Author Archives: Luke Norris
The Nolitan Hotel NYC
Nolita — “North of Little Italy” – is your neighborhood in New York and The Nolitan Hotel is your home when you’re here.
At the corner of Kenmare and Elizabeth Streets, The Nolitan Hotel is the first luxury boutique hotel in Manhattan to open in this authentic New York City neighborhood. Arriving August 1, 2011, The Nolitan Hotel combines luxurious downtown living with luxury boutique hotel services and amenities to create a distinct New York City experience. Our NYC boutique hotel offers accommodations, intuitive service and the comforts of home. And with only 55 rooms, we will take very good care of you.
Reservations
212.925.2555
reservations@nolitanhotel.com
Cope2 Bubble Tee
Graffiti artist Cope2 will soon be releasing a graphic T-shirt with his signature bubble. The shirt comes in grey and white.
ROOK: Beginnings
ROOK Beginnings from Rook Brand on Vimeo.
Love some of these guys graphics on their tees. ROOK is the brainchild of Jonathan Garcia and Joe King.
The Art of FLIGHT: The Metal Trailer 2
I can’t wait for this to come out in September. The first video ‘That’s It. That’s All’ changed the way I snowboarded. I’m sure from the two trailers that this is one’s going to be even more mind blowing. Track is by Arch Enemy – “Vengeance Is Mine”.
The World is Where We Live
The world is where we live from WWF on Vimeo.
A fantastic video that makes you realise how close the nature of humans and animal are. Created by WWF.
Food for thought
This is an area of design I’ve never really thought of, but imagine if you got the opportunity to create your own candy bar. There’s quite a lot of elements that you’d have to consider to it. How big would it be? What ingredients would you use? What shape would it be? How would you package it? What would you name it? It’s an interesting thought and has got me thinking outside the box and an area I’d like to investigate more. Sorry if this has made you hungry.
Hulk Baby
I stumbled across this fantastic foot high Hulk Baby figurine by Ron English while mountain biking through Hong Kong yesterday. The gallery wasn’t open where it was on display in the window, so I’m going to get back there this week to have a better look at the detail and maybe buy it if it’s not too expensive. Sorry for the ratty photo. I’ll take some better pics when I’m at the gallery again.
SBTG: We are 138
We are 138 from VITA BREVIS FILMS on Vimeo.
Mark Ong aka SBTG talks about his creative process and the hurdles he has had to overcome growing up in Singapore. He makes some great points in this interview I found inspiring and make me proud to own a pair of his sneaks.
Incase + Paul Rodriguez: Signature Collection
Paul Rodriguez has a strong following in the skateboard world and with his continued partnership with Incase, expanding to the street culture world. His latest collection of bags and accessories for the traveling skateboarder all built with good durability and design. The entire collection is available now through Incase.
Photography by Pavel Platonov
Little is known about Pavel Platonov other than he is from eastern Europe. I think his work tells a thousand words of how talented he is.
BMW i3 Concept
Could this be the future for BMW? It’s exciting to see car companies foresight for the future of automotive technology, their considerations to the environment and of course the looks of future models.
The i3 concept is powered by a 170-horsepower electric motor with the ability to propel it from 0 to 60 mph in under 8 seconds, the nimble errands runner’s liquid-cooled lithium-ion battery bank is at 80% charge capacity with only an hour at the charging station. Underneath is a brand new manufacturing methodology, the LifeDrive concept. Compartmentalized in Life aspect, where a composite of aluminum and carbon fiber-reinforced plastic (CFRP) makes up a strong, lightweight cell for the passengers. As for the Drive aspect, the battery bank, transmission, and drive-train are all underneath the Life cell, this layout enables BMW engineers to free up more space. Zero-emission and a drive range of 150 kilometers, or about 93 miles between charges, BMW has an ambitious goal of launch the i3 Concept in 2013.
Converse All Star Chuck Taylor ‘N-Wool’ Hi
Frank Ocean: “Swim Good”
Frank Ocean – Swim Good by BLINDO
I discovered this song after hearing this track over the top of the latest interview with Chad Muska for Supra Footwear on HBTV. Frank Ocean (aka Christopher Breaux) blends soul, pop-infused R&B. The track is off his debut LP “Nostalgia, Ultra“.
Download here
The art of design
A key to a good designer is the ability to multi-task. A lot of design work is charged out on ‘billable time’. Meaning each hour we are sitting in front of the computer is time we are working on a job and is allocated to a current project. This may seem straight forward but when you spend the majority of your time concepting and coming up with ideas. Some projects ie. a logo design can come to you in a day. And other times it can take weeks! So time is of the essence. What I try to do is take a brief or project idea and plant that seed in my mind and let it grow. A good example of this is when you start looking a buying a car and you like the colour red. You notice you start to see a lot of red cars on the road. This is the same with ‘brief seeds’. You plant the idea and you start to become aware of visuals that relate to the brief. This way you are always concepting. I have found it very effective for me. I am currently working on two interior design jobs at the moment. One retail the other residential. I decided to leave my computer at home over the weekend and pick up a new pile of interior design books to thumb through.
Source
NEIGHBORHOOD: 2011 2nd Fall/Winter “GIMME SHELTER” Lookbook
NEIGHBORHOOD has always channeled biker culture through their apparel. This coming fall/winter collection has kept with this look but also be inspired by the late 1960’s and events around the Vietnam war. I love the the grainy styling of photo shoot but I’ll wait to see the products in the flesh before I grab any August 6th.
44 Club with Nike and Wieden+Kennedy
44 Club with Nike and Wieden+Kennedy from The IPA on Vimeo.
A great watch to see the ongoing love/hate relationship between one of the largest advertising firms in the world and one of the largest sporting/leisure brands in the world. Nike’s Ed Elworthy and Weiden + Kennedy’s Nic Owen sit down to talk about this relationship that has lasted for over 30 years.
VERBAL Named Creative Director for Reebok
Reebok have just announced the news that musician and AMBUSH co-founder VERBAL will become the new creative director at Reebok. VERBAL has always been a dude that pushes fashion since becoming known through Teriyaki Boys and it’s obvious from Reeboks choice of Creative Director that they want to take Reebok to in a new direction. Best of luck to you VERBAL.