Flowers of the Day

The third pink/white dahlia to open is the prettiest of all, in my humble opinion of course!

This is the time of the growing season my goldenrod start to bloom. I've planted 3 groups of these native wildflowers around the base of an old tree trunk, along with dark purple Perilla, a native perennial relative of Coleus. My day lilies and some Iris are also in this 'tree garden.'

This is my red/yellow variety of dahlia in the beginning of its blooming cycle, with distinct and saturated  color delineations. . .

. . . as they mature over the course of a week or two, the colors fade to a more muted peach with just the tips in a darker red. This makes the plant seem to be two plants to the casual observer, and the reason I don't pick them. I love to watch them change.

By my front door, I have a painted antique milk can with a pot of asters on it. This plant has been green and lush all summer and as is the case with asters, is just now starting to flower with lavender daisy-like flowers. Some nasturtiums can be seen in the background. You can also see that Pink Gardens needs a bit of maintenance on the steps  . . .

A close-up view of the lavender fall asters. Day lily leaves surround them in the back.

Music Post Links to be Fixed

I "shelved" the Disco post until I can work out the kinks in some of the links. Kinky Links, who knew? I think it was the comma in them, breaking them into two pieces, but I'll figure it out. Sorry 'bout that!

Freedom Land USA—Elsie the Cow Stood Me Up

Found in the attic today . . . Freedom Land USA ashtray/paper weight. Freedom Land was an amusement part in the Bronx, New York, from 1960-64. It featured an historic theme, with Old New York, Old Chicago, San Francisco etc. I remember it fairly well, so I'd say we were probably there towards the end, '63 or '64, when I was 6 or 7. I remember riding in a stagecoach, I remember the fake Chicago Fire, and I remember waiting in line at the Borden's display to see Elsie the Cow. We waited for at least an hour, slowly making our way up the raised ramp and had just about made it to the barn doors when it was announced that Elsie was going to take a break, lol. I'm not really sure what happened to her that day, but apparently whatever cow was actually there that day had some problems and they shut down the display. I was so upset, I just wanted to see the cow from the TV commercials! For some reason, even though we lived near a farm and I saw cows everyday, I was in "love" with Elsie. My father promised me we'd never buy another Borden's product again, lol. 

For the Wiki on Freedom Land, click here. Apparently most of the rides were dismantled and sold to various other venues. I've been to Clark's Trading Post in New Hampshire where the Santa Fe Railroad Depot ended up, so I must have seen it twice without realizing it. Co-op City was built on the land that was Freedom Land.

Found with Google Images, is there any doubt why I was so fond of Elsie, rofl!

The Mustang is the Only One Left Today

The opening spread introducing the new 1971 Fords in the September 1970 issue of Popular Mechanics.  I can still remember the excitement I felt seeing the new-for-71 large Fords and Mercurys, and the equally new Mustangs and Cougars. The large cars were sleeker and more sophisticated looking than ever before, and had longer wheelbases and chassis. The Pony cars were also all-new, with a 1 inch longer wheelbase and an engine compartment that could now hold Ford's large 429 V8s. The 'Stang notchback and the Cougar even had flying buttress rear C pillars, a very sexy look, lol! The Torinos, Montegos, Mavericks and Thunderbirds were merely facelifted, but still really desirable, unburdened by the "I-Beam" bumpers that these cars would be saddled with starting in 1973. Mercury was given its own "Maverick" which it called Comet, a name used by the company since 1960 on their compacts, although from '68-'69 Mercury used it on the least expensive intermediate.

Have We Really Come All That Far in 35 Years?

This is a large format brochure for the original VW Polo from 1975 (11 x 17 inches, 8 pages). I spent a few months in Germany during my senior year in high school, on an exchange program. My class went to several cool places, and several great cities, for cultural, educational and social reasons. I, of course, found my way to every car dealer I saw, lol. I loved this tiny little VW, which was also sold as an Audi, the 50 model. 

