Notes on beauty

I do a lot of everything, my entire life is centered around creating. I can’t say I love creating one kind of thing over another, though within the confines of 24 hour days and 7 day weeks, I’m forced to prioritize.

The thing I love is simply, beauty.

What is beauty? Well, it is somewhat in the eye of the beholder. But, beyond style and taste, it is also in harmony, intentionality and craftsmanship. A piece of furniture or clothing or ceramics may not be to your taste, but it is beautiful when it was clearly made with intention and a caring hand. It may even be a bit lopsided, crafted by an inexpert hand, but the beauty is in the heart that was infused into it. Equally, something expertly made is beautiful in part because it took so much care to become the expert that was able to craft such a thing.

When it comes to design, we may say that design is primarily concerned with functionality, and beauty is a core component of functionality. It inspires awe, it gives us energy and calm, it makes us want to engage. A world lacking beauty is a world sans inspiration.

And so, this is my devotion: making beautiful things. I will be updating this space with beautiful things!

Search Engine: How to Pursue Excellence… in Noodles

The podcast Search Engine is in itself a work of art, finding such wonder and depth in seemingly banal questions. In this episode, we hear about Jason Wang’s mission to bring the most perfect noodles to his NYC customers.

To the point that the restaurant has signs warning their customers:

Are you sure you want to take those hand ripped noodles to go? They will not taste as good as fresh dining noodles. We allow take out orders of our hand ripped noodle dishes due to popular demand, but please heed this warning. …

Little Island

This public park looks like a magical mushroom forest sprouting from the water on the western side of Manhattan. It’s magnificent from every vantage point: seen from the water, strolling the grounds, and viewing from above. The flora, materials, and lighting were all impeccably selected. Continue from here to the Chelsea High Line for gorgeousness part 2.

Lucas Museum of Narrative Art

Vogue:

“George wanted the artists and the art to be in an important building,” Hobson [his wife] says. “If the building looks important, people will understand that art must be important too.”

[…]

“He spent years doing this on big pieces of paper on the dining room table,” Hobson tells me now, with visible restraint. “On the dining room table—years.”

“Yes, there were floor plans, elevations…,” Lucas drifts off dreamily. He had pored over the designs—and then, when they were done, pored over them again, determining where every piece of artwork ought to go.

The result is a museum that, much more than most, adheres to a single vision, a unified point of view.

Sunlight Ski Patrol Welcomes You

Isn’t this just the most glorious sign? Part hand-written, part stenciled, part hand-written trying to look stenciled! Who made this? How did they decide which letters would be done in which style? Was this a game of mad libs?? One ski patrol wrote half a phrase, another filled in the second half?

What’s going on with the alignment of the bottom phrase? The hierarchy is actually quite clever, “PLEASE ASK” stands out more like this than if it had been center aligned along the bottom. Was this pre-meditated? A happy accident of hand writing a sign you have no plan for and ran out of room on?

I have so many questions, none of which I want answered.

Maybe this doesn’t fit a strict standard of “beauty” exactly, but months later, I’m still thinking about this sign.