Hasta La Ideas

January is Get Organized Month, or what the organizing community refers to as GO Month. It’s the time of year when home and office organizing supplies typically go on sale at major retailers and when people start acting on their organizing-themed resolutions. It’s also the time of year when professional organizers tend to hold public events in their communities talking about organizing and uncluttering strategies. Check your local papers to see if any of these events will be held in your area.

When organizing, it’s best to unclutter first. Pull everything out of a space and sort it into piles: keep, purge, and other. Keep obviously means that you plan to continue to store and/or use the item. Purge can mean that you intend to trash, shred, recycle, or donate the item to charity. Your other pile is for objects that need to be repaired, relocated, returned to a friend or family member, or some other special action needs to be taken. Once all of the objects from the space have been sorted, you need to deal with the purge and other items immediately. If you don’t, they’re likely to cause you much frustration in the coming days. Trash what needs to be trashed, donate the objects that can be donated, return items to friends, and drop off objects that need to be repaired at the repair shop.

Once all the purge and other items are handled, take a look at all the objects you have in your keep pile. Do you need to do another round of uncluttering? If you’re feeling more courageous about purging items, now is the time to do it. When you are satisfied with your keep pile, sort the objects into new piles of like items — pencils with pencils, envelopes with envelopes, jeans with jeans. When everything is in piles by type, examine what you have and compare it to your storage systems. It is only at that this point that you should consider going out and buying organizing systems. Before you do, though, look through your house or office to see if you already own something that could hold and organize your objects. If you do, you don’t have any need to go out in the cold to buy anything.

If you decide to buy organizing products, check out the sales going on this January. The Container Store has a 30 percent off sale on all its Elfa closet organizers. Home Depot has all their storage and organizing items on sale through January 29, including their Martha Stewart line and many Rubbermaid products. And don’t forget to check out your local retailers that might also have sales on organizing items.

Before putting objects away, be sure to clean the space where the items will be stored. Wipe down shelves, replace shelf liner if needed, and vacuum out all the dust and spider webs. Repair or replace any storage items that are damaged, and make the storage area inviting. You are more likely to use a storage system if you like it.

As you’re putting items back into their newly cleaned storage spaces, be sure to put the items you access most often in the most convenient locations. Objects you access less often can go into the less convenient locations — and the heaviest of these objects should be stored lower to the ground so you don’t hurt yourself when you retrieve them. Put lids on things that aren’t accessed enough that they might collect dust, but keep objects you access regularly open to speed up retrieval time. Try not to stack anything more than three objects deep. Most importantly, know yourself. If you’re someone who has difficulty putting items back where they belong, make it as simple as possible to put items back in their places. A four-step return action will mean you probably won’t ever return the item back to where it belongs — one-step and two-step return actions are the easiest. Keep things simple.

What projects do you have planned for GO month? Share your plans in the comments.

Like this site? Buy Erin Rooney Doland’s Unclutter Your Life in One Week from Amazon.com today.

I’m looking forward to the Altitude Design Summit coming up (quickly!) in January. UPPERCASE magazine will be represented there—I am helping the folks at Squarespace plan their mini party (I’ve had my blog on Squarespace since 2004). Our concept is “handmade by you”. I have a unique photo/video booth activity in the works, free magazines, DIY “dessert it yourself” sundae bar… I’m going my best to make the party fun and memorable.

I would like to incorporate the handwriting and scribbles of lots of different people which I will then used to design some paper decorations. As ALT attendees and friends of UPPERCASE, I am inviting you to get the party started…

Using a black marker or Sharpie, please handwrite the phrase “handmade by you” a few times and make some abstract scribbles or doodles on an 8.5″ x 11″ sheet of white paper. No need for perfection or to design the page in any way, just take 5 minutes and go for it! Please scan the paper (300dpi greyscale is fine) or take a picture of it and send it back to me here. thanks!!!

The Australian press is abuzz with news that native son Marc Newson will be designing the New Year’s Eve festivities for the city of Sydney, where Core77’s own Glen Jackson Taylor might be from. “I work in such a broad range of industries, I’m always attracted to things I’ve never done – and perhaps will never do again,” Newson told the Sydney Morning Herald.

New Year’s Eve has never been ”designed” before, and there were non-negotiables to navigate… [Newson] conceded it was “quite a tight envelope” to work within, but said a surprising amount could be done creatively. A strict colour palette from his blue, violet, green and yellow endless rainbow logo, festooned on banners all over the city, will feature. And there will, he revealed, be a big countdown with numbers on the bridge before the still-secret midnight “bridge effect.”

Glen, what’s the secret “bridge effect” going to be?

