Click-through screen shots of six sites we look at daily:

Nearly every small Western town we stopped in on our road trip over the holidays had an “antique” store like this one. Aisles and aisles of old cookbooks, silverplate candlestick holders, broken toys, old military medals, crocheted table clothes.

We couldn’t help ourselves; we almost always stopped and poked around. We used restraint and made no “fine collectibles” purchases (the car was super full with our ridiculous amount of luggage–three weeks is a long time to be on the road).

That said…there are two sets of things we regret not buying. Is it worth the trek back to Silver City, NM and Childress, TX?

A ritual we quickly established on our road trip was for me to look up the next small town we were coming up to on my iPhone while he drove. I Wiki-ed dozens of tiny towns in California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. More often than not we enjoyed the “facts” of town, most of which were established during the migration west in the late 1800’s and involved the rail road.

Driving home, I looked up “Desert Center, CA” and it was by far the most interesting and in depth Wikipedia entry I read aloud. So much information (and drama) for such a little town in the middle of literally nowhere. A preacher who writes bad poetry and gets shunned for “dallying,” the country’s first managed health care, lots of fortune, even more loss, and palm trees planted in a crazy pattern. Read it.

A Google search on Desert Center also brought up an interesting photo stream on Flickr of the town’s abandoned schoolhouse. The images were beautiful and strange. As soon as we saw them, we knew we had to exit off the boring 10 and check it out. And I really wanted to steal that typewriter.

The school is situated right alongside the Interstate and is surprisingly new for being abandoned.  We stepped over the chain barring the driveway and poked around. Alas, the typewriters were gone, but everything else looked much like Bill Lindsay’s Flickr pictures.

A couple of hundred yards down the dirt road from the school was another motel we did not stay at:

We’re currently in the fantastic little town of Marfa, Texas on day thirteen of a rambling, meandering road trip. Over the next week we’re going to slowly make our way back to Los Angeles. Our antics and drinking experiences have been chronicled on our wine blog, Swirl Smell Slurp, and Twitter.

We’ve been trying to stay off Interstates as much as possible…how many Quality Inn’s and McDonald’s do we need to see? Consequently, we’ve driven through a whole bunch of small towns with places we decided not to stay at…

And of course, we also passed a whole lot of places we decided not to eat at…

My camera and iPhone are full of these: “In Defense of the Poor Image,” a provocatively smart and complex essay by Hito Steyerl.

The poor image tends towards abstraction: it is a visual idea in its very becoming.

We’ve been so obsessed with our wine blog that we’ve neglected this design one. Of course they go hand in hand at our house (drinking while designing, for example).

Here’s some stuff that’s caught our eye recently:

So perfect for purse or pocket: Sneak-It-In Disposable Flasks. (Thanks, estarLA)

A design that should not have come to fruition: an opener for screwcap bottles. Really now. Stop it. (Thanks, Dr. Vino)

Pictures published in The Daily Mail of Constellation Europe’s wine warehouse, which is currently housing just their Holiday Collection, remind us of the wine equivalent of an industrial stockyard. Interestingly, must of the wine is shipped there in bulk and bottled on site. As if we needed another reason to seek out boutique wines. And the images have a nice Thomas Demand / Andreas Gursky / Gerhard Ritcher quality. (Thanks, Dr. Vino)

We do it already, creating the perfect music mood to match our drinking mood. Now there’s an app that will do it for you: The Wine DJ. “The application builds a playlist of “Music to Match Your Spirits” based on mood, setting and which Liberty School wine is being consumed.” And…it’s free. (Thanks, Serious About Wine)

The name says it all, but the shelf talkers the marketing team developed for pro-mis-Q-ous wines make sure you get the point: “Are you ready to mingle? May we present a casual dalliance with more than one partner – a sensual blend of…When you’re in a red wine mood and want to drink a red wine that’s not so ridiculously serious. Practice safe sipping.” Sex sells. (Found this one on our own, simply Googled “wine sex” images)

We had been contemplating what to do for our anniversary, until we saw a special for the Ace Hotel & Swim Club offered by Jetsetter on Gilt. Both longtime Californians, she had been to Palm Springs once, and me, never. I wanted to tell the story of the weekend in photos, but I realized upon sitting down to compose this that I didn’t really take enough. (There are more pictures and a bit more about our stay at our wine blog: Swirl Smell Slurp.) Alas, a few words first.

Firstly, I had no idea PS was so close, one hour and forty-five minutes. We arrived well before check-in time at the Ace, so we decided to head to the Parker for an arrival drink and breakfast. The grounds at the Parker are fantastic, the decor retro-eclectic and chic and we need to go back and stay there soon. We sat on the patio and had mimosa’s and Bloody Mary’s and a pretty good breakfast. The highlight was hearing Giorgio Moroder’s version of Mah Na Mah Na. Kitschy, catchy and fun, the song became our PS theme and to me is the musical equivalent to the city.

After breakfast, we went to check-in at the Ace. Having read a few reviews on Yelp, I was a bit concerned about the service at the Ace. Despite (or perhaps because of) the bad reviews, the staff was friendly, laid-back, attentive and nice throughout our stay. The Ace was exactly what I had heard; loud, fun, hipster-ful, late-night, popular etc. This isn’t the place to go if you are looking to be in bed by 9:00. The pool opens at 6AM and doesn’t clode until 3AM. There are outdoor fireplaces, hammocks and loungers galore at the pool, it’s a place to be social and I appreciate it. Not everyone goes to a hotel to be asleep.