Notice that the cover shows the base model at the top, with the black rubber trim around the windows, and plain body sides, and the "L" model at the bottom with chrome window reveals and a mid-height chrome/rubber body molding. The German translates to "Small on the Outside, Big on the Inside," not exactly a new PR theme, even 35 years ago. Cars have been advertised that way since the beginning of the industry in the early 1900s, the Rambler making it quite a famous motif in the 1950s and '60s.

Also notice the proportions of this small front-wheel drive car. The wheels are fairly well forward, almost rear-wheel drive in looks. Perhaps that's why I find it so appealing. I don't think VW has improved upon this Giugiaro design since. Georgetto Giugiaro was truly at the height of his game with all of the cars he designed in the 1970s.

Nothing says the 1970s more in this brochure than these exterior and interior color selections. We're so used to having tasteful, nondescript exterior colors these days, and it's extremely rare that an interior is anything other than 3 shades of gray. I would love VW to come out with a 'heritage' color option for their new cars, and use these colors. They've done that with the New Beetle, but the colors they chose were from the fifties and early sixties. I could really get into a VW Golf with a cinnamon and black houndstooth cloth interior. I wouldn't mind seeing more primary colors on cars' exteriors either.

The Bicentennial Fourth of July, Leete's Island

The family home, the Daniel and Charity Leete House, built in 1766. This photo was taken on July 4th, 1976. This is the house my mother and Hoohoo grew up in, having been in their family since the 1860s. We were only the third family to own it until 1985 when it was sold after Hoohoo's husband, my father's brother, committed suicide and secretly, and illegally, sold it out from under us. More on that later. Much later. Probably in my obituary, lol.

I just love this photo! The house is nestled on a hill, and had beautiful, mature plantings and gardens all around it. Hoohoo had it freshly painted dark brown in honor of the Bicentennial, and it never looked better. Notice the 13-star flag, the same one I hang on my porch every 4th of July. My mother and I never really got over the loss of this house. I always thought I would continue the family ownership. It was really difficult to come up with a new life plan after it was sold. I probably would never have gotten the job in Manhattan had things gone differently, and who knows how that would have changed my life. But things happen for a reason, although I am still not exactly sure what that reason is.

The house looks completely different today. All of the trees have been cut down, all of the original windows and doors have been replaced with a different style, the siding is new, the roof is new, and it has been painted bright white. To say it now sticks out of its hilly landscape like a sore thumb, instead of fitting in so elegantly as it does here, would be an understatement. It has been sold twice since my uncle unloaded it for next to nothing. The first 'new' person's last name that lived there was Casey. It was unbelievably ironic, and cruel, for my parents and I to drive by the old homestead and see Casey on the mailbox.

N O T E :  Ten bonus points to anyone that recognized the purpose the black 'ring' around the ancient tree in front of the house. In the early '70s, Gypsy Moth caterpillars invaded Connecticut and devastated the native trees. You could sit outside at night and actually hear them munching the leaves. They were EVERYWHERE! The year after the first infestation, a tar-like goop was sold everywhere around here. You painted it in a ring around the trunks of trees and the caterpillars couldn't climb up any further. You had to go out and scrape them off every few days and then burn them in a coffee can with a bit of gasoline or kerosene. They haven't really been back since. I wonder if anyone knows why their numbers exploded so much in the first place? The end of DDT or something?

You MIght Not NEED a Ferrari, But . . .

An illustration I did in the 1980s for the "Shopping Bag," a weekly feature that ran in the group of newspapers I art directed back then. In hindsight, I probably should have included Maranello in the names of Italian towns in the background. This is a pen and ink sketch, with applied Benday screens and tapes, all tricks of the circa eighties paste-up world of graphics before desktop publishing began. We had a mainframe and Compugraphic typesetters for the stories and headlines, but the layouts were all done manually with hot wax and paper. I ran a small art department of about 6-8 paste-up people working on 28 weekly newspapers and classified sections. I'm pretty proud that several of the people I trained, and they were all young and entry-level, went on to bigger and greater jobs in the art production world.

Before There Was Artandcolour . . .

