Small Change

If you happen to live in the esteemed Southern portion of the east coast, our friends at Small Change are on the road and coming quickly! to a town near you. These friends are of the cinemotographic persuasion and host a series of experimental videos and music videos by Philly based filmmakers. For your viewing pleasure, they're toting...

Fantastical deteriorating video narratives, metaphysical workout videos, music videos, and experimental animations and documentaries from Philadelphia. Curated by the members of the Small Change film screening series you can expect the full range of emotions from sensory overloading trance-party-inducing visuals, deeply personal life-affirming introspection, Wu-Tang dance parties, and TGIF television nostalgia.

An event dubbed the Action News Tour, is one not to be missed! Besides, this could be your only chance to see those fancy nurses costumes in action on the dr. biggles screen.

The films in question are from the talented brains and braun of Ted Passon, Dave Dunn, Chris Ward, Andrew Jeffrey Wright, Ryan Trecartin, Sarah J. Christman, Michael Robinson and Clare E. Rojas. The pictures in question are of course, therefore:

2/21: Roanoke Marginal Arts Festival Jefferson Center 541 Luck Avenue, Roanoke, VA * 12:30pm

2/22: NIGHTLIGHT Bar & Club 405 1/2 W. Rosemary St. Chapel Hill, NC * 9:30pm * $5.00

2/23: The Sentient Bean 13 E Park Ave. Savannah, GA * 7:30pm * $5.00

2/25: FLEX (Florida Experimental Film Festival) Hippodrome State Theatre 25 SE 2nd Place, Gainesville, FL * 9:00pm * $5.00

2/26: New College of Florida 5800 Bay Shore Road Sarasota, FL * 8:00pm * FREE SHOW * Outside screening @The Z-Quad

2/28: The Eyedrum 290 MLK Jr. Dr. SE (suite #8) Atlanta, GA * 9:00pm w/ Oicho Kabu

3/01: Green Cup Books Richard Arrington Jr. Blvd. South Birmingham, AL

3/03: Church Of Crystal Light 309 N. Adams St. Richmond, VA * 8:00pm w/Cars Will Burn!!

Since there's nothing like a good new-fashioned movie, show these good ones some Southern hospitality please.

Derby Meetin Up

You may remember last year that we hung at the Trenton Avenue Arts Festival, a.k.a. the festivus around the Kensington Kinetic Sculpture Derby. Now, if you're just the spectating type, you have three more months of winter until the actual event.

BUT if you are interested in being part of the derby this year, this Saturday is the Meet N Greet for potential entries to the 2009 Rendition. From 2-4 this Saturday at Philadelphia Brewing Company, folks are meeting up to talk kinetics, probably over some of that fine brew. I imagine the ideas will be flowing like the beer and if you're a derby hopeful, you should try to go! I mean, you probably need a project in your life, right? A new hobby? Maybe bicycle scultpure is it.

Any thoughts?

Our buddies got all wrapped up in some controversy over at boingboing the other day over this new shirt. They've sold quite a few now, but I NEVER would have predicted that people's interpretation of the print would be so ugly. Do YOU happen to get a "cruel irony of the cost of the two wars" sort of a vibe? I mean I suppose that truly dark people might go there, but not really.



Thoughts?

FH LH Cameo

I just found this video, It's Your Ride, directed by Daniel Leeb and commissioned by Hutchinson tires, and I'm sharing it. Not because it's well done as urban cycling videos go, or because the soundtrack is pretty nice, or because it smartly features equally a pretty girl on a cruiser and a handsome boy riding fixed. Not even because it has bicycles in it. All of that, and I was still on the fence. There's something else.


It's Your Ride from Cinecycle on Vimeo.

Did you catch it? At 2:24, if you're paying attention, our little lock holster makes a cameo. It turns out that it's pretty darn exciting to find yourself watching a commercial on the internet when you notice that you made the thing worn by the guy in the commercial on the internet. Or rather, it was exciting until I wrote it here and now re-reading it makes it seem like pretty small potatoes. It's a commercial! For tires! See? Exciting.

Either way, you probably shouldn't blink because you might miss it.

Duly Noted

You know how the greeting card industry is so crazy, and they're always coming up with holidays and occassions for which you need to send cards? Well you might also know that I am sort of a fan of such craziness, I love inventing excuses for mail in general and sending cards in particular, whether it be internationally or just across the street.

For the second time this week, I'm passing something I ran across and thought you might also like. I can imagine keeping a stack of these in my belt just in case.


