Pepsi...

There have been a few times when we've been in a taxi, driving down the freeway that runs down the east side of Manhattan, and we've looked across towards Queens and seen a big bright Pepsi sign by the river. Each time I've said that I wanted to go and find it.

We used to see the sign from the window of the photography studio we were at a year or so ago, and I tried to work out where it was then too.

So this afternoon I went on a little adventure to find it...

It's in a part of Queens called the Gantry Plaza State Park, right down at the river across from the UN building. The area used to be where the Pepsi bottling plant was, and the sign has stayed there ever since. Being refurbished from time and time - but never changed to the new logo (phew!).

The park that's around it seemed very new, and very nice - even on a grey day - but unfortunately they'd closed off the area directly in front of the sign, but you can still see it up close...

I love big signs like this - especially when it's old branding. It makes me think how great it must have been when Piccadilly Circus and Times Square had physical signs like these, rather than big screens and projectors.

I'm glad I finally found it - but I'd definitely like to go back on a nice sunny day and be able to look out over the water and the Chrysler Building in the sunshine.

Bread Bin Cafe...

When I was mooching around Queens this afternoon, I came across the Bread Bin Cafe. I was in a bit of a weird place (next to a petrol station), but the outside facade looked brilliant. 

It was made out of rolling pins!!!

Some of the pins had little name plaques on them - I think you must be able to 'sponsor a pin' or something... 

I thought it looked blummin' brilliant.

5 Star Dining...

Out & About...

I went for a little stroll around the studios in Queens...

Moody View...

One Lump, or Two...

Or 80,000?

This afternoon I went along to Silvercup Film Studios in Queens to help out with a Stefan Sagmeister project...

It was very exciting arriving to Silvercup studios - it's been used for loads of telly programmes and it's been in films and stuff - so it was great to be able to go there. Unfortunately, apart from a load of big trucks outside, there wasn't much to see... but still - I can now say I've been inside.

I found out about the project on twitter, when Sagmeister's studio said they were looking for volunteers to help with a project. So I emailed to find out more and was sent directions to the studios and told that it would involved making stuff out of sugar cubes.

When I arrived one of Sagmeister's team, Simon (a very nice German chap) showed me round and explained that they were building big letters that would spell TYPOGRAPHY out of sugar cubes - 80,000 of them in fact!

They'd been working solidly, all day and all night for the whole week and today was their last day of work - it looked like they still quite a bit to do, but there were a few people there helping out.

My job was to make tiles out of the sugar cubes (which aren't cubes at all, they're cuboids!) - 6 lump x 6 lump tiles, held together with a special icing/egg/glue concoction. It was pretty messy, but oddly therapeutic.

The tiles were then put together to build the sides of the big letters...

You can see the T in the front - each letter's roughly a foot deep and 2 or 3 feet tall.

The plan is to have a 3D modeling projection thing projected onto the letters that's somehow linked up to a facial recognition camera that can tell if you're smiling or frowning. When you smile the colours will be all bright and the projection will be active, and when you frown the projection will stop... I think that's the plan anyway...

There were some really nice people there, from all over the world, some German, some Swedish, an Australian guy, and me... there were some Americans too. I was sitting on a table with a girl who'd just left Pentagram! Although she wasn't exactly the chattiest of people, I got the impression she might have been fired from Pentagram, she didn't seem as enthusiastic or as excited about the fact that she used to work there as I was... Oh well. I'll have her job!

It was a fun way to spend a few hours on a cold and drizzly afternoon, and it was nice to meet some other designer types and do something that meant getting our hands dirty for a change. It was great to be in a film studio too, with all the lighting rigs and camera dolly's around, there were even Evian water sprays lying around - I didn't even know they made them! It was all very impressive.

The view from the loo was pretty impressive too...

The Happy Show opens at the Institute of/for Contemporary Arts in Philadelphia on Wednesday - luckily it runs until August, so Abi and I will have plenty of time to go and see how the sugar lumps ended up looking. I can't wait!

Howard & Hilda...

Now What...

Up On The Highline...

The blossom up on the Highline was looking beautiful, there were still a lot of bare branches around - but the buds were beginning to come out.

We walked the entire length, all the way to the end where they're planning on expanding even further - they're trying to get planning permission at the moment I think.

As you walk towards to the top end of the park some of the apartments overlooking the park are pretty close to the footpath. Some of the apartments are very overlooked and I imagine they get quite a few people peering into the windows, so someone's decided to have a bit of fun with it...

They'd painted a full sized version of themselves waving and put it at the window! It's really clever and very realistic and had become a big photo opportunity, loads of people were taking photos of it... including us!

Sipping and Strolling...

On Sunday morning we all went for some brunch in Brooklyn before walking down to the Williamsburg water front...

Then we had a mooch around Artists and Fleas before heading to Brooklyn Brewery for a few beers...

Luckily we arrived just in time to beat the big queues at the bar. Since I was last at the Brooklyn Brewery they've expanded into some of the surrounding buildings, so the beer hall now feels a lot bigger.

Before people would get their beers and then order a take-away pizza and get it delivered to the brewery, but now they've invited some local food vendors to set up shop inside the beer hall. Some people still bring their own pizza, but there were some delicious roast port sandwiches on sale and some  S'mores (two graham crackers with melted chocolate and marshmallow in the middle). We just had a little taste, just to wet our appetite...

Then we had a spot of lunch at Brooklyn Bowl. We were hoping to go bowling but it was family day and there was a reeeeeally long wait for an alley so we ended up going into Manhattan instead for a walk along the Highline.

Nice Wheels...

While we were out and about we spotted some great old cars...

 Last time I was in the area this old car was under the cover (I took a photo of the purple car in the background instead) - it's a beautiful old car, I'm not sure what kind it is, but I want one!

I've seen the red Ford van around before too, I think we first saw it during Abi's very first visit to New York!

Graffiti Safari...

Just around the Cotton Candy Machine there were loads of interesting pieces of graffiti and street art and some amazing different textures on the walls.

We went on a bit of a graffiti safari...

 While we were out on our safari eagle-eye-pro-celebrity-spotter Abi Turner spotted Joe Jonas - of the Jonas Brothers, cycling through a not very glamorous part of Brooklyn. It was quite impressive that she recognised him, especially as he was wearing a helmet... she must be a secret fan!

Cotton Candy Machine...

After 5 Pointz we went over to another part of Brooklyn near Lorimer Street - there was a shop there that Simon had asked to go to, and there were a few murals that I'd seen earlier that I thought he'd like.

The shop was called the Cotton Candy Machine - it was just down the road from Fette Sau (or favourite BBQ place!) near some great little junk shops and bars. The shop was set up by Tara McPherson, it actually used to be her studio - and now sells loads of her work as well as affordable prints of other artists that the shop represents.

They had some fantastic prints in all sorts of styles, by all sorts of artists - there were some great gig poster and some really lovely screen prints. Abi and I found a lovely long print for the apartment and Simon bought a couple of prints too.

The people in the shop were so friendly and really passionate about the artists they represent - it was great to hear about some local artists and it was nice that Simon got to go, he said he goes on the shop's blog a lot and had been wanting to go for ages.

Now that I know where it is, I think I'll be popping back for some more lovely prints!

5 Pointz...

One of the first places we went with Simon and Ruth was 5 Pointz...

 There were some great new pieces on the walls - and it's always great to see all the sprayed pavements and fire hydrants.

My favourite pieces were the black and browny ones, they looked quite folky - one of them was by a Brooklyn artist called The Yok.

I thought Pops might like this one...

 It seems everyone loves Angry Birds, even graffiti artists!