 . . . There Was Art With a Lot of Color

Two drawings I found today, almost 20 years old, done in 1991. These are fanciful renderings for my mythical car company, Delgiata. The GT/3 is at the top, and the Quattroporte is on the bottom. I wasn't trying to create anything "real" but rather cars that had a fun streak; sleek and colorful way beyond the futuristic silver and gray concept cars making the rounds of shows back then. Click on each image to see the pastels and colored pencil work in greater detail.

Lady Gaga's Inspiration, 1970 Style

Shayne of Leete's Island, Hoohoo's pedigreed Miniature Schnauzer, 1969-84, here dressed up for his first Halloween in 1970. I'm not quite sure why Hoohoo made a Devil outfit for him, but he was quite the ham and would allow her to dress him up any way she wanted. He had birthday hats, holiday outfits (turkey feathers and reindeer antlers as well as Easter bunny ears), and of course, Halloween costumes. He also had sweaters and coats in every color and pattern imaginable. No, she had no children!

Lady Gaga's Red Outfit at the 2009 MTV VMA awards ceremony. Hoohoo would be pleased that the spirit of "Devil Shayne" lived on!

Old Chops Never Die. Or Rust.

I'm going to revisit this concept as a chop soon. This is the late and unlamented Tbird roadster, made much more classic than the one Ford produced. I set the cab further to the rear to improve the proportions. I also changed the porthole roof, which is an idea that worked in '56, not 2006, with a sharper edged removable top with triangular quarter windows—a more classic Tbird styling trait. Overall, I tried to "butch" it up a bit more than the production car as well. I would like to start over with a better original photo one of these days. This chop dates to 2007 I believe.

A tongue-in-cheek look at the future of über luxury cars if we ever see $10/gallon gas, lol. This is the Dodge Hornet concept with a Chrysler Imperial front clip from that brown luxury concept of a couple of years ago. I was more concerned with the overall coloration of this piece, and I still love the pastel lavenders, teals and greens. The car, well, it is what it is! I think this is from 2008.

A slightly more svelte Smart ForTwo, the ForTwoPlus. I lengthened it slightly, enough for a few grocery bags on a shelf behind the front seats. I changed the trim, gave it better wheels, and added a whole bunch of small LEDs outling the front airdam, grille surround and center bar. I think it looks less like a grocery cart here. Hopefully it would somehow get better mileage than the real one, which is really disappointing considering how tiny it is.

How about a Yaris coupe? This was chopped from a photo of one of the Autoweek and MotorTrend 'regulars' back in the day, a kid named Brian. This was his mother's new Yaris in 2008 I think. Brian is a really talented musician that is probably going to hit Nashville any day now. He has several CDs he's produced already. For this chop, I wanted to see if I could  make the Yaris lower and wider, a la Harley Earl's mantra, but keep the Toyota-ness of it. I added chrome to the grille's center bar, and modified the headlights, although I don't remember just what I did to them, lol. Chromed door handles, and a glass roof add a suitable upscale touch to this little economy car. I think this is the first chop I made from a personal photo rather than a PR piece.

Ummm. Fraternal Triplets?

Yes, folks. The dahlia that has been nicknamed "Fraternal Twins" for its two totally different flowers. has thrown off a third flower, and it's yet another variant of the two colors! Instead of being pink and white all over, like the bloom on the left, or solid magenta like the flower on the right, "Goldilocks" in the middle has deep magenta petals on the outside with a lighter pink/white center section. I can't wait for this flower to open fully to see the exact pattern of colors. Remember, all three of these stalks and flowers belong to one plant, grown from one corm. Click to see this burgeoning oddity! 

Flowers in a Truck, Tuesday; Wedding Flowers to Remember Long After, Saturday

They really didn't show up well in these photos, but the cream colored dahlias in the upper right were absolutely gorgeous, very creamy and velvety looking.

My blue salvia didn't flower as well as these fine specimens did this year. I wasn't going to try them again next year, but now that I've seen these, I just might.

Pinks, yellows, pale oranges and creams as far as the eye can see!

