Crotches are rarely sniffed or nuzzled within the first five minutes of a first date, yet even with ten first dates occurring simultaneously in a crowded Warehouse District coffee shop, this was no ordinary dating scenario. The distracting backdrop of panting, whining, pawing, and the occasional licking of naughty bits, in fact, might evoke thoughts … Read more
“What do you know about the washability of Sharpie?” asked a curious onlooker as she watched Eric Inkala, a Minneapolis-based painter and graffiti artist, decorate an American Apparel T-shirt with the long strokes of his black Sharpie pen. “It usually fades to dull blue,” Inkala offered. “I’m suggesting spot-cleaning,” said Emma Berg, a thirty-something fashion … Read more
In celebration of thirty years of my wife’s profound ability to tolerate me, we went to France for ten days last month. We did the things we usually do when we go to interesting places. We got a very small and inexpensive hotel room (under the theory that we’re never there anyway) and spent all … Read more
If you had to pick one person as the ultimate observer of the past, present, and future of design—from cereal boxes to sneakers to web architecture—it’d be hard to go wrong with Steven Heller. His name is on more than two hundred books as author, co-author, editor, or contributor; he produces a continual flow of … Read more
Back in the late 1990’s, I lived for a year in a house that felt completely wrong. Liminal, oddly oriented. It was set sideways — or rather, along a street that somehow struck me as sideways — on a hill, facing the back parking lot of a school that ran perpendicular. What’s more, the main … Read more
Here’s a fashion idiom indigenous to Minnesota: The piles of hoodies, scarves, polar fleece pullovers, and down-filled jackets that are just now getting unearthed from the closet. It bears mentioning, however, that there are two distinct paths to dressing for the frigid weather. The less inspired might insulate with a giant, balloon-like university sweatshirt and … Read more
University of Minnesota Athletics Director Joel Maturi is a triple-A battery of a man. Walk into his office at the Bierman Athletic Building on the East Bank and he leaps out of his chair and shakes your hand as if you’re about to parachute out of an airplane together. Trim and fit at 62, Maturi … Read more
In February 1953, a violent North Sea storm crashed through the Dutch levee system, killing 1,835 people and leaving a hundred thousand others homeless. In the aftermath, the country responded by building the Delta Works, the world’s most sophisticated system of flood defenses. According to John McQuaid, a reporter for Mother Jones on assignment in … Read more
Spend a few minutes with photographer Dona Schwartz and you’ll start to see a bit of grandeur hiding beneath humble day-to-day routines. “I want to see what’s amazing that’s right under my nose,” she explains. “To me, that’s really compelling. But to photograph daily life, you have to first really see it. You have to … Read more