so pardon the temporary mismatches, jumbilation and any weird buggy things you see going on!

The almighty Secret Wars arrived in NYC last week on a much anticipated whirlwind 10 day tour. I’ve been DYING to attend Secret Wars for the longest (drawn to my attention by the boys at BNTL), so on Wednesday, confid3ntial and I trekked out to the Public Assembly in Billyburg where the USA vs ENGLAND event was taking place.
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When SKAGGS told me - we were taking a last minute business trip to the 300k population filled land of Fire and Ice, I was truly blown away. In all honesty the only thing I knew about Iceland were Vikings, the eternal daylight in the summer, the everlasting darkness in the winter and of course the cold. We touched down in Reykjavik on Saturday at 6am and it was non stop GO (iamdiddy style) from there on in.
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About a year ago, confid3ntial gave me a book somebody had left in his office. I scoffed at the title and wrote it off as a chick book that had gotten mad props purely because it was on Oprah. I take it all back…After a nightmare month, I needed some light bedtime reading and decided to pick it up and give it a go.

Eat.Pray.Love ranks in my book-list as one of THE best books I’ve ever read. It sounds cheesy but I had a few “AHA” moments reading the book…it completely changed my perspective on life and living life. There are a lot of stand out moments in the book including one that Jenna highlighted on our trip to Tokyo, the other was a paragraph on Happiness.
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I used to love invisible ink as a kid (magic marker pens were particularly brilliant). Obviously technology’s moved on a bit since 1989…
In Japan I collected business cards left, right and center and they all had this weird alien type looking thing on the back or front. When I got back to the USA I googled “squiggly pattern” til I was blue in the face and eventually found Kaywa that explained exactly what it was. A QR Code.

A QR Code is a matrix code (or two-dimensional bar code) created by Japanese corporation Denso-Wave in 1994. The “QR” is derived from “Quick Response”, as the creator intended the code to allow its contents to be decoded at high speed. QR Codes are common in Japan and Korea, where they are currently the most popular type of two dimensional codes. Moreover, most current Japanese mobile phones can read this code with their camera.
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Debauchery Creator aka The Baroness emailed today with some brilliant news. Gads! Nicole never ceases to amaze me. Aside from being The Toy Baroness at Kid Robot, having some of the most beautiful ink I’ve ever seen and throwing the best bday parties ever (this year’s Dirty 30 Masquerade Ball included) she’s also raising $$ for charity…
“30 CUSTOMS BY 30 ARTISTS: An Auction to benefit the Children of Cambodia” is the first step in trying to help the children that have impacted my life. After traveling to Cambodia last year I fell in love with the people of that country. I have reached out to 30 of my friends and asked them to create a custom toy specifically for this auction. Every cent from the sale of these customs will go directly to help the children I have met in Cambodia. With the help of people that I have met in Cambodia, I will be delivering clothing, shoes, books, paper, pens, and bicycles to children of Siem Reap villages. It has been a passion and a dream of mine to use art as a way of helping children and communities all over the World, and I am excited about this first step.”
Bid Now , see the photos, watch the video or Read On!
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Lordy! I’ve missed you blog. While I’m still mourning my departure from Tokyo, I’ve also been on a crazy work tip. You know some days when you just cant bear to look at your computer screen anymore? Well I had a few. Sorry!

I’m ok though - lotsa bloggin’ coming up! I came across Neon Gray on a random blog exploration. Side note: Have you ever clicked on one blog and it’s led you to a million different other cyber places and then you don’t even know how you got there? Well it happens here on a regular basis…it’s like Virtual Exploration on a whole other “click-a-link” level.

I came across Neon Gray on one a midnight Virtual Exploration™ and thought this best summed up my thoughts right now.

“A series of digital photographs shot among the ever-changing landscape that is the California coast.The overlayed text (inspired by the 1972 best-selling self-help book) was chosen to communicate the emotional healing qualities and/or sense of well being that the California environment provides.”

See more here.

