The dazzling colors of the islands 

and it's people.

The variety and brilliance of it's flora and fauna.

The luminosity of its skies and waters.

The mysteriousness of Hawaiian beauty and it's secret places.

Pegge Hopper offers original acrylics and giclee reproductions for sale at her website here. 

I hope you like them.

Corner View - Coffee Companion

Today's Corner View is about coffee companions.  I've always wanted to live in France which is an obvious place to be if you love coffee (there, and Italy, but I'll get to that) and you want to have faithful and regular coffee companions. Living in France it would be de rigueur to bring your French dog along with you to watch the world go by.

A fluffy, stately, and highly protective Briard would be just the thing.  To lean against your legs in case of cold drafts. And to lean against the rest of you and growl MENACINGLY at unwelcome panhandlers, flower sellers, religious cults and persistent "dragueurs" who might be a little spoiling your quiet moment on the terrasse.  And blocking your view of the passing "foule".  As long as he did not wrap his leash around the table and topple it in a moment of exuberance. Spilling coffee all over your new coat and shoes.

Photo: Francois Halard, Vogue March 2010

I would welcome company in the form of handsome Eurasian French men.   Like Frederic Fekkai.  I like to fantasize that since he is Aixois, I used to rub elbows with him at places like "Le Grillon" on the Cour Mirabeau (in Aix-en-Provence) which was the bar where all the beautiful young people congregated to smoke their cigarettes and plant kisses on each other four times on the cheek.  (That would count already as a coffee companion, wouldn't it?)  He's got great taste in animals.  My, doesn't his French donkey look a little like my Briard?  You know what they say, "Great Minds Think Alike!"  Do you think he ever gets his scissors out on that shaggy moptop? (The donkey's.)  And if we got quite cozy as coffee-buddies, do you think he might consider getting them out for mine?

Of course the ultimate coffee companion in the culinary sense is chocolate.  And if I were to become a long-term denizen of the French scene I would almost be morally obligated to intiate a Bicerin campaign in my neighborhood to make the drink a standard item on the cafe menu. Isn't it strange that Bicerin's have never made it to France yet????? Or perhaps it has, but they call it by another name.  Anyone know?

Bicerins come from Piedmont in the North of Italy (as did my Grandfather, who actually considered himself French - a long story).  In fact there is a little cafe in Turin called the Bicerin, where the drink originated.  And they serve it in voluptous glass goblets "Bicerins" instead of coffee cups.  

So what IS a Bicerin ALREADY?  You might well ask.  It is expresso, mixed with hot dense French (Italian) style drinking chocolate and served with thick heavy cream.  Throw in a couple of biscotti and dear hearts, you will know that you have died and gone to heaven!

The picture above is from Carlucccio's in London, which is where I first experienced this breakfast drink of the Gods.  I like that they serve the different components in their own little jugs (the chocolate and coffee MUST be impossibly hot) so that you can mix according to your taste.  I usually let my Bicerin get creamier and then sweeter as I go on.  I do drink and mix very slowly.  To prolong the ecstasy.  Sadly, VERY SADLY, Carluccio's has recently been sold to an CORPORATE RESTAURANT GROUP and the Bicerin now being served there though still charmingly presented, exhibits pronounced characteristics of instant chocolate pudding, i.e., not proper European drinking chocolate at all, and tastes instead of artificial sweeteners and cornstarch.  ICK!  (Nothing lasts.  Sigh.)

So my recommendation is, start your own Bicerin campaign, and in the meantime, order all the different components at your next cafe visit, or try to make it at home.  You will not be sorry.

Photo credit: Unknown

For more about Bicerin, you can click these links:  from David Lebovitz's blog and the New York Times.

Spring!!!!!!!!!!

Hello to all!  Happy March!  Hope everybody had a good weekend despite MORE snow, earthquakes and tsunamis. Feeling terrible for Chile.  Hope we all can rally and help them all out without taking our eyes off of Haiti too.  I hope to post more about this later on in the week.  Meanwhile had a really great weekend celebrating a birthday with loved ones.  What about you?

In L.A. it's going to be truly spring weather this week with temps in the mid-60's.  It is almost the time of the jacarandas here.  Through February we've had narcissus, lantana, bergenia, crabapple blossom, honeysuckle, iris, pyrethrum, icelandic and California poppies, camellias and magnolia blooming. (!!!) Now it's the time of jasmine in profusion (our neighborhood is already swathed in perfume), some early wisteria are showing flowers on their vines, my euphorbia are bustin' out! and california daisies and blue lupines are appearing on the freeway embankments.  It's a DREAM.

Mr. Paradis and I are going to be stay-cationing here all week.  This will mean abbreviated posts and maybe not so many visits to all of you, but I hope to bring you all a little piece of the paradise we capture in the weeks to come and I hope you know I'M THINKING OF YOU.

So have a good one yourselves!  Ahui hou!  ("See you soon" - in Hawaiian.)