Martin Creed's Madness

I found out about Martin Creed's work a couple of months ago and since then I have wanted to share it. The Scottish artists has been doing his thing since the late 80s and his work can only really be described at bonkers or I'm sure a lot of people would say pointless. Well after all, art is pointless but it's all the pointless things in life that make life so good, right?

His work carries on nicely from my last post, nicely organised things and if you are into things that are a bit surreal then you will love his website and the rest of his work. Click the link and you will see, "The official and the unofficial Martin Creed website", cupboards blocking doors, weird protrusions, pointless marker pens and all sorts of daft but thought provoking installations.

Let me know what you think, like or dislike. All images are from his site

Ikea: Home Is Best

Not too sure if I am late on this one but I bumped into these images of Ikea's new recipe book over at snOOp. I'm a sucker for anything Ikea/cooking/neatness. The images also remind me of Things Organized Neatly, which you will love it you like the above.

I can't seem to find out much more about the Ikea: Home Is Best cookery book but I'm sure you can pick it up in store now. Nice to know you can use a cookery book just for the pictures.

My Money Doesn't Jiggle Jiggle, It Folds

Orange and red, bit of a weird mix? Yeah, that's the way we roll.

You always here women buy tones of bags and shoes, sometimes to match. Well I think my equivalent would be wallets and watches. I don't have loads of them but the ones I do I use them till the fall apart. I've added this J-Fold orange and red wallet from Equip to my collection. 

I know little about J-fold other than they're a New York based leather goods specialists, stocking wallets and bags, which always seem to feature either an unexpected colour mix or an offbeat design. Plus it also came in this cool storage pouch(which reminds me of Indiana Jones, you seeing that?)

Do you guys actually collection anything, clothing/accessories wise?

New Bits & Bobs

Ralph Lauren check shirt, TKmaxx

Velour chunky knit, Topman concession

Stripy tee, Gap

Blue parka, New Look

Velour pocket shirt, Topman concession

Brown leather trainers, Camper

If you follow this blog you may remember me saying a couple of months back that I had drastically changed my spending habits, buy less crap and more things that I know I will still like a few seasons down the line. It's really worked and now my wardrobe is so much more manageable, everything seems to go with everything, which has cut down the stresses on those early mornings. So here's a few things I picked up other the past month or so.

Oh and this is my first pair of Camper shoes and I can safely say they're the comfiest shoes I've ever worn.

Sadly I couldn't make it down to London Fashion Week this season so I have been glued to the live stream, Twitter and everyone's blog updates.

New Design & Layout

Fresh design/fresh fruit

Two things are fresh this week, Buckets & Spades finally has a new design and layout, which is all thanks to Hollie(I'm naff at things like that and she did it all from scratch). She was kind enough to put the hours in and sort it all out for me, I'll take her out for a meal as a thank you. 

What do you all think? If there is anything wrong in your browser please let me know and I can sort it out, I know everyones is on different settings ect.

The second fresh thing is fruit, I've been at my local fruit & veg shop taking close up snaps for my current uni project. Thank you for all the nice comment, you will be glad to hear I am very much less stressed than I was a week ago.

Buckets & Spades Made The Fashion 100

A nice little email popped up in my inbox yesterday to say that my blog has been included in "The Fashion 100 - The Definitive List of the Most Influential Bloggers", which has been complied by The UK's biggest online discounter, VoucherCodes.co.uk. I'm in the menswear category!

To say I was surprised is an understatement but I am very flattered to be included along side some really well respected blogs and websites. Lots of blogs which I read are on there. Style Salvage, Dapper Kid, Male Mode, Last Style of Defense all make the cut in the menswear top 10. The list is made up of categories like Best International Fashion Blog, Street Style Blogs, Up and Coming UK Fashion Blogs, Vintage and Thrifty Fashion ect. The list is well worth a browse as you may come across you next favourite blog! Click here to see the full 100. So thank you very much.

You may also see things are changing, design wise. Slowly getting there, things aren't final(like the header for instance) so expect more changes over the next week or so.

End Of Summer

Out of control

Nice and under control, phew

Outfit - Uniqlo check shirt, Gap stripy t-shirt, Junk de Luxe chinos.

One of my favourite things in the world is to visit my local park and sit near the lake, I've said before that I don't do it enough but over this summer I have gone for a stroll tones of times. The ice cream was the 4th I had that week and this one was by far the best!

Well it's back to uni and back to reality this week, I bought a new printer and it's all up and running, therefore this week will mostly consist of catching up on work I should have done already. Oh and if anyone was wondering why it is taking me so so long to sort the re-design for me blog, well i'm just not that inspired at the moment and everything I try isn't really working. So I'm just going to keep in clean and simple.

Birthday!

So today is my 25th birthday and what better way to celebrate than go on a 3 mile trek up a massive hill(not quite a mountain, it's about 150ft too short to be called a mountain, officially). Pendle Hill to be exact. 

Now I am flipping knackered. I've not had the best of luck over the past few days, I found out I have a large-ish uni project to be in next week, so straight away ran out to buy some printer ink. Forgot my bank card so I wasted another hour going home and coming back. Then got home and my printer decided to break, therefore I had to go out and buy a new printer on my birthday. All that and the fact I woke up feeling terribly sick. 

Onwards and upwards? I could do with some words of encouragement people! Hope everyone is having better luck than I am this week.

Hard At Work

Prisoners on treadmills

London & North Western Railway engineers

I'm really into photographs of old workers at the moment, in a variety of noble industries like fishermen, railway engineers, miners, farmers, oil riggers, soldiers and even prison workers. It's hard not to be influenced by such images if you're even remotely into menswear. This and the fact that I was down a mine last week! Seriously though, you can really see where the workwear influences come from, which are always seen in some form on the catwalk to the high street and everything in between.

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Llandudno - Seaside Holiday

As I mentioned in my previous post, me and Hollie set off on a mini road trip to the sleepy seaside town of Llandudno, in north Wales. We went for a few days and packed our days with fish & chips on the busy promenade, tram rides up the Great Orme, a visit to the old copper mines, coffee shops/pubs and 5 course meals at the hotel. Here's some snaps from the time spent there:

A rammed beachside, old Victorian seaside town at its best.

Nice Art Deco building top.

Staircase to nowhere, on the pier.

King of the hills.

Buckets & Spades, following me about.

The halfway stop of the tram which literally pulls you up the hill

A quick trip down the copper mines, this was pretty immense.

Footwear choices of the night spent at the hotel bar.

The next few photos were taken by Hollie on her Digital Harinezumi camera, if you haven't heard of them, google it!

The alternative way up the Great Orme was by retro cable cars.

We stayed at The Empire Hotel, which was literally 1 minute from the beach.

Cone of chips, a mandatory seaside event.

Images - © Hollie Reid, 2010

On the way home we popped to Liverpool for a few hours, to visit The Beatles Story at Liverpool Docks. It was much better than I thought it was going to be actually, well worth a visit if you're a fan or just like the 60s. I picked up a snaz fab 4 t-shirt and a Ringo badge too.

Well that's my holidays for this year but it is safe to say Llandudno was brilliant and I recommend it highly if you want a relaxing time by the sea.

If you want to see some more photos of the holiday click here