Remember the most important time’s in your life with a “Reflection.ws” Memory Book. Whether it’s for a wedding album, a baby book, yearbooks, a vacation, or a personalized children’s book, or family memories, Reflection.ws has an ebook, that can also be printed, just for you.
Website: Reflections.ws
Video Production: denisemarie.co
PetMatch is a revolutionary new app that uses Superfish’s patented image recognition technology to help you find adoptable dogs and cats in your area. Simply take a picture, upload from your collection, or use a picture from the PetMatch sample gallery to get started.
Website: www.superfish.com
A good education is of vital importance for those seeking a way out of poverty — But in many parts of India, there is a serious shortage of basic necessities such as school bags and proper classroom furniture. Looking to solve both of those problems in one move, Aarambh is using discarded cardboard waste to create school bags which unpack into small desks.
Aarambh is a non-profit working out of New Bombay, and their Help Desk looks to tackle many of the problems faced by children in India’s poorer classrooms. The organization first collects old cardboard boxes sourced from recycling centers, offices and retail stores, before a stencil design is overlaid as a template for cutting out the desk/bag. Once cut, the cardboard can be folded into a book bag for children to carry their texts to and from school, rather than the plastic bags many used before. At the start of every day, the bag can then be unfolded, and refolded into a small desk, improving the children’s comfort and posture. It will also help them to avoid eyesight and handwriting problems which can arise from reading, writing and sitting all on the floor. The Help Desks were distributed to schools in the rural areas of Maharashtra, and you can see them in action in the video below:
The solution not only helps the children and helps recycle discarded cardboard, but each desk only costs 20 cents to produce. How else could waste produce be upcycled and put to better use?
Website: www.aarambh.org
SOURCE: www.lady.co.uk
Kelly WeatherleyMy husband and I were employed as a couple in Highclere Castle – he was a caretaker, and I was the assistant housekeeper. We worked there for a year in 2011, which was the first year of public opening after series one of Downton Abbey. Before Downton, on a good day the castle would receive 30 visitors. Once Downton had aired, this shot up to 1,300 per day. It was a bit of a shock for everyone.
When the cast and crew came to film the second series, everything closed to the public. They were there for a couple of weeks, and we had to make sure particular objects and pieces of furniture were out of the way so nothing got ruined. There were certain antique plates, which were worth more than £5,000, so they had to be stored away safely. The castle looks like a big place, but once you’ve got 70-plus people inside with filming equipment, it soon becomes rather less spacious.
The team of domestic staff is smaller than you might expect, too. There was a chef and an assistant chef, a butler, a banqueting manager and an assistant banqueting manager, the head housekeeper and myself, a couple of gardeners and a security person.
With just two housekeeping staff, we were always busy, and the work varied from day to day and from week to week. On the days we were open to the public, I started at 8 or 9 o’clock and would spend the first couple of hours dusting. There are all the rooms you see on Downton Abbey, such as the entrance hall, the library, the state dining room, and lots you don’t see, so it takes a while.
Of course, after you dust you have to vacuum (and that involves a lot of plugging and unplugging, because the cables are never long enough to reach across the large rooms). On a public day, the vacuuming would be one of the worst jobs. It was a constant effort to keep the place clean and minimise the wear and tear.
People always remark on how homely the castle is. There are of course all the priceless portraits and pieces of antique furniture, but there are also personal touches such as family photos. All the rooms have fireplaces, too, which is very cosy during the winter. The castle has a special feel – it is not remotely sterile, like other grand houses. My favourite room was the green drawing room (which you often see in Downton). It has pink sofas, a piano, and a lovely view on to the lawns and the rolling countryside beyond. When I first started there, I was in awe of the grandeur of it all, but you quickly get used to it. It is a very warm place.
Another part of my role was answering the door, and greeting any visitors. I would be responsible for informing the relevant person that their guest had arrived, and then making the tea and coffee. When members of the Downton Abbey cast were around, I would often make them tea, too. Dame Maggie Smith and Penelope Wilton (the Dowager Countess and Mrs Crawley) were the only two people allowed to sit in the morning room. Everyone else would drink tea from plastic cups, while they would sit on comfy chairs and drink from china teacups and saucers.
