Belgian-born, New York-based Natalie Joos is a fashion consultant and founder of Tales of Endearment. Very inspired by her unique combinations of vintage, designer, color, pattern, and texture; and her layering of casual sweaters over fancy dresses.

In Snowballs, Proenza Schouler continue their collaboration with Harmony Korine to showcase their Fall 2011 collection.

With a Nico-esque voice captivating melodies strangely dark and sweet all at once, songstress Cate Le Bon holds her own as more than just the opening act for St. Vincent. However, she is the opening act for St. Vincent so don’t be late!

St. Vincent / Cate Le Bon Tour Dates
10/06 – St. Louis, MO @ Old Rock House
10/07 – Lawrence, KS @ Liberty Hall
10/08 – Boulder, CO Boulder Theater
10/10 – Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge
10/12 – Vancouver, BC @ Commodore Ballroom
10/13 – Seattle, WA @ Neptune Theatre
10/14 – Portland, OR @ Crystal Ballroom
10/18 – Los Angeles, CA @ Music Box
10/20 – Phoenix, AZ @ Crescent Ballroom
10/22 – Dallas, TX @ Kessler Theater
10/23 – Dallas, TX @ Kessler Theater
10/24 – Austin, TX @ Moody Theater at ACL Live
10/25 – Houston, TX @ Fitzgerald’s
10/26 – New Orleans, LA @ Tiptina’s
10/28 – Atlanta, GA @ The Earl
10/30 – Charlottesville, VA @ Jefferson Theater
11/01 – Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club
11/02 – Philadelphia, PA @ Union Transfer
11/03 – New York, NY @ Webster Hall
11/04 – Boston, MA @ Royale

Bio:
A new force in song craft, Cate Le Bon currently resides in Cardiff’s infamous French quarter and befitting a songwriter who only writes in the dark, her music is a heady and highly personal Gallic stew of equal parts Nico, Malkmus and the chronicler’s own emotional observations on the impossibility of existence.

Disheartened by the constant stream of dead animals she found herself burying in her parents farm in Penboyr, West Wales, and inspired by her fathers impeccable record collection (The Velvets, Neil Young, Pavement et. al) Cate packed her things and begrudgingly set sail for the neon lights and ample rehearsal space available in her country’s capital.

Following a string of club night shows in the city, Cate caught the attention of Super Furry Animals front man Gruff Rhys who over a cigar and a glass of brandy offered her some support slots with his band. Cate continued to gig extensively in the UK releasing singles and a Welsh language EP (Edrych Yn Llygaid Ceffyl Benthyg) on the Indie Record label Peski.

Knowing that there’s never too much of a good thing, Rhys roped Cate into his hip hop exchange program Neon Neon. What began as a guest vocal appearance on their debut single, “I Lust You,” resulted in a year of touring the world as part of their band.

During a month’s break from the road, with her confidence and enthusiasm doubled, Cate retired to Y Gerlan in the mountains of North Wales for a prophetic 10 day recording session which resulted in the release of her debut full length album Me Oh My to rapturous critical acclaim. On the back of the album’s US release in April 2010, Cate completed a two month tour stretching from SXSW in Texas to Café Hotel in Los Angeles, sending postcards from Boston, Buffalo, San Francisco and New York along the way.

Like a dutiful daughter Cate returned for the British festival season, seeing out the summer at Glastonbury, The Great Escape and Field Day to name a few, and snatching free time between performances to write new material in her North Walian bolthole.

At the dawn of 2011, Cate re-entered the studio to start work on a new record of her own. Drawing on her experiences of the last year, Cate has created collection of pop nuggets that sound like they’ve fallen off the back of a broken carousel, imbued with the playfulness of Faust and Syd Barrett and the tropical melodies of Os Mutantes. Existential word play abounds and fuzz fused guitar lines tear through like an angry bee in a CAN on CYRK, which is due in the US via The Control Group label in early 2012. “Puts Me To Work” is the first single from that record.

One of my favorite memories of my grandma’s house in Ohio was the hummingbird feeder she kept hanging from the big tree in her front yard. My mother carried on the tradition and regularly attracts hummingbirds to her feeders each season, so when we started our garden in the spring I decided that I too would become a hummingbird aficionado.