As a person who has once received such a nice note left in the basket of my bike, I advocate them wholeheartedly and every single day of the year. These particular ones are adorable and fairly affordable and if you are a planner-aheader then totally you should order some from this nice lady. They are letter-pressed and include a handy loop for attaching them more assuredly to one of the many tubes that come standard on the modern bicycle. I'd also say, however and in contrast, don't let any aesthetically inferior correspondence stop you from leaving a similarly sentimental note on a scrap of a PW with a blue crayon, if that's what you happen to have.

If I had my way, we'd start leaving notes for each other over the most ordinary, mundane possible things because it seems like we could use some good old fashioned cheering up these days, no?

Speaking of Fleather-Brained

I mentioned yesterday the fourth contributor to the MISS giveaway, Fleathers, but realized that you may not be familiar. You haven't been formally introduced to yet another Philly label that continues to inspire the work around our studio. Fleathers and Rabid Fox (two branches from the same tree) are jewelry lines by Linda Smyth, a Philadelphia based store-keeper and designer that have long adorned the lobes and fingers of Miss Carrie Collins.

Fleathers is Linda's leather-based line, usually earrings that are large and colorful and you guessed it, crafted to mimic the fluttery fringe of a feather. Rabid Fox on the other hand, which is co-created with Rebecca Pulver, is all metal, forged in the shape of little animals. The pieces are designed so the animals perch in the unlikeliest location--a knuckle or two--making for quite the visual impact.



Both lines are at home at TopStitch boutique, where wouldn't you know it, FH also happens to sell our wares. Carrie was kind enough to buy me a Rabidfox ring as a moving-out-west present, and boy it is swell. I'll bet you can guess which member of the animal kingdom we favor in jewelry format...

MISS Winners

We put some loot into a Philly Love Contest over at M.I.S.S. back in December. To play, hopefuls had to answer some basic Philly trivia. Anyone could enter, few could win.

The decision was so tough that the ladies ultimately turned over the responsibility of deciding a winner over to Magick Outlaw's infinite wisdom and jurisprudence, based on a very tricky Bonus Challenge:

In the interest of helping us write a song about Philadelphia, write down what you think of when you think about Philadelphia. The only requirements are that it has to be two lines, and the two lines have to rhyme.

The winners were Vida Vazquez with this entry:

I never seen so many neon colored weaves,
Philly’s under-rated you best believe

And Kim C.:

Feel like i’m running towards the sky as if i was rocky, Amanda Blanks nails claw ya out if anyones try’s to stop me
Mannequins around me because no one does anything, but Philly’s hood won’t get better unless we do something

Each winner takes home some assortment of goods from Fabric Horse, R.E.Load, Magick Outlaw and Fleathers.

Sprawled Out

Since the inauguration, I imagine our new President feels a bit like a rag doll, the way everyone's been tugging him this way or that way, trying to fit so many visions for our future into the stimulus package. If what passed yesterday in both houses really is the New New Deal, the programs enacted as part of it will be historic and exemplary, a real blueprint for what our new economy, and by extension our culture, will be. The things we throw money at as part of our economic recovery are the pillars we hope can hoist us out of this big, sagging mess of a recession.

And so, it was with swelling heart that I read the following excerpt from an interview the President gave in Florida recently:

Not only do we need to rebuild our roads, our bridges, our ports, our levies, our dams, but we also have to plan for the future. This is the same example of turning crisis into opportunity…Now, look, this is America. We always had the best infrastructure. We were always willing to invest in the future. Governor Crist mentioned Abraham Lincoln. In the middle of the Civil War, in the midst of all this danger and peril, what did he do? He helped move the intercontinental railroad. He helped start land grant colleges. He understood that even when you’re in the middle of crisis, you’ve got to keep your eye on the future. So transportation is not just fixing our old transportation systems but its also imaging new transportation systems.

That’s why I’d like to see high speed rail where it can be constructed. That’s why I would like to invest in mass transit because potentially that’s energy efficient and I think people are a lot more open now to thinking regionally in terms of how we plan our transportation infrastructure. The days where we’re just building sprawl forever, those days are over. I think that Republicans, Democrats, everybody recognizes that that’s not a smart way to build communities. So we should be using this money to help spur this kind of innovative thinking when it comes to transportation. That will make a big difference.

I for one, really believe that condensing our cities and making them more livable will bring about the right kind of development and can strengthen our social structures. And this will be huge in configuring the next economic era. It's just nice to hear someone more powerful than little old me agree.

Chalk Bicycles

You know how I have a soft spot for quick drawings of bicycles and for that matter, slow drawings of bicycles. I ran across these today at the blog of photographer Sharon Montrose. She is a pet photographer, by the way, which is mind blowingly adorable. And her apparently charming husband drew the following illustrations on a chalkboard in their house. Those white, dusty lines are so satisfying; I can't believe they're only temporary.