F L O W E R S — Mary stopped by today with her delivery truck full of zinnias, dahlias and blue salvia. She picked them at a flower farm owned by a friend of hers. She's doing an informal country garden wedding this coming weekend, and will create simple arrangements with these flowers in clear Mason jars. I think it sounds fantastic, elegant and beautiful, like something I would want at a big party if I was going to have one. Knowing Mary, the guests, and the wedding party, will be blown away with what she calls 'simple' arrangements. Her sense of color and texture, arrangement and composition, is second to none. And no one works harder, or longer, than she does to ensure a couple's special day is really something to remember, no matter what the budget or venue is.

Miniature Autumn Tableau

June gave me this selection of decorative gourds the other day. I love the way the orange Nasturtium has entered the picture, lol, as if saying "Me too, Me too!"  Though nasturtiums bloom in the summer too, they seem to be enjoying the cool nights more, and are throwing off many more leaves and flowers now. Autumn begins tomorrow night, Wednesday September 22, at a few minutes past 11pm to be more precise. I'll be enjoying summer right up until the last second.

Zest of Zinnia and Hello Dahlia 4

The yellow filaments in the center portion of this red zinnia remind me of the zest of a lemon peel. I love the way they look like a wreathe wrapping around the center, and the way the petals haven't quite fully unfurled. Click to enlarge and see if they remind you of a gourmet salad, too!

The red and yellow dahlia blooms grow larger every day. As they mature, they change from bright red and bright yellow, to an almost overall orange color. This one is midway through the process. This is the only bloom with those shorter, squatter petals in the center, though. I'm having a lot of unique dahlia flowers this year! There is an additional surprise with the "Fraternal Twins" progress. Stay tuned!

Just a 2¢ Stamp Away. And a Check.

As long as I'm on a vintage fashion kick... How about a Standard Mail-Order Catalog from 1918? I absolutely love this cover painting. I love the colors and composition, the subjects, the "painterliness" of it and, of course, the typography. The "Spring & Summer 1918" is especially attractive and evocative of that period now. I have a couple of these, and scanned a few pages for y'all tonight. Click on each image to enlarge. I tried to make the pages as readable as possible with respect to the web resolution.

$21.50 sounds like a lot of money for 1918. You could buy a Ford Model T for as low as $500. That's a bit higher than the Ford was in 1915-1917, I can only guess because of World War 1. Here's a great list of original prices for the T throughout its 19 year production run.

With their slim legs and 3 button jackets, these men's suits are almost contemporary. The hats not so much.

Quite a range in prices for these coats. I actually like the least expensive. That's the first time THAT'S happened! I love the styling of all of them.

These are perfect examples to use when I have new clothes made for my vintage dolls. I think most children in art from this period resemble small adults more than children.

I didn't realize before tonight when I looked it up that 'kid' leather was, in fact, made from the skin of young goats, or kids. I thought it was the tanning process that made the leather more supple.

I want every single one of these hats to hang on a wall. They're all works of art. I really think hats like this should make a comeback. If I was a fashion designer, hats like this would be in my new Spring collection for next year! 

I found  a table online, of the average prices of goods in 1918. It's someone's site about their father, but at the end of it they included a few prices. I can't verify they're correct, but they seem about right from the little I know:
• Average National Salary: $1,144.
• Average Price of a Home: $4,821
• Gallon of milk: 55¢
• Loaf of bread: 10¢

Mercedes 380SLT Drawing, 1979

Extremely cab forward WAY before it was introduced by Chrysler, with many of the then-new '79 Mustang styling cues including the tri-spoked wheels, I forgot the headlights on this Mercedes SL wagon. Let's just say they're hidden! Not bad for a party monster of huge proportions. Make that gigantic proportions. I once had to jump out of a van going at least 30mph to escape from a machete-wielding serial killer, I kid you not, but that's another story for another time. Enjoy this drawing for now.

R E M E M B R A N C E — An illustration of a proposed Mercedes Benz sportwagon I created in 1979 when I lived in LA. I lived a 'fast' lifestyle, frequently going out to clubs for 3-4 days straight. I rarely had much money for anything except clubs and drinks and other party favors, hence the ripped piece of paper used for this drawing. Many of my friends were fellow artists, and after we came home at 6-7-8am, none of us would be tired, so we'd amuse each other by drawing, or singing, making clothes, or whatever creative spurt hit us. I was the only one that drew cars, lol. 

