Hasta La Ideas

This week, millions of us will be wrapping holiday gifts and finishing them off with a piece of twine or string. And even those of us who don’t celebrate Christmas will still be tying our shoelaces before we leave the house. String is one of the most valuable and least recognized inventions ever, yet few of us ever stop to think: This tool is amazing! But I think when it’s all said and done, historians may lump string in with the biggies, like fire and the wheel.

How old is string? Previously it’s been unclear, but this past fall, the earliest evidence of string was found in France. The discovery was a big deal, because textiles and twine are highly perishable, so it’s been really challenging to get an idea of its history. The evidence that remains is only indirect: Perforations in clay or bone or shells, or evidence of awls, looms, etc. So far the oldest record of actual string is about 30,000 years ago.

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On 7th Street in Manhattan’s East Village stands McSorley’s Old Ale House, one of NYC’s older Irish pubs, dating back to the mid-1800s. Since its inception the bar had a no-women-allowed policy—an anachronism they held onto until 1970 (!) when the Civil Rights Bill was passed. The first woman invited inside was Barbara Shaum.

If being invited inside a bar doesn’t sound like an accomplishment, what Shaum was achieving just two doors down the block was. As a 21-one-year-old woman living in 1950s NYC, she had begun learning leathersmithing. By 1970 she’d had nearly 20 years of experience, and had her own leathergoods shop—in both senses of the word—next-next-door to McSorley’s. (And she’d actually had beers inside the bar before the ballyhoo, as local shopkeepers were once a lot friendlier with each other.)

Barbara Shaum is the leathersmith whom Kika Vliegenthart apprenticed under. And now, at age 83, she’s 62 years into the business and still running her shop. Rising rents have forced her off of 7th Street, but she’s still keeping it East Village real enough, now relocated to 4th.

Shaum refers to the leather sandals she makes as “like wearing a T-shirt on your feet.” It’s not uncommon for them to last for decades, as her business has. Over the course of her six-decade career she’s made bags, briefcases, sandals, belts, and a variety of custom work (her strangest “client” was a llama). Here’s her story:

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Paint restoration is a painstaking and challenging skill to master. But it can also be hugely satisfying.

One of the more challenging tasks is restoring the paint on an old car.

I never thought I’d be interested in car paint correction until I came across Larry Kosilla and his quite extraordinary detailing skills. In this 15-minute video he goes through the entire process of restoring the beat-up paint on a 1958 Porsche Speedster to its original glory.

It’s truly shocking to see the difference at the end of the process.

Here’s a summary of the cooler tips and geeky tools for those who are considering a paint restoration project for a car.

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Thor’s mighty hammer, Mjölnir, was forged from magic metal in a workshop of the gods, right? Well, not this latest one; it was TIG-welded out of chromoly steel in a workshop in Burbank.

Tony Swatton is a California-based master blacksmith who runs an unusual roster of employees, with a “Warlock of Animal Fibers” working alongside conventional machinists and swordsmiths. Swatton’s Sword & Stone operation creates custom armor, weapons and props for Hollywood; if you need an historically accurate medeival broadsword, an anodized 14th-Century suit of armor or a silver Valkyrie’s circlet with an agate centerpiece, S&S is your spot.

While they were not the ones contracted to make the version of Thor’s hammer used in the forthcoming movie, Swatton & co. took it upon themselves to make a convincing replica as a testament of their skills. (Every week they make a new mythical weapon, and this week Mjölnir’s number was up.) Watch as they turn chromoly, aluminum, leather and a rod of allthread into a lead-shot filled 250-pound beast, and use it to smite some of Thor’s worst enemies like a lava lamp, a soda can and a watermelon:

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Our inbox has seen an influx of concrete-based products and projects recently. Seems like the impending winter months has everyone looking to heavier materials. While concrete is no new design material (it’s been seen used for everything from pens and office supplies to wayfinding signage, these designs have featured a fragile touch to an otherwise rough and tough material.

La Morena by SHIFT

This planter is composed of wood and concrete in a somewhat fragile-looking design. The wood holds the concrete planter in a claw-like grip—while bringing an uncharacteristically warm touch to any room it inhabits. What began as an experiment to relocate cement away from construction sites and into the home has become an upscale product with big personality. Monterrey, Mexico-based design studio SHIFT combined their love for local production and the abundance of concrete (one of the Monterrey’s main products) to create a more humanistic use for the material. “In an attempt to explore this material, we decided to pair it with a more organic, artisanal and friendly one,” designer Daniela Valle says.”We needed a material that could introduce a ‘human factor’ and not necessarily counter concrete’s cold looks, but blend it to provide a unique feel as well as provide an artisanal and Latin-American vibe.”

It was not the material itself so much as the stigma associated with concrete that proved to be a major obstacle for the project. “The main challenge stood in the common perception of concrete as a rough, industrial and unnatural substance as opposed to a friendly and uniquely aesthetic element,” Daniela says. “Both materials have great character and presence, each in its own way. The difficulty was mixing them as they both fight for a stellar role, so rather than an even mixture of both; we used one to complement the other in a subtle way.” Concrete’s heavy appearance is toned down by the wood’s soft grip.

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