It’s The Swede Beat. Your monthly online magazine dedicated to the impossibly and effortlessly cool Swedes in music, art, fashion and culture. We were responsible for the design of The Swede Beat logo, which as you see has more of an organic feel, rather than a structured typographic design that the Swedes are well known for.
We’ve got an interview with Lydia Kellam (founder + editor-in-chief of The Swede Beat) on thinking Swede Beat 24/7, being a Brooklyn Swede, her love of dancing, music, cats, hot chocolate and roof top hang outs, the Stockholm/New York fixation and of course her brand spanking new logo. Subscribe here, get the twitters here + read on for (more…)

You can’t go to Japan without eating sushi…that would obviously be a crime. So I was positively thrilled when the awesome Miho and Satoshi took me for some of the best sushi I’ve ever had in my entire life. So fresh!
We ordered randomly from the extensive menu and picked what we wanted, while sipping on (might i add THE BEST) beer I’ve also ever had (and I’m strictly a liquor, sake/shochu wine lady). I asked Miho and Satoshi to order the delicacies I MUST have off the menu, they ordered and then told me that they’d give me the run-down on everything I’d eaten, once I tried it.
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On my first day in Tokyo I spent a lot of time walking around the little side streets in Harajuku and randomly discovered Photo Sticker Booth Mecca Madness, down a little alley way just off Takeshita St (I’m saying nothing - that was the name). Imagine walking into a place chock full of giggling adolescent girls, in all manner of outfits, encompassed by a din that can only be described as arcade game mania to the 50th power. Welcome to Purikura.
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On one of our many walks around Harajuku, Jenna and I discovered and positively fell in love with Eri Utsugi’s Merci Beaucoup — a Japanese clothing brand that mixes the Kawaii with the casual and yet still manages to look adult. In fact you could say it’s kidult.

Eri Utsugi debuted her mercibeaucoup brand at Japan Fashion Week, March 2006 with a catwalk show involving animal-shaped afro wigs and a shower of confetti swept along the runway by models. 3 years later and backed by A-net, the fashion firm founded by Issey Miyake to handle his proteges’ solo efforts, Merci Beaucoup’s remarkable F/W collection drew lots of attention at Paris Fashion week, where she chose to show.

While the clothes are killer, the Harajuku showroom is to absolutely die for. Why? Both the interior and exterior are completely covered in stickers of all shapes and sizes, all relating to or saying “Merci Beaucoup”. It had to be wallpaper though right?
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I leave today and I’m gutted. New York I love you, Manchester you’ll always have a special place in my heart but Tokyo is officially my favorite metropolis.

From eating with the locals at a hidden authentic restaurant, gawping at the Harajuku girls, and taking in the teenage consumer madness at Shibuya 109 to buying p***y in a can, shaking my booty on the dance-floor at Le Baron - Tokyo, eating horse (raw!!) and getting pooped on by a bird at Ueno Zoo, I’ve seen, heard and experienced soooo much. Much in part to my new found brilliant Tokyo friends — Miho and Satoshi. I’ve also taken a bazillion pictures some of which I’ve posted here. I’ll be back properly next week about everything. But for now…some flicks!
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Wow, so much to say…I started writing a blog post to accompany this but it turned into a massive essay. I will eventually post it but for now, some pictures from Day 2’s mammoth walk around Shibuya (again!) this place is like a maze! Also the manga’d image of me and Jenna? - All the photoshop work was done instantly and automatically. Look at our eyes…how bizarre!
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Wow. I’ve landed, I’ve explored, I’ve got lost a few times, I’ve finally learned how to read a map, my brain feels like its about to explode and I’m loving every minute of it. Weirdest thing seen yet?
The Kingly Masks Face Gear above…
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I’m currently loving the BNTL blog. Based in the UK and with 4 (or 5) contributers they give an amazing insight into the youth/street culture of England (more so London but still…). Covering everything from music (download the mix-tapes yeah?), to fashion, to art/graffiti, to random parties, nights out, chilling with friends or just pop culture commentary it’s always my first go to blog of the day.

While the content’s great the best part of the blog is the pictures…photographer Witts‘ color driven nightlife images are brilliant and his Semantic Artwork makes me seriously miss the streets of home. The real genius though is Matthew Schnickens, slated by commenters for his sometime overuse of the fisheye, he kills it every time.

See more of his work here and here, and of course check out the blog here.