I love this Minimal Black Heart print by the big harumph! Made with hand-pulled linoleum cut — love the texture and interesting pattern. Makes me want to work on some linoleum prints… :)

I was so stoked that I had a chance to stop by Anthropologie store in Rockefeller Center last week — it’s like going to a museum! Their styling and art direction of the whole store is always so impressive. Above is a window display; it looks like an artist’s studio — love how you can tell the story!

Below is an interesting installation by using yarns and chairs… there are few throughout the store…

and this installation below is made with bunch of fluorescent tube bulbs, definitely caught my eye.

Happy creative year! xo Hijiri

If you have 15 minutes to spare and if you haven’t already, please watch this very inspiring speech by Steve Jobs. I couldn’t watch it without tears and feeling really inspired. Rest in peace, Steve Jobs, thank you so much for all you did. You will be forever remembered and honored…

Besides fining some types, I was enjoying all the store display designs at the Anthropologie store the other day (as always). I saw a lot more, but I couldn’t take all the pictures so here are some…

Awesome wall display by using crates and vintage boxes (above).

and how cool is this chair sculpture to the ceiling? Definitely caught my eye. Love the painting, too.

Very inspiring!

Leanne Marshall Takes on Fashion Week from Etsy on Vimeo.

NY has been busy with Fashion Week, I saw this video Leanne Marshall Takes on Fashion Week and my thoughts are with her and all the independent designers who are doing their collections by hands with original ideas and sleepless nights. Very inspiring.

Last night, I was so happy to open my amazon.com order — my pre-ordered copy of Design*Sponge at Home had finally arrived! Grace and the team had been working on this book for the last two years and it really shows their hard work in every single page! Amazing!

Love these chapter opener pages — behind the scene post was very inspiring, too.

Congratulations, Grace and the team!!

I know what I’m going to be doing for the next few days… :) Happy Friday and weekend, everyone! xo Hijiri

p.s They are giving away the book!

On Tuesday, I stopped by the Metropolitan Museum of Art to see the Alexander McQueen exhibition “Savage Beauty” — it’s ending this Sunday, August 7th (good luck to you if you are still planning to go) and it was WAY busier than I thought it would be, probably the busiest exhibition I’ve ever been and ohhh my god, it was THE exhibition of the year!!!

What a beautiful building…

When I went inside, the wait time was… 2.5 hours! (At this point, it was already 3pm, museum closes at 5:30pm)

but thanks to their membership program, I became a proud member of the MET museum and so I didn’t have to wait! (but now it says “Due to extremely high attendance, we regret that we are no longer able to offer Members priority access to Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty.” — aww I really went there just in time! Because next day on Wednesday, the line was out on the street and the line closed by noon, who knows what happened yesterday and today, scary to think about this weekend!!)

You are not allowed to take any photos inside of the exhibition and so I respected the policy (some people were taking lots of pictures because it was packed so it wasn’t easily get caught — I hated it) so these photos are from their website, though, photos don’t do any justice… it was more than an art, the whole exhibition was his whole life, love, passion — Alexander McQueen.

Dress, VOSS, spring/summer 2001
Red and black ostrich feathers and glass medical slides painted red

(this room was, oh, so awesome… I felt like I was totally in a different world…)

Dress, No. 13, spring/summer 1999 (check out the video)
White cotton muslin spray-painted black and yellow with underskirt of white synthetic tulle

I could post all the images because each one was just so special, but if you are interested in seeing more, the website has a lot of images and information, please check it out.

(Shoes were all sooo amazing, too)

Inside of the exhibition was even more packed than the line outside… I felt like I was at some kind of jam packed concert… but because of that, I could spend well 10-20 minutes each piece (I’m not kidding, it wasn’t moving at all!) so I could admire all the details and his quotes, thoughts, materials… He really was a genius. I can’t even imagine what his real shows were like… I bet the words can’t describe…

I feel very lucky to get to go see it!

and how cute are these baby cards?! Love <3

Very inspiring for my next card line, too… :) Happy Friday! xo Hijiri

When I visited Kinokuniya book store last Friday, I saw so many great stationery and paper goods besides Japanese books. And I had to get this “Origami” (in Japanese below, it says “Origami Origami”) — isn’t this so cute?!

Comes with a lot of everyday-use origami instructions like these:

and it comes with so many cute and fun patterns, I wanted to get more, but the ones I liked were all gone… but this polka-dots & bunny stickers sure came home with me :)

Hope you had a nice weekend… let the new week begin!

When we went to Bubby’s for a dinner the other day, I couldn’t help but notice all the flowers in the store. These were from ladies’ room, but the colors and everything inspired me :)

I’ve been getting ideas and inspirations together for our baby’s nursery, these colors (light pinks, peach pinks, yellows, whites and light greens) are calling my name…