Gift Guide Day 16 was hand made by Shade Elaine… it is our guide of many G’s - the Gorgeously Goth Gift Guide… for our dark sides, our darker friends, or just when you need that extra little something to show people its not ALL happy and shiny around here!

p.s. sorry i didn’t get to other posts today ~ its been a week of sheer insanity, and i have been working on a proposal the last two days to no end that i have to show over breakfast at 7AM!!! (i’m sure you may have noticed i’m not morning person…) Also a NOTCOT Radar gallery channel launching today i think… but anyhow, this gift guide should keep you going for the moment!

Gift Guide Day 17 is all about grooming. Gorgeous gadgets and potions to get you all cleaned up from head to toe- or great for gifts as a not so subtle hint… a little something for guys, girls, both…

The Serif just featured these great posters for the Museum of Childhood at the V&A. Not much to say here, more just for your staring pleasure… and reminiscing.

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Seeing as i’m pretty much lost in a state of continuous consumption with this holiday season - particularly thanks to the gift guides - it was nice to be gifted with this “Christmas Survival Chocolate” this morning… nothing like some playful graphic design to help you hang in there, and it doesn’t hurt that its filled with chocolate! By New Zealand brand, Bloomberry, this line of playfully wrapped confections is quite cute ~ but the signage like figures on the xmas pack are definitely the best. Also loving that they designed nice wrappers for the interiors… see below.

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Gift Guide Day 18 is sponsored by WEJETSET ~ which I told you about earlier when they gave away a mercedes pre-launch… and now they have finally launched! Ready to take on the designer/luxury travel niche… regardless of whether you are continent hopping or just commuting to work ~ WEJETSET is just starting to build up their store to meet all your needs, and for all you east coasters keep an eye out for the brick and mortar store coming soon.

p.s. i just noticed that the links to the previous day’s gift guides at the bottom were broken, but now they are fixed!

Having one of “those” days ~ but thank goodness for surprise packages from people like RStevens of Diesel Sweeties ~ angry red robot socks. I don’t even know what gift guide theme these should be on, and i never even knew i needed them, but they deal with a less than shiny mood very nicely. I recruited RUGenius to be the sock model in this shot! Although not quite available yet, both the red robot knee socks (for ladies) - and shorter men’s red robots - and even some cute pixely owl knee socks - are available for pre-order here. And that bumper sticker made me smile - there have been some pretty nasty, ignorant emails and reports coming on all the sites today for some reason. Why are people so angry? It’s just the internets! Yay. Angry red pixel robots on my feet.

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Ooooooh. Ok, to be honest, when i first say the Griffin Evolve Speaker images i thought it had floating speakers… they are in fact ~ “wireless rechargable digital speakers”, and it’s also you’re all in one ipod dock ~ with audio out channels, video out, s-video, etc… And you can even add more speakers - they have a cute little Multicast flash piece that shows you various members pairing their speakers then taking them to various rooms! They say “So have your friends bring their Evolve speakers next time they come over”… but doesn’t that seem a bit silly? I mean we’re already supposed to be carrying our wiimotes around, but our speakers too?

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Between the overdosing of digital and physical mass consumption going on all around us this month ~ it is refreshing to see this email from Kelly about the Terrazo: Views of Mexico City photography exhibition by Pablo Lopez at the Sasha Wolf Gallery. There is something mesmerizing and calming about the perspective and detachment in these images… between all the shopping and dealing with the masses, these images certainly help you step back for a moment.

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Is Vogue advocating lockpicking and hacking? So i was half awakenly flipping through the december issue of Vogue (the penelope cruz one) ~ Staring at this image, i was initially surprised that they don’t mention the word ‘lockpick’ in the post - focusing on the “hacksaw blades, a paperclip, and keychains” in the caption… the torn page sat next to me as i read up on Claire Fontaine and the Passe-Partout pieces… and these most definitely ARE lockpicks… cut from hacksaw blades (brilliant, it might be one of my new favorite pieces!) And then i looked closely at the ridiculously small print that was tucked into the spine of the magazine which only became apparent once torn out… and i see the following links…
http://www.lysator.liu.se/mit-guide/mit-guide.html
http://www.hackerethic.org
http://www.lockpicks.com
http://www.lockpicking101.com
http://www.gregmiller.net/locks/makelockpicks.html