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A featured artist talks music, food, fashion and skateboarding

by Frank Galland

Founded by Aaron Broudo, Brooklyn Night Bazaar brings the inspirational energy and madness of Southeast Asian night markets to a 40,000 square foot former carpet warehouse on the Williamsburg waterfront 15-17 December 2011. Broudo partnered with Ken Farmer, creative director of Nuit Blanche New York, to bring their Brooklyn audience a few evenings of beer, music, artists’ wares and skateboarding with the holiday season in full swing.

We caught up with one of the bazaar’s featured artists, Brooklyn-based Canyon Castator, whose work spans oil on canvas to human tattoos. At the bazaar he will be showcasing his selection of DIY tattoos in his new zine “Ink on Skin.”

Can you tell us a little more about “Ink on Skin?”

It’s a 64-page book, conceived and designed in a collaborative effort, documenting my un-surveyed works. The images presented come from four years of tattoos by my group of friends and me. The book at once exposes a clandestine culture of DIY tattooing, and the evolution of technique and subject matter.

Can you elaborate on what’ll be in the zine?

I bought the original tattoo machine back in Boulder, Colorado. I lived with five dudes at the time in the quintessential skate house. I think we all threw in like $12 or something. No one knew what to do with the thing. We just kinda went for it. The first couple were really rough. The machine would break down and you would be left with a half way done Bart Simpson or a banner reading “skate and des”. Really good stuff. The brief stories in the zine touch on that original uncertainty. I’ve always drawn, and these silly tattoos were just another medium to experiment in.

When I was invited to participate as a vendor in the Bazaar, I wanted to display the recently completed zine, but I also wanted to set the tone for the person passing by. I’m not a tattoo artist, I’ve never worked in a shop or gone through the proper channels to apprentice or study tattoo arts. The environment I was most accustomed to during this time was the essential dingy basement, full of trash, half eaten pizzas, beer cans etc. I’m using my vendor space as an installation that pays homage to that original aesthetic. Come in, have a drink, watch me give Stick and Pokes to willing friends and pick up a zine.

Were you involved in last year’s bazaar?

There was a Bazaar in October earlier this year at the DeKalb Market . I wasn’t involved, but it was crazy. Amazing turnout. I’ve never seen that many people in downtown Brooklyn.

How has it evolved since then?

Essentially, it is extending the forum for growth and marks a confluence of Brooklyn’s cultural vitality. The use of Williamsburg’s fleeting waterfront warehouse space is the perfect setting for this cultural collaboration.

How will you be involved this year, what is your connection?

I recently participated in the Carsten Höller installation at the New Museum, an unbelievable and ambitious project which came together due to the hard work of some incredibly talented people. Afterwards I was put in touch with Ken Farmer, the creative director of Nuit Blanche New York. He was interested in getting some of Brooklyn’s finest to skate the half pipe each night before it was transformed into the performance space. I’m more or less organizing who will be skating.

Who are some of the vendors joining you at the Bazaar?

There’s a wide array of participating artist and vendors, anyone can apply for a space, but the majority of the participants were pulled from the organizing teams creative network. You’ve got design from Windowfarms, curated classics from Kill Devil Hill and original works from local artists like Anton Zolotov and Colin Snapp.

Skateboarders can be a rowdy bunch. Are you prepared for the debauchery?

I’ve always recognized skating as a form of artistic expression. It’s rad that the Bazaar is utilizing an art piece, as a shared space for skateboarding and music. Its always been unclear to me where the line is drawn between the three genres anyway.

Why at night?

Part of the motivation for the night market is the desire to make room in the city’s nighttime cultural landscape for a little innovation. The Bazaar runs from 5 p.m. to midnight, giving you time to head to the bar afterwards.

Each night of the Brooklyn Night Bazaar will feature a different live act including James Murphy, Fucked Up and The Hold Steady. For tickets visit the event page.

Every now and again, be it ceramics exhibitions or legally contentious jewelry designs, Frank Gehry branches out into creative outlets other than architecture. He’s soon to be doing it again, as the Grammy Awards have just announced that Gehry will be creating the official artwork for the event. The main image features the Grammy’s gramophone logo surrounded by a handful of models for Gehry-esque buildings and will be used on the program book, tickets, and the posters for the awards show. We’re not entirely sure what his architecture and a music awards show have to do with one another, but there it is. And here’s a bit from the press announcement:

“We are thrilled to announce our collaboration with world-renowned architect Frank Gehry on our official artwork for the GRAMMY Awards and the opportunity to further The Academy’s dedication to celebrating the arts in every discipline,” said Neil Portnow, President/CEO of The Recording Academy. “Frank’s exemplary creative accomplishments through a variety of artistic platforms have been inspirational. We are honored to work with such a well-respected talent who has served as an influential figure within the arts on a global scale.”

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