During this period, I created a mural on my bedroom wall, a mural approximately 8 feet by 10 feet, all with a very-fine Rapidograph pen. It was completely comprised of teeny-tiny lines and geographic shapes. It took the entire 8 months I lived there to finish it. I went back to LA five years later to visit my friend Andy, and when we walked past my old place, I could see through the open window the mural was still there—not bad for a rental in West Hollywood! I know for a fact the building was razed recently, so, sadly, I have no artistic presence in LA today.

The Fashion of the Day, If Your Day was in 1910

Page 11 color plate from the January 1910 issue of The Delineator, showing the Princess and Semi-Princess dress of the day. Published by the Butterick Company. Be sure to enlarge this thumbnail to see the really great illustration!

M Y   C O L L E C T I O N — One hundred years ago, this is what the fashionable woman wore if Princess, or Semi-Princess dresses were their style of course. Issues of The Delineator, a monthly magazine, went for "fifteen cents a copy," or "one dollar a year" as stated on the cover. My mother's Aunt Edith subscribed to this magazine. I have several of them from this period. They're a treasure trove of not only full color plates like this, but black and white illustrations, stories about Temperance and other issues of the day for women. And of course the ads. The ads! I think I could probably design a book just around the black and white ads for salves and creams, home remedies, early cameras, stoves, shoes, and frankly, items I have no idea what they could possible be used for, lol.

Glancing through this particular issue, which had to be scanned in three sections and pieced together in Photoshop, I was struck at just how small the type is in these very large format magazines, and the resulting HUGE number of words in each written piece. Each article has to be at least ten times as long as your average People magazine article is today. Hell, they're longer than your average New York Times exposé of today. They not only utilize a lot of words, they utilize large words, lol. I'm being serious now, I don't think the average American today would have the time or the mindset to read a single article. What has happened to us? We like to think that each generation is smarter and more savvy and more "together" than the previous one, and frankly, I just don't see it! If this is the level of reading material for your average American woman in 1910, we have truly lost something in the intervening 100 years.

I'm going to try shooting some of these pages with my camera tomorrow, outside, for the best light. It's not only time-consuming to have to scan each page in three pieces and them join them, but I don't want to have to fold the pages back and then have the scanner cover press down on them. They're fairly fragile, although when you think of it, for plain magazine stock that is more than 100 years old, they're in good condition. Some of the covers are loose ad some pages are water-stained. They lived in the family attic for most of their lives, an attic that was in a 250 year old house, but overall they're quite presentable.

• For a very short Wiki article about The Delineator, click here.

• Here's the Wiki on the Butterick Company. Apparently the company was located on Spring and MacDougal Streets in the Village, Manhattan, one of the coolest areas of the city today. I think I used to frequent a bar on that corner, or very near to it back in MY day.

"Never Before a Car Like It"

Cover of the 4 page, 4 color brochure for the new-for '58 Edsel. If the pages seem to have a 'seam' in the middle, I had to scan each page in two pieces and then join them in photoshop. Clickable to enlarge as always!

Inside left-hand page (Verso in publishing-speak).

Inside right-hand page (Recto in the aforementioned publishing-speak).

Back cover of the brochure. Manufactured 1957.

Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time

The September 1957 issue of Popular Science magazine touted the brand-new Edsel by Ford Motor Company. In a few short years, that would be "all she wrote" about this much-hyped and much-focus group tested automobile. While the name "Edsel" has since become synonymous with "lemon" or failure, there was really nothing wrong or even out-of-the-ordinary about the Edsel except for they styling of the front grille and a couple over-the-top features. One such feature was the location of the "PRNDL" buttons; they were in the center of the steering wheel hub, the horn's customary position. They weren't built any worse than any other car in 1958, and they weren't any more prone to rust or mechanical failure. BUT, they were introduced during what has become known as the Eisenhower Recession, and it was just the wrong time for an upper-middle class car to be introduced. Car sales for the entire domestic industry were down by about half compared with the year before. Edsel's weren't "all new" either, as much as the press seemed to believe they were. The lower two series of Edsel shared inner structures with the Ford, and the upper two series were based on that year's Mercury. All images clickable to see larger.