When the film crew arrives at Highclere, certain items of value are kept out of the way
All of the cast members were very polite. Some of them were more focused on learning their lines, but others would have a little chat with you. Hugh Bonneville (Lord Grantham) was charming and lovely, and I always thought Jim Carter (Carson the Butler) had an amazing voice. He was very easy to listen to.
There were a few visitors to the set. Alan Titchmarsh, Carol Vorderman, and Carole and Michael Middleton – they are big fans of the show. The show’s creator, Julian Fellowes, stopped by too, and he and his wife were funny and charming.
The castle has notable visitors throughout the year, not just when Downton is filming. Prince Harry has called in, as has the Queen. Of course, it is always kept very hush-hush. Lord and Lady Carnarvon (the owners of Highclere Castle) live in a house on the estate, but they stay in the castle when they have guests.
The relationship between the Lord and Lady and their staff is a lot more informal than the Downton era, but there is still an etiquette to follow. We would never call Lady Carnarvon by her first name, for example. As a member of staff, you’re in the background. It is almost as if you are watching someone else’s life and you are there to help make them comfortable and provide anything they might need. I would always make a point of bringing Lady Carnarvon her morning cappuccino.
I know we don’t use the word ‘servant’ any more but that’s what you are: a server. You’re there watching, observing and ready to do whatever they would like you to do. There’s still a hierarchy amongst the domestic staff, too. Everyone has their set role, and you have to be careful not to step on anyone else’s toes. At the same time, you have to be willing to pitch in. I remember one day when we had a group of American tourists and they wanted to go to the gift shop. I spent the afternoon gift-wrapping for them – and my goodness, were they big spenders.
I enjoyed our year there and it certainly gave me an insight into how the rich and famous live. The downside, however, is that you’re always at work, and it can get claustrophobic at times. We lived in a little cottage on the estate. If there was a bit of tension you couldn’t switch off because you live there, you work there – your whole life is there.
My husband and I could have renewed our contract but in the end we decided to move on. I will always have fond memories of it. Of course, I am a huge fan of Downton Abbey but I must admit, watching it being filmed does take away from the magic ever so slightly. Still, Highclere is a glorious place indeed.
The fifth series of Downton Abbey will be broadcast on ITV1 in the autumn.
See more stories at: www.lady.co.uk
By using a diverse array of perspectives and visual approaches, photographer Michael Wolf uses his camera to reveal the human energy that flows through the contemporary city. In so doing, he establishes himself not only as a photographer of the urban structure, but of the myriad ways in which people adapt to and reconfigure this rapidly changing environment, thereby providing us with a fascinatingly intricate portrait of life in the city.
What distinguishes Michael Wolf’s Photography from others is his acute ability to find the symbolic value in those seemingly insignificant details that so often go unnoticed. From this perspective, Wolf has been able to produce a body of work, which deals with the more universal reality of contemporary city life.
In his best known series on Hong Kong’s highly compressed, often brutal architecture, Architecture of Density, Wolf uses the city’s sky-scraping tower blocks to great effect, eliminating the sky and horizon line to flatten each image and turn these façades into seemingly never-ending abstractions.
Beyond the stark beauty of these compositions, Wolf’s studies of the thick concrete skin of the city make us wonder about the thousands of lives contained within each frame.
Although Hong Kong is all but deserted in these images, minute signs of life creep to its surface… a shirt hanging out to dry or a silhouette behind a blind. Despite the stifling compression of this architecture, Wolf’s compositions are laced with evidence of people’s ability and need to express their individuality within these formal structures.
The formalism and deadpan approach of architecture of density echoes the work that emerged from the Dusseldorf School of Bernd and Hilla Becher. Like the work of Sndreas Gursky or Thomas Struth, Wolf’s photographs reveal a desire to document and connect with the world around him, but with a contemporary visual approach.
