Random and not so...Irene Nemirovsky

I've been grateful lately to have such interesting work and non-profit projects that I don't have much time to read. Here you can see some of the random things I saw in the past few weeks. The metal work above prompted me to think about a client's swing. The bumper sticker below made me long for Sweden and its forests!

A good friend was generous enough to lend me this biography about the great writer, Irene Nemirovsky, who died in Auschwitz. If you haven't read her novel, Suite Francaise (about the German Occupation of Paris), you must. Equally fascinating is her Elizabeth Gille's book, The Mirador:Dreamed Memories of Irene Nemirovsky by her Daughter. These are perfect winter reading when it's dark and there is time to reflect on history and the human condition.

What are you reading???

And thank you all for the emails about my last post. Yes, bulbs were poking through until this past week of wacko weather: freezing, spring-like, rain, ice, snow and now super cold again. We set a new record and went almost a year without an inch of snowfall...obviously: not good news. We are still in drought. One can hope. And practice sustainable life components.

Nature vs. Man Made

I hope this image from a hike on a trail at Red Rock Canyon outside Vegas demonstrates how much more the natural qualities of the landscape are intensified when you have something man made, like this sign, that heightens the juxtaposition. This part of the Mojave Desert is very, very dry.

A guiding aesthetic concept in the midst of disappointing, worrisome and continued drought here in Chicago. Yup, some of the bulbs are starting to poke up in what passes for my garden through very, very dry soil.

January Ducky

First three weeks of January have been chock-full of design deadlines, so little time for this blog...
As I was wrapping up a Concept Drawing for tomorrow's client meeting, this bit of it leapt out at me, looking like a rubber ducky. I realized that it (a transition line between ground cover and mulch) was the only curve in a large geometric design. I had to preserve its function, so I took a marker and rendered the curve into straight lines. Always room to edit.
Meantime: 61 degrees forecast for Saturday and, as usual, the local NPR news person announces it cheerfully: Awrgh!!!