Fail. I was so disappointed in my lack of ornithological skills that I said screw it, and just let the feeder hang there all summer while the syrupy nectar melted down to nothing.

But then…Monday morning while standing outside admiring our tomato and herb plants, a hummingbird started hovering right in front of me just a few feet away! I cleaned the feeder, made some food and put it back out in hopes of securing the little lady to stay. We now have at least two (they’re so fast it’s hard to keep track) female ruby-throated hummingbirds living in our backyard (males actually have a ruby throat and are very protective of their feeders). Feels nice to continue the tradition.

Learn more about attracting hummingbirds here

Last weekend, the citizens of Sofia, Bulgaria awoke to find a public monument to Red Army defaced by an unknown interventionist. The statues of Soviet soldiers who “liberated” Bulgaria from the Nazis in 1944 were painted as Superman, Joker, Ronald McDonald, Santa Claus, Captain America and other pop culture icons of capitalist Americana. Below it, a graffiti caption read: “In step with the times!” or “”abreast with the times!” depending on the translation. As you might guess this angered both Bulgarian and Russian officials who are actively searching for the artist some are calling the “Bulgarian Banksy”.  The clean-up process on the sculpture started on Tuesday morning even though 1,700 people rallied on Facebook against removing the artists’ work.

Katy Grannan was born in Arlington, Massachusetts in 1969. She received her B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1991 and her M.F.A. from Yale University in 1999. She lives in Berkeley, California, and Brooklyn, New York.

Throughout her work, the influence of portraiture, from classical painting to fashion advertising, can be sensed in the poses and gazes her models adopt. From escapism to self-discovery and catharsis, the motivations for posing – the projection of idealized self into the lens of a stranger – are varied, yet the resulting images consistently reflect the intensity of the relationship between artist and model. Each image resonates with the tension of a first encounter.

In several of Grannan’s series, the photographs her models in their own surroundings or her own home, paying meticulous attention to the elements of each domestic setting: wood paneling, patterned wallpaper, and other mundane but often telling details. The subjects choose to remain clothed or model nude, or to pause somewhere in between, working with Grannan to arrive at the pose. In Grannan’s series Sugar Camp Road and Mystic Lake, she moves the exercise outdoors, using municipal parks and their surrounding areas as the backdrop. Even though parklands and roadsides that serve as her set bring the private encounters of her earlier series into the public landscape, she maintains a delicate – yet increasingly charged – sense of intimacy.

Katy Grannan’s BOULEVARD series (top three images) is on display at the Fraenkel Gallery (49 Geary Street, San Francisco) January 6, 2011 – February 19, 2011.

When a CNN reporter asked admitted Freemason and Congressman Nick Rahall (D-WV) if the secret fraternity is trying to dominate the globe, he bizarrely replied: “Well let’s say no. But if we were, would I tell ya? No.”  Ok…a simple no would have sufficed Congressman.

Read an entire article about Freemasons in our government here

posted by: Harold Johns III

In true punk rock fashion the band defied orders. Costello began his SNL performance with the less-controversial song “Less than Zero.” But after a few bars, he turned to the Attractions waving his hand and yelling “Stop! Stop!,” then said to the audience, “I’m sorry, ladies and gentlemen, there’s no reason to do this song here,” possibly referring to the fact “Less than Zero” was written as a reply to British fascist politician of the day Oswald Mosley. The SNL music director at the time Howard Shore attributed it to Costello purposely bucking the pressure he felt from Columbia Records.

Either way, Lorne Micheals was furious. The second Costello changed songs Micheals allegedly began flipping Costello the bird and continued to do so until the end of the performance. Whether Micheal’s reaction had more to do with the SNL’s taping being thrown off schedule or Costello’s song choice remains to be seen. However, Costello would not appear again on Saturday Night Live until 1989. On SNL’s 25th anniversary show in 1999, Costello interrupted the Beastie Boys’ performance of “Sabotage” in a similar but joking fashion, and together they broke into a version of “Radio Radio.”

And follow suit they shall. The quick success of the label speaks for itself: a full page spread in Nylon, a write-up on Style.com comparing the label to of-the-moment designer Junya Watanabe, and an exclusive 1,000 piece deal with Opening Ceremony. Thank you Max Osterweis for taking the fashion industry a step in the right direction.