On Saturday we headed out to do some sight-seeing. As an architect, I was aware of the mid-century moderns of Palm Springs, but I had absolutely no idea that they are literally everywhere. The Alexander’s built 2200 houses and it was incredibly fun to drive around looking at them. I recommend stopping at the Visitor’s Center and buying a map. There are also guided tours, but I prefer to look at things at my own leisure; I don’t like being told I’m done looking.

Our welcoming drinks at the Parker.

The Ace Hotel and a beautiful view.

Room 219, our room. The Ace is a redesigned Howard Johnson’s.

The pool at the Ace.

Plugging the iPod into the MP3 jack to listen to Mah Na Mah Na. Again.

2 of the 7 Steel Houses designed by Donald Wexler and built by the Alexander’s.

The Kaufmann house (and their mailbox) designed by Neutra. 1 of 2 remaining Neutra’s in Palm Springs. One was demolished in 2002. Let’s not do that anymore.

Elvis’ Honeymoon Hideaway designed by William Krisel

Even some bizarre “Swiss Miss” houses.

Several shots of City Hall designed by Albert Frey (et al.)

Palm Springs Art Museum designed by E. Stewart Williams that has a very nice sculpture garden.

Spa Hotel and Bathhouse (now the Spa Resort Casino) designed by Cody, Wexler, Harrison and Koenig. Some things just break your heart. The images I saw of this place from it’s heyday were tremendous, now it’s just an ugly, gross old casino.

This is a very small slice of what we did and what we saw. For more about the Ace Hotel visit NotCot who happened to be just a few doors down from us while we were there. She has some great pictures of the hotel and especially of her room.

Across a variety of media: “The kinetic motion of the movement of the hand.”

Workers of the mind unite: “The futurists were against sadness, moonlight, marriage–even pasta…” (via Bookforum)

Loosen up: movement class and you get to wear his old clothes.

Relic??? Mmm. Maybe he’s just mad these shoes aren’t made for walking.

Go see it: “My goal is to make obvious in your face art that ninety-nine percent of the people who walk by.”

Sometimes, while driving, we roll down our windows and click and shoot pictures with our little Canon digital camera. Actually, we do it ALL the time– and probably shouldn’t. It may be more distracting and dangerous then talking on our iPhones–at least for whichever person is doing the driving. But even if it is the passenger doing the clicking and shooting, whomever is driving usually ends up stoppping and slowing to accommodate the clicker and shooter. It’s a bit messy all around. And so are the images. The results are pretty consistent: blurry, bad, indistinguishable, and quickly deleted.

But, if we’re lucky, there will be an image that we fall in love with: the cropping, the colors, the placement of objects…it  all just seems to work. And the best part: no Photoshopping required.

An example (driving down Eagle Rock Blvd. Friday night):

R & S brought us back a big bag of treats from their trip to New York. A whole bunch of goodies from Zabar’s: smoked trout, spinach spread, lox, jam, coffee. Everything was delicious and the gift was good timing because we hadn’t been to the store in a few days. None of the yummy stuff lasted too long, but we still have the bag…and this may be our favorite part. We love the retro styling, clip-art graphics, and the way the text (listing all their products) becomes its own graphical element. The design breaks rules we learned in school (no all caps!, avoid cliché, don’t over-do alignment choices)…but it’s so, so good. Check out the equally beautiful cover of Zabar’s Deli Book, designed by Seymour Chwast of Push Pin Studios.

(image: Fast Company)

Introducing Little Perky: We like this diverse designer more and more.

Diary, To Do List, Sketchbook, Assemblage: Just call it what we’ll be working on.

Next theme party: Live painting. (via VLU)

How to divide up a room: One wall doesn’t really know anything about another.

Cultural anthropology: The meaning is still subject to debate.

The new site is up and running.  We have spent a lot of time getting it to look and perform the way we want.  There are a few bugs to work out, but content is being generated and wine is being drunk.

Swirl Smell Slurp.

Ilan Hall’s restaurant The Gorbals, designed by Somewhere Something, is opening next week.  Prepare for bacon.

Please pardon our silence on this particular website.  Please don’t mistake it for inaction.  First things first, there are far too many sports on right now to do something as provincial as work.  During said sports, we have been doing R&D for a new venture.  Thankfully, this R&D involves getting drunk.  Even more than we love sports, we love wine.  Early next week, we will be launching a new site (URL forthcoming) that will chronicle our adventures in and with wine.  We spend our evenings reading books and tasting wine.  She is already somewhat of an expert, and she is teaching me the ins and outs of wine.  She’s a good teacher, and I am definitely Hot For Teacher.

We will be back in the office early this week, making things for ourselves and to send to you.  Stay tuned.  In the meantime, here is what we have been working diligently and drunkenly on:

Also, it is one of our birthday’s and we have been planning the party for tomorrow.

Cheers.

Dominus Winery.  Yountville, California 2008

Wine.  Rain.  A year ago.

Wine.  Rain.  Today.

Building a wine website  and looking at wine labels for design inspiration.  Maybe I’ll even open a bottle soon for additional inspiration.

Cheers.

I see esses everywhere. And I just want to give them legs.

More things in the making / mailing.  Check your mail.

Brand identity, 3D modeling, greeting cards, photography, website development, styling, fine art, merchandising, furniture design, installations, architecture, brand identity, and sending people free stuff…THIS IS WHAT WE DO.

The perfect sign to come across while on a walk to Staples to buy rubber cement.