Also new for '58 was the 4 seater version of the classic Thunderbird, featured here on the cover of Popular Mechanics' February 1958 issue. Everyone that reads my blog regularly knows I am a Tbird junkie, and I'll leave it at that, lol.

Hard to see, but here I am at the age of 5, in 1962, sitting behind the wheel of Hoohoo's '58 Silver Mink Thunderbird  coupe. The only reason I've blanked out the license plate is that I have the same number on my Infiniti today. That license tag number has been on a family car since the mid 1920s.

Back When I Had a Life, Part 77

Last week was Fashion Week in New York. This is when the world's designers come into Manhattan and show their next season's clothes. There are several fashion shows every day and night, parties you can't imagine, celebrities, models, paparazzi, limousines, you name it. It's a whirlwind week for designers, buyers, fashion editors and publishers, as well as for the city itself—fashionable restaurants, bars and clubs are even more fashionable that week. For quite a few years in the late '80s and early '90s I was part of it, actually receiving invitations to shows, such as Betsey Johnson's show illustrated above. I found this invitation yesterday as I was rummaging around in the attic. I still wear the T-shirt I received as a memento of the show, and if you had asked how old it was I probably would never have guessed 20 years. It's black and still looks like it did 20 years ago. If I could only say the same thing!

• For the Wiki on Fashion Weeks in general, click here.

• For the Wiki on New York's Fashion Week, click here.

• Betsey Johnson's website.

Hello Dahlia 3

Yet another variety of dahlia has bloomed. This one is a deep burgundy, unless the sun is shining right on it as in this photo. Then it's a gorgeous, blood red with almost a purple in the center. This plant is going to have flowers that are more "spider" like than the pom-pom shapes of the dahlias that have been featured on this blog in earlier posts. There are still quite a few petals to unfurl, but I think it's going to stay fairly loose and open. This plant is about three feet tall now, and I'm hoping for a lot more flowers before the season ends.

Close-up view of the fuschia-colored dahlia, one of the "fraternal twins.' The bloom is just about three inches in diameter, and very full as you can see.

A longer view shows the "fraternal twins" location along the outside perimeter of the vegetable garden. They are about to be joined by a third bloom, lower right, which appears is going to be a solid color fuschia color. A few Striped German tomatoes can be seen in the background inside the garden. Just as a reminder, the red and yellow dahlia is planted around the perimeter also, just to the left of this plant.

Oh, Da Perfume!

A set of four Faberge colognes that belonged to my grandmother, always on her bureau, like my mom's Chanel I wrote about below. I scanned these bottles, lying them on their sides, which accounts for the brown "stains" on the glass bottles on the left, the small amount of liquid left in them settling on the sides when I placed them on the scanner. The other two are pretty much full, not bad for small bottles which have been open since, I'm guessing, the early 1960s, and they still smell pretty good, too!

My grandmother was diagnosed with cancer in 1963, and didn't get out much after that, dying in 1969 when I was twelve. I can remember her wearing these, so I think they must have been relatively new in the sixties. Even though it has been more than forty years, whenever I smell one of these, I can imagine sitting next to her in her car, or in a restaurant—she loved to take me to lunch, all dressed up, see below, or in her home, side-by-side as she taught me to knit and perl. After she died, I guess Hoohoo couldn't throw them out, and after Hoohoo died, I kept everything including these, lol.

From left, the names of the perfumes are, Aphrodesia, with a reddish top under clear glass, Woodhue, with a woodgrained top, Act IV, with a black top with stars on it, and Tigress, with a furry faux tigerskin top. 

All ready to go to lunch with my grandmother, or Nanny, as I always called her. The Ratpack was alive and well in 1962! I might have looked like a little Peter Lawford, but I thought I was Sammy Davis, Jr. Every time he was on TV I'd jump up and try to sing and dance just like him, lol. I think it was because he was short! Doncha just love the pose? I was a natural!