Out of Office Message

This photo was taken during the Bush II era in Brooklyn. It could be seen from street level as well as the elevated highway that ran right through this area. Feelings were strong at the time in a post 9/11 world. Who knew it would be even more relevant in these strange times?!

Believe - Merry Christmas to All!

Believing in Midtown Manhattan

Street Heart Textures

Little Italy/Chinatown, New York - April 2015

Lower East Side, New York - April 2015

Spring Cravings

As the temps have finally started on a steady rise, colorful store windows reflect the mood of most New Yorkers hungry for brighter, longer days. This week, at the beginning of what felt like a global-wide spring break, a welcome day in the mid-sixties allowed us to all finally thaw out. I was out walking amidst the crowds along the route of the big department stores across Midtown. The stores seemed to be rivaling themselves for their own Christmas windows. Now, a floral theme was very dominant, and lifted my mood considerably. Above, the understated elegance of Bergdorf Goodman.

Macy's hosts an annual flower show and this year's theme is a survey of the fine arts. Above, an homage to Pop Art with a double entendre for the season, while the two most dominant figures in Seurat's A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (1884) make an appearance just outside of the main entrance. The original hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago. Inside, more floral decor on the main floor brings in the work of Michelangelo, Matisse, and Picasso. Below, a rainstorm references Magritte with large floating raindrops and red Gerbera daisies.

Happy Spring!

Boo York!

The fall sunset sky. Taken from City Island in the Bronx, 2014. Happy Halloween!

NYC's Big (Faberge') Egg Hunt

Over two hundred sixty large egg sculptures designed by notables in art and fashion have been scattered across the five boroughs of New York City. This interactive egg hunt allows egg seekers to use their smart phones and social media to "collect" the eggs and incorporate social media. The big egg hunt is modeled after a similar one held in the UK in 2012. The eggs will be auctioned and the proceeds will benefit art charity, Studio in a School, and Elephant Family, a conservation program. Egg collectors can also win a real Fabergé egg jewelry.

An egg designed by Diane von Furstenberg (above left) and graffiti artist, Retna (below).

Artist, Jeff Koons, designed the kid-friendly walrus/seal combo egg in the same style as his recent work from the inflatables from the Easy Fun Series (below) - and no egg hunt of this size and scale would be complete without Humpty Dumpty representing the event as he sits front and center in Rockefeller Center (last picture).

Celebrating the Horse - Chinese Lunar New Year 2014

Horses of a Different Color - Atlantic City, New York, France, and Chicago

Museum Voyeur

Guggenheim, New York - Fall 1994

New York City's Annual Christmas Window Display Extravaganza

If you haven't been to see New York's Christmas windows, there's still time. I'll start off with Bergdorf's since they are always a treat. I work a block away, and even put off taking a sneak peek at these beauties until I had my camera in tow. Never disappointing, this year's theme was "Holidays on Ice" translating a few notable days on the calendar throughout the year into visual theatrics.

My favorite was the spectacular Halloween corner window featuring a custom made feather dress by Naeem Khan and entirely Alice in Wonderland in scale. The mannequin's stretched limbs popped through the windows of a replica of the original mansion of Cornelius Vanderbilt which stood on that very corner from 1883 to 1928. 

April Fool's Day - inverted here for ease of viewing

In a stark contrast to the Gothic pageantry, Valentine's Day brought sweet pink treats; the 4th of July, a regal and stylish parade marshal; and April Fool's Day defied gravity in a fully upside down window. Lesser-celebrated Arbor Day showed us an underground cross-section revealing tree roots and all. 

The larger-than-life diamond wrap-around snake necklace sparkles at Bulgari

Tiffany's voyeuristic city vignettes displayed their baubles dangling like Christmas decorations. An enormous outside building wrap gave us a glimpse of silhouetted families enjoying the season mimicking the smaller shadowy and glowing windows within the windows - all offset with that little blue box, strategically placed, of course.

Gucci's mid-century modern star bursts

Bendel's salutes illustrator, Al Hirschfeld with three-dimensional celebrity caricatures

Midtown decadence at The Peninsula

Anthropologie in Rockefeller Center never disappoints either. Known for clever installations using common objects throughout the year, this Christmas season, passersby were lured by spools of thread and 1970s string art that were transformed into a Russian Fairy-tale Forest. Gigantic colorful Matryoshka dolls, sleeping wolves and bears all nestled among the latest on the clothing racks. The mammoth tree in Rockefeller Center was brought to us by the residents of Sandy Hook in CT in a memorial to last year's December tragedy.

Oh, Barneys.....Huh? Why would you take a chance on subjecting an unsuspecting public to a seizure? For sure, this store is off on some sort of bizarre tangent. I didn't really get anything suggesting "holiday" or "Christmas" out of the flashing and radiating Star Wars-style windows (or large metallic angular entryway either).

And in the corner ring....some pom-pom bedecked elf (?) who will take photos with anyone willing to wait in line and venture into a side door. The photos are then digitally posted on a screen just outside on the street for all to see. I'm not sure who she's supposed to be exactly, but the whole setup appears to be Barney's answer to "an outer-space convertible too".

Not to be outdone, Grand Central Terminal has its own modern light show that silently changes in a grid formation in the rear windows of the main terminal. It's not particularly Christmas-y in theme, but can certainly help grumpy commuters lessen their stress-levels nonetheless.

Finally, there's Saks with its friendly snow yeti as the star of its windows and a short video display on the side of the building. 

Enjoy!