Gone Shopping

I had a meeting in the city yesterday, (I've recently been made fun of for calling it that. Have I become a total hick?) and since it was a gorgeous afternoon I decided to take a stroll down Broadway in Soho and do a little shopping. It's been a long time since I've done that.

It's really, really hard. I had forgotten about how crowded the streets and stores are, and definitely how expensive everything is. I specifically was looking in Best Buy for headphones (which I haven't had since my old pair died last April) and jeans at Uniqlo (remember when I lost about 12 pounds when I started this project? Well, I still don't have pants that fit me right, except the nearly shredded pair I stole from my boyfriend, and those are covered in goat manure at the moment). I really felt like a fish out of water. Not that it's completely foreign to me to buy something and not know who made it -- I did live in the real world for 30 years before starting this project -- but the process by which I would make these consumer decisions is not a comfortable one.

I went home empty handed.

Milk Makers at Sprout Creek Farm

What an amazing way to wrap up the project. Friends and I drove up to Poughkeepsie, New York, on Thursday night, where I participated in the Rusty Bucket Series at Sprout Creek Farm by giving a presentation to the farm workers and neighboring community members about my consumer project and my design practice. As an educational farm, my message fit in with their mission of teaching school kids and adults alike about the value of understanding the efforts and dedication involved in producing their most basic necessities. Jumping at the opportunity to spend time on a working dairy farm, and celebrate my 31st birthday in a unique way, the four of us stayed through the weekend in a cottage on the farm, participated in chores and explored the area.

First off, I have a new found appreciation for goats. I'm not even kidding, they're remarkable creatures! We learned to milk them with the farms' new pneumatic equipment, fed the yearlings (young goats who have not yet had babies and therefore not ready for milking), and playing with the kids who were aged 2 days to 2 weeks old. Only Joe was brave enough to climb under one of the giant manure-machines of a cow, but we both shoveled some of their nastier by-products. And last but not least, we fed the chickens and ducks and collected their eggs. All this under the care of some wonderful farm workers, who we got to know fairly well over the four days. From Jesse, the lactose-intolerant gluten-allergic bread baker; to Rebecca the urban-transplant educator who had invited me up, who regaled us with tales of slaughtering turkeys and taking up the farm's gardening on top of her other chores; Margo, one of the three Sisters (I don't know why they never called them nuns....) who started the farm in 1982 on the grounds of their school in Greenwich, CT, when they came to the conclusion that they were part of a system that was raising a generation of B.S. artists, and then moved it all to its current location in 1990; Meredeth who runs the market, who was a student of Margo in the 80s and had been living in Virginia working in advertising with Margo offered her the job marketing the farm; and Bonnie, the young Bard College graduate who lives in a suped-up trailer just off the farm who patiently taught us goat-milking and shared her quest to adopt and raise one of the goats on her own.

On the merits of fun, personal growth and education, spreading what I've learned thus far to a willing audience, and capping the project with experiences that surpassed what I could have expected, I could not have had a better weekend. More to come on where I take it from here....

March Catch-up and End of the Year Thoughts

This has been a crazy month, in many ways. My design practice has really been taking off, I've begun working at a wonderful co-working space in Downtown Brooklyn, and I've made wonderful connections that include an official sit-down with one of the owners of my newest favorite coffeeshop (which was my 'office' until I started working at the Treehouse) and presentation to a great group of visual arts students at Bennington College in Vermont.

I've been a regular at Flying Saucer on Atlantic Ave in Boerum Hill since I went out on my own in October, immediately getting to know Nick, Rob, and Akhila, among others -- the daily counter staff. It's a warm, friendly neighborhood joint that feels like a living room, has free wireless, cheap refills, and a small army of us independent workers that take advantage of it all. When I started hosting the Brooklyn Likemind, it was no-contest that I would hold it at Flying Saucer. I had also met Emily and Ivan, a young couple who seemed to be in charge, but it was only recently that I realized they were the managing owners. I sat down with Emily a couple weeks ago and told her about my project and got the full scoop from her. She's younger than I had even imagined, and previously working in the criminal justice industry in the Bronx, it turns out they're almost accidental owners. Brought in by a couple who owns a number of local businesses, including the bar down the street, Emily and Ivan run the day to day business, and are looking into buying the shop outright soon. They've designed the menu, and the space. Oh, and the living room feel? Apparently the coffeehouse looks just like their living room at home.

Just a few days later, Joe and I drove up to Bennington, Vermont. Just following the NPR piece about my project, I had been invited up to talk to a class there about design, consumption, production routes, and manufacturing chains. If I didn't know better, I'd think the course was designed just for me to come speak to it! I presented for nearly 2 hours and excitedly incorporated all of my interests, including the awareness, reflection, and actions we can engage in as designers promoting community over commodities (my new tag line, of sorts). I'll give a similar presentation as part of the Rusty Bucket Series at Sprout Creek Farm in Poughkeepsie later this week.

And so it is on this Poughkeepsie farm, milking goats and cleaning barns, that I will turn 31 and come to the theoretical end of my consumer experiment. I've been asked many times what I will do then, and if I'm excited to run out and buy whatever I want, blindly and wantonly. I'm not sure of the exact next step, but I know these habits and this passion that I've found over the last 12 months is not about to disappear. And though I might allow myself to buy some Q-Tips and new work-appropriate footwear, I don't think this is the end of my project.