Update November 2010:
Since this post in February 2009, Suno has gained much more acclaim with its innovative designs. Check out Suno Spring 2011, Resort 2011 and Fall 2010 collections on Style.com to see the progression of the brand.

For our sixth and final installment of architectural projects dedicated to vertical farming, renewable energies, and the construction of a better, greener 21st century, s.a.johnson discusses Aberrant Agriculture by University of Kansas Masters of Architecture student Scott Johnson, also known to the Rathaus as s.a.johnson.

The sixth and final post on vertical architecture presented by The Rathaus is titled Aberrant Agriculture. Designed by Scott Johnson, a Masters of Architecture student at the University of Kansas, the 30-story high-rise takes a fresh, new approach to growing food in an urban environment. Aberrant Agriculture combines vertical farming, residential, hotel, and retail functions into a single, hybrid structure that is intended to be self-sufficient in regards to its carbon footprint and impact upon the environment.

While other concepts for vertical farms efficiently site their towers within the urban fabric, thus minimizing the need for food distribution through transport, Johnson’s project entirely eliminates the need for transport by processing and vending the entirety of the building’s food yield on site. The building is biomimetically influenced by the anatomical make-up of a sea cucumber. A sea cucumber’s exterior skin is structured for protection while its interior anatomy is dedicated to sustenance. They have generally flaccid exterior shells that are capable of becoming very rigid when endangered and their interior anatomy is primarily dedicated to the processing of food and reproduction. These systems are reproduced in Johnson’s project. The vertical farm is an entity in the building’s core that nourishes and provides for the hotel and residential occupants inhabiting the building’s shell who in turn react to the climatic conditions that Chicago presents them.

The agricultural core hydroponically grows 12 Power Foods, as Johnson calls them, that are known for their high concentrations of essential nutrients, vitamins, minerals, and protein. These foods include: citrus fruits, berries, tomatoes, onions, peppers, broccoli, spinach, sweet potatoes, eggs, black beans, garlic, and various herbs. The production of food, in accompaniment with housing, creates a different form of sustainable building than has been planned by organizations like LEED. The on-site food production creates a building that not only sustains itself but the people that inhabit it daily. Johnson does not, however, intend for the vertical farm’s yield to be the only source of sustenance for the occupants but for the yield produced to theoretically equal the annual need, in caloric intake, of the residents of the building. This system thus seeks to minimize and offset the consumption of food produced hundreds or thousands of miles away and shipped to Chicago. All excess produce will be for sale to the public in a market on the easily accessible third level of the building.

The vertical farm employs similar systems to those seen in urban farming projects by SOA Architects, William McDonough, Mithun, Gordon Graff and Dickson Despommier. Fresh water is drawn from Lake Michigan and stored in underground cisterns. Hydroponic systems pump nutrient infused water to all plants. Lighting is carefully monitored in each growing area to the specific preferences of individual crops. Humidity and room temperature are likewise adjusted for individual plants and also according to sunlight and circadian growing cycles. Ventilation is controlled separately in each growing space and is capable of drawing newly circulated air from the building’s spacious atrium. Finally, energy is produced from burning the large amounts of methane in plant waste and harvesting the steam for electricity.

An urban agriculture initiative that draws water from a local resource, in this case Lake Michigan, would make Chicago an influential precedent setter for other Great Lakes cities such as Buffalo, Detroit, Cleve­land, Toledo, Erie, Milwaukee, Green Bay, Toronto, and Duluth. Imagine traveling to the city to catch a glimpse of an agricultural environment. By creating an accessible farm at the core of a residential high-rise, residents will reestablish a relation­ship with the food they consume. People will rely on the build­ing for sustenance rather than simply for shelter and thus feel a deeper connection with the building and its occupants than with other buildings in their environments.

Proposals for hybrid buildings such as Johnson’s have the ability to transform our built environments and reinvent the cities we know. Johnson asserts that the implementation of urban agriculture, housed in towers throughout cities worldwide, is an efficient, sustainable, achiev­able, and above all, local solution to many global problems.

A pdf of the Aberrant Agriculture proposal can be downloaded here or please visit verticalfarm.com to see the new addition of Aberrant Agriculture to its site and check in on the other vertical farm designs mentioned above.

For more and higher quality images of Aberrant Agriculture please visit Johnson’s Flickr account.