Contrary to the lyrical drama of ‘classic’ documentary photography, these images are coolly detached from their subject and the photographer’s presence behind the camera is barely perceptible.
The work on the architecture of Hong Kong can also be linked to the new photographic approaches that emerged in the late 1960s and 1970s in the United States.
The landmark 1975 exhibition, new topographics: photographs of a man-altered landscape, brought together a group of photographers who, in the sprawling post-industrial landscapes of the new American West, found a mirror for the transformation of the structure of American society. READ MORE >>>
Brooklyn’s iconic Clock Tower on Main Street, New York, was transformed into a jaw-dropping triplex penthouse, in the trendy DUMBO (down under the Manhattan bridge overpass) neighborhood in Brooklyn. The 6,813 square feet space gives you 360-degree view, but the most magnificent detail has to be the 14-ft glass clocks on every wall. All those who are house-hunting and have $18 million to spare, don’t snooze!
Source: www.demilked.com Website: www.corcoran.com
“I’m very small and in my work everything is small too. I like to do macro photography and will try to make a little dream from every picture. I hope you will enjoy my creations of the small world around us,” writes the Netherlands-based macro-photographer Wil Mijer.
SOURCE: http://500px.com/wjmijer
Colour O’Clock, by Duncan Shotton, is a unique timepiece that complements the passing of time with colour. As the seconds, minutes and hours roll steadily by, the colour window glides subtly through the full spectrum of colours, creating a timepiece that adds a more relaxed method of reading the time, not by number, but by colour.
Is a young British designer based in Tokyo, Japan.
My mission is to create products that engage users emotionally, promote happiness and ensure people love what they’re doing, wherever they are and whoever they’re there with.
Designed exclusively for Rainbow Spectrum, Japan.
SOURCE: dshott.co.uk/colour-o-clock
Buona Fortuna’ is an ongoing project by Jorge Mañes Rubio and Gianluca Tesauro, which began as a series of photographs taken in the summer of 2013 in Salerno, Italy where several villages were destroyed after the Irpinia’s Earthquake in 1980.
Despite its ancient history, these sites have remained completely abandoned since evacuation and have fallen into total oblivion. These places have not only been deserted, but also been recently looted of their goods. Many attempts to rebuild some of these villages have been made, but a lack of funding and corruption have proved fatal for these locations. The images document spaces that many have never seen before, symbolically reopening them to the public.
INCREDIBLE CHAPELS— some dating back to several centuries ago — can be found hidden amongst isolated villages on top of the mountains of the ‘Parco Nazionale del Cilento.’ Most churches and chapels had been bricked up, waiting in vein for reconstruction. unfortunately, the barricades didn’t keep looters away and many of the precious relics have been stolen.
Given the great importance that these religious symbols have in Southern Italy, the absence of them leave behind a significant cultural void hard to replace. Yet despite their poor condition, these places reveal themselves in all their glory.
These photographic series attempt to capture the great beauty and fragility of a heritage that is inevitably doomed to disappear.’ Manes describes ‘Buona Fortuna is not asking for reconstruction nor restoration, but to preserve them as what they are today: truly works of art. The project will culminate in a collaboration with local craftsmen, creating a series of new artworks and installations that will replace these stolen icons with new fictional symbols, inspired by Southern Italian Folklore. we call this project Buona Fortuna (good luck in Italian), and it will re-imagine these abandoned places as new cultural scenarios for both locals and visitors.
Many relics, figures and paintings have been stolen from the ancient sites
A literal and symbolic void is left in the abandoned places
Colors peel away from the wall, bearing the mark of tragedy and isolation
This is the abandoned village, photographed from the sky
The device features an advanced lens system with a built-in wide angle, fisheye and portrait lens attachment
Best known for their DIY cameras, lomography has for the first time, dipped into the world of instant film photography with their latest release, ‘the lomo’instant’. currently available in four different versions on kickstarter,
The modular camera comes loaded with features including an advanced lens system with a built-in wide angle, fisheye and portrait lens attachment, three different shooting modes, unlimited multiple and infinite long exposures, and works with fujifilm’s credit card-sized instax mini film.