Is it terrible that i find it highly amusing that Vogue is showing people where to go to learn to pick locks and the hacker ethic (the hackerethic.org seems to be squatted on… don’t they check links?) - See image of the full page and a close up of the tiny print in the spine below…

Also ~ take a look at Claire Fontaine - which few know as the “Paris-based collective founded in 2004, but the French brand of school supplies it is named after, whose logo is everywhere stamped on the tools of their trade.” Frieze magazine has a great article on them by Vivian Rehberg. “Appropriation is an artistic strategy laden with precedents, and one of the ways Claire Fontaine distances herself from those is by advocating theft. 371 Grand (2006) copies of keys to Reena Spaulings Fine Art in New York made using the same process the FBI employs, and Passe-partout (Paris 10ème) (2006), a set of lock picks, hacksaw blades and a small flashlight hung on an ‘I Love Paris’ key-chain, are wryly subversive little sculptures, especially when accompanied by the lock-picking demonstration in the video Instructions for the sharing of private property (2006). As an extension to these works, Claire Fontaine has offered to duplicate keys to galleries that show her art, and to sell them titled with the gallery’s address, therefore granting the purchaser access to the valuable objects held there. In two recent Paris exhibitions, versions of Passe-partout were hung nonchalantly on a hook, ready for the taking. But, just as she expected, nobody walked off with them.”

UPDATE - figured out where they got their links from… as well as some images of the FBI piece and more keyring sets…

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Click the images to find out more! So many great designer inspirations at .org this week i couldn’t resist another roundup to help kick start your week!

Wow it’s Monday Dec 3rd already, I find it hard to believe how quickly these few months are flying by… for Gift Guide Day 19 (and counting down) here are some goodies from our sponsor, Shop Modi! And for a sneak peek into the future of gift guiding, due to a little planning ahead, you can be sure to look forward to some great designer travel goods tomorrow… fun grooming potions and gadgets… dark gifting… gifts for the designer weekend warrior… and more!

Click images to find out more! Late night workaholic hunger pangs kicked in ~ so here’s some deliciousness at TasteSpotting to kick off your Monday ~ now back to trying to make gift guide pages… and can you believe that is “parmasan cheese air”?

Gift Guide Day 20! This is part two of yesterday’s animal inspired guide… and thus plant inspired! This back to back pair are definitely ones i’ve been tempted to start buying the most things off of so far… well maybe these and the tech one too… well the things i don’t already have anyhow!

Creature by Andrew Zuckerman… i’ve been pretty obsessed with this book since the post, but been so slow and busy i hadn’t gotten around to ordering it until making the gift guides (it showed up on Day 28 and Day 21)… at which point my mom apparently took the hint and ordered it. Well good news + bad news. The book is BREATHTAKING, even more so in person with the large coffee table format. I wish i could have ordered a copy for everyone i know… truly incredible. The bad news is… she happened to order it from Powell’s (the largest independent bookstore!) instead of our usual Amazon since she had some credit to use up… and unfortunately the packing wasn’t quite up to par and being the book/product junkie that i am, its driving me absolutely mad that the corners were all bashed up, and the bottom right corner of all of the pages are buckling a bit… enough to notice when flipping through such pristine white pages… oh, and somehow this copy has it looking like the cat on the cover is crying green… So, as my random Saturday night post, just wanted to vent slightly, and let you know i’m suddenly reminded why its more satisfying to buy things in person sometimes… in brick and mortar stores… or sticking to super huge giants who take too much care in packaging for survival during the holiday season! more images of some of the awesomeness within, as well as what’s driving me crazy.

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For Gift Guide Day 21, i teamed up with RUGenius to bring you some of our favorite nature inspired finds, this is only part one, since as far as flora and fauna go, we accidentally filled today with fauna… so part two focused on flora coming tomorrow! And as a side note, i’m a bit disappointed i can’t REALLY buy a crocodile for $50, a sheep for $45, or a camel for $175… well i can, just not ship it to a friend as a surprise… loving the Oxfam America Unwrapped initiative though.