than a handcrafted one-of-a-kind piece made of solid, responsibly harvested wood?
Can’t think of anything right now.
This little number? It’s the workmanship of Jeff Martin Joinery which I first discovered on Room 907. And one day my kitchen island will look just like it. Mark. My. Words.
Look to Mother Nature. Because she know what she’s doing. And if a colour palette is good enough for her, then it’s good enough for me.
Let’s take the peacock feather for example. The forest green, the deep purple, the navy blue and, when the light hits it right, the splash of yellow. (The peacock headpiece, by the way, is one of two custom pieces made for me by Vancouver’s Alice Hart.)
Stripes, florals, miscellaneous geometric patterns — they all work together beautifully when Mama N picks the palette.
She makes the potentially disastrous practice of print-mixing as foolproof as can be.
In fact, I’d say she’s the best stylist a gal could ask for.
that when my friends and I get together we’d play the tambourine, discuss philosophy and be all artsy.
Instead we drink cheap beer and watch reruns of 30 Rock.
Image from Pandora.
Eva Markvoort, whose heartbreaking battle with cystic fibrosis was chronicled in the documentary 65_RedRoses, would have been 26 today.
She lost her battle with the disease on Saturday. The legacy she leaves is one of hope. How many more people are organ donors because of the awareness she raised? How many more funds were raised? It would be impossible to measure because her impact was so widespread. Through her blog she touched people all over the world.
I never knew her, but like everyone who has seen 65_RedRoses, I fell in love with her charisma, her determination, her positivity.
65_RedRoses is returning to CBC’s Passionate Eye this Friday, April 2nd at 8pm (ET) / 5pm (PT). For those of you in the States, the directors are currently talking to broadcasters and will hopefully have an air date soon. For those of you in other parts of the world, I will let you know as soon as I do how you too can watch the film.
Want to honour Eva’s legacy? Become an organ donor (in BC visit British Columbia Transplant, in Ontario visit Ontario’s Organ and Tissue Donation Agency, in other provinces and states, Google “Organ Donation”), donate in Eva’s name to the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, and join the Reddy for a Cure group on Facebook.
Photo by Cyrus McEachern.
And it was finally spring-y enough to wear a summer dresses (underneath a faux fur jacket, but still).
This particular number I found in Turkey last summer. And it’s got everything I love in a dress — bat-wing sleeves, light material and a beautiful print. Makes me think I need to get a similar one made in a different print.
My boots? Didn’t have to travel quite so far to find them. They’re from Umeboshi on Main Street.
The good kind, I mean. Where a lecture makes you fall so deeply in love with its subject that you want to switch majors. In this case, the subject was Vancouver Opera’s Nixon in China and the lecturer was Assistant Stage Director Stephen Drover.
As part of the opera’s Fan Night, Drover took us through some of the highlights of the $1.4 million dollar production. It got philosophical. And interesting.
Ponder this: opera is always seen from afar (hello opera glasses!) but we are living in the age of the close-up (hello HD TV!). So how did the fine folks at the opera bridge that gap? They brought cameras onstage to project visual close ups onto the backdrop and miked the performers (so often frowned upon in the opera world) to achieve audio close ups.
But my favourite part had nothing to do with technical trickery and everything to do with dance. The second act — oh! The second act! — featured a beautiful sequence choreographed by Wen Wei Wang (whose work I’ve been a fan of for years). It made me realize it’s been far too long since I’ve been to the ballet.
So what did I wear? A beautiful, straight-out-of-the-eighties dress that my sister found for me. (Thank you, Rissa!) The vintage clutch is one of many I have in my collection.
A pendant necklace I also stole from her (how do those of you without sisters dress yourselves?).
And shoes the colour of pink highlighters.
Want to see more photos of Nixon in China? Take a look here. (The other gal in that photo? Kim Li of Delicious Juice.)
Wondering what I wore last time I went to the opera? And the time before that?
The first three images are courtesy of the Vancouver Opera. Thank you again, VO, for an amazing evening!
Just when you thought I couldn’t get any nerdier, I bought a ticket to the YVR Twestival. What’s a twestival, you ask? It’s a novel idea, really. It’s people meeting. In person. And socializing. In person. And networking. In person.
Plus, it’s for a good cause. Are you going? Let’s get our geek on!
Photo by Miss 604.
P.S. You can find me on Twitter here.
When you’re in Mexico — beaded accessories, silver jewelry and tequila.
And then there are things you do not expect to stock up on when you’re in Mexico: oversized bat-winged sweaters…
and giant scarves. Both of which made it home in my suitcase. The sweater is from Shalom in Playa del Carmen, which you should stop into if you’re ever there. I have a feeling you’d like it.
The scarf is from a stall on Playa’s Fifth Avenue. And I should point out that it is made of — and I am not even kidding you — llama wool. Which might actually be something you would expect.
P.S. Add the Anthology on Facebook. Because it’s about time we were FBFFs.
When we were in Mexico last week, we stayed at a resort in Playa del Carmen. Now don’t get me wrong, it was beautiful, but I love Mexico Mexico. 
The part where pesos (not American dollars) are the most common form of currency.
Places like Cuernavaca, Mexico City and Valladolid, a town that is beyond picturesque.
We stopped at Valladolid — all too briefly — on our way back from Chichen Itza (whose pyramids, unfortunately, you can no longer climb).
We were there as the sun was setting so it was cool enough to walk around (temperatures hit a scorching 36 degrees earlier in the day).
It was all so beautiful it made me want to buy a hammock, learn Spanish, and move there.
