Monthly Archives: February 2013

The Curious Case of the Photo in the Bathroom at Dudley’s New York

The decor of Dudley’s, a popular Australian-style restaurant in New York’s Lower East Side, is beautiful and makes clever, amusing use of some unusual spaces.

Take it’s WC, for example. It’s almost as small as those you find on commercial aircraft — it’s a tight wedge of space tucked under the narrow stairs leading to the basement.

Though small, there’s just enough space, for some decorative flourishes and artwork. In this case, a framed 1990 Associated Press photo of then Aussie primer minister Bob Hawke golfing with the first President Bush during an official visit to the U.S. Framed with the black-and-white image is the original A.P. caption and slug information (the photo was for use with a profile article on then U.S. Secretary of State James Baker).

It’s a curious choice for a washroom photograph. Is there a cheeky underlying statement being made by having a picture of these political figures mounted, literally, above a toilet?

In any case, it’s an amusing nuanced detail, a touch of Australian identity at a restaurant that on the surface doesn’t scream its Aussie roots. (Well, except perhaps when the bartenders speak and you hear their accents.)

The View from the Office at Golden Hour … New York City

The 10th-floor view from our Hell’s Kitchen project office looking east toward Midtown Manhattan at golden hour. We love moments like this in NYC.

The Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York City

The legendary Apollo Theater on 125th Street in Harlem, NYC.

Giant Squinting Eyes by JR

Here’s another one of those gargantuan wheat-pasted photos on the side of a building in SoHo, New York City. These massive street art pieces are by the artist JR and are part of his series of Native American faces for the Inside Out Project.

The Awesome Coffee and Space at HeadFirst Coffee Roasters, Amsterdam

Amsterdam is a city with a lot of amazing spaces and a reputation for awesome, super-cool design. Awesome coffee, however, is not something Amsterdam is famous for. But that’s quickly changing. A handful of coffee roasters and cafes have recently set up shop in the city and are brewing some of the best coffee in Europe. Headfirst is one of them, and it’s doing it with great style and taste in design, as its cafe and branding attest. The cafe is full of vintage, mid-century modern furniture from Sourced and Sold, the shop to which it’s adjacent. This is the must-go coffee spot in AMS to get your double-espresso macchiato and while you’re at it, say, pick up that authentic Barcelona chair you’ve always wanted (most of the furniture is for sale from Sourced and Sold).

“Nothing Beats Groningen” … Amsterdam Stencil Street Art

More Amsterdam street art pix … Here a stencil painting on a wall in the city’s Nine Streets neighborhood, in the canal district. The guy in the image looks like Ghandi. The Dutch phrase is loosely translated as “Nothing beats Groningen,” which is a Dutch city far north of Amsterdam.

“Savvy”

“Savvy” graffiti on a post box on Wooster Street in SoHo, in downtown New York City. We call graffiti or weak street-arty stuff like this “graff-junk.”