Those white, dusty lines are so satisfying; I can't believe they're only temporary. Makes me need a chalkboard, I think.

I'm all for handmade but...

You know when somebody seems so ironical that you're like, "hold the phone.." because they seem to be making fun of something but you are having quite the time putting your finger on it?

Well Friday evening I ran across something like that. These two boys, hip as could be, were showing their wares in a tiny, teeny space moonlighting as a gallery at the monthly art murmur here in Oaktown. One of them bent over a big four harness loom and the other over an industrial Singer, they were displaying blue jeans they'd made from start to finish. And the price? In the neighborhood of several thousand dollars as I recall. They claimed the process took nearly 4 months to complete.



My first thought was, "are you-all crazy? it wouldn't take anybody four months to do that!" Not that I'm some kind of raging capitalist, but that just doesn't make any sense to me, someone with a basic knowledge of how things work and what things are reasonable. (And someone with a working knowledge of handmade time frames.) Hand weaving, sure. Hand stitching, sure. But these boys had tools and seem to be skilled. But four months! Jesus.


So as these boys cooed, "see, we're wearing them," and "of course it's profitable!" and "would you like some sake?" I just sat there trying to figure out who exactly was having who in that little room. Were they poking fun at handmade? At luxury items? At money itself? Or at the people who don't know how much work goes into a pair of blue jeans? I still can't figure it out.

Bless me Roy and Travis, for I am confused. I suppose that as such a provocative exercise, it may have succeeded in that vaccuum of the gallery space, but as for any larger, broader context, I'm afraid not.

Business Trip

We were in meetings all weekend, folks. HARD AT WORK, I assure you.

Winter Got You Down?

You so snow crazy? Well you know what they say...necessity's the Mother of Invention.

Photo by Patrick Barber

However you manage to do it, stay classy out there you all because a little hog told me there's 6 more weeks of winter in store.

So keep your chin up.

xoxo,
FH

If You're in San Francisco on Feb 28th

Hellos! Emily Glaubinger here. This is my first official blog post on this here FH blog and although I post for selfish reasons (shameless self promotion as some dear friends would say), I would like to start out by saying that without Fabric Horse, I would not be the person I am in today. The ladies at FH have more talent and smarts in their pinky fingers then the combined amount of energy in the whole universe and to have touched that pinky finger, well, it got me in this digital design tournament.


I was chosen (!!!) to along with 7 other designers from SF to compete on February 28th, 2009 to win a shit (please forgive this) ton of prizes. Obviously, it would be amazing if I could have some friends up in there to cheer me on. Here is what they about the SF challenge:

Sunshiney San Francisco wakes up to memories of gold-rushing crazes, rainbow-striped protests, and summers of love.

In its long history as a leading city on the Pacific, this old town’s been knocked down more than once—earthquakes and fires, bursting dot-com bubbles—and always gotten back on its feet. Today, the City by the Bay stands tall as a bastion of liberal attitudes, free spirits, and open arms. Hills nestled against lapping waves and streets bustling with geek savants, bon vivants, cosmopolites, and one of the largest creative communities in the world, San Francisco brings its fair share of aesthetic genius to the tournament.

San Francisco will host competitions in 2D, 3D, and Motion Graphics for Digital Design Tournament 2009.

To purchase tickets you can go here and look left for all the info and the link to buy the tickets. You can also email me to try to get the group rate and I can pair you up with some friends that will definitely be going.

If you are not familiar with my work ( I've had the wonderful opportunities to work on design projects with the likes of Fabric Horse (duh), R.E.Load Bags, Depot Japan, Bilenky Cycle Works, Tomoni and some other fabulous fun bike related companies) you can check out what i've been up to here: DRAWING IS AWESOME

watch this video and get an idea of what it will be like:

Cut&Paste Digital Design Tournament 2007 from Cut&Paste on Vimeo.

For He's a Jolly Good Fellow

Old FH buddy and dear dear friend of mine, Ralph over at Via Bicycle has started updating the blog over there more regularly and I thought it deserved an announcement. He's been posting images of some of the rarer clutter in the second floor Museum at Via and talking about some of his own restorative projects, recent acquisitions and just generally, the life and times of a vintage bicycle aficionado. Plus, he's a really nice guy. A veritable fountain of know-how, you've probably seen Joel at a swap anywhere from Michigan to Virginia and didn't even know it. (Hint: he's the one with all the loot.)

Go ahead, give a little peek.