Sub city.

Sub City New York from Redglass Pictures on Vimeo

This video is about that moment in New York when you emerge from the subway and find yourself in a new and sometimes unexpected world. Nothing is better…

More NYC metro(card) love.

via My Modern Met

Last year, artists Jean-Pierre Roy and MIchael Kagan had a brilliant idea. They would recycle the countless, used MetroCards New Yorkers mindlessly throw away and turn them into something amazing. These discarded pieces of trash would serve as canvases on which to create miniature works of art. They would call the show Single Fare.

Last night I decided to clean out my purse – who knew that would make me nostalgic for New York City. Floating around the bottom of my huge purse were three MetroCards I collected during my trip last month to New York. This blog is always an ode to my love of New York City, so I thought a photo from the Sloan Fine Art Gallery on the Lower East Side would be perfect for today’s post.

Pretty in pink.

via Hey I'm Anna

14th Street FML subway stop.

@huffingtonpost provides quite the array of news. One minute it tweets “Proof that Justin Bieber fans are craaaazy - http://huff.to/aCESyK” and the next it informs me “BP may agree to set up a massive victim’s compensation fund - http://huff.to/cs8Pd8.” But it’s ok, I keep following because I like my Bieber fix to be mixed with some news that actually makes me feel like a competent, slightly informed American citizen. This may be all journalists can ask for from a population that may turn the news on but tunes it out… but that’s a post for a later date.

Today @huffingtonpost led me to a New York related story and, because I’m pretending to be a real New Yorker (minus the love for the Yankees), I decided to read on and to now add a bit to the discussion.

image via CNET - click on it to check their story out

The the article says:

The MTA promises to change new signage at a 14th Street subway station that now boasts a profane internet punchline.

Because the M train is replacing the V train, a previously innocuous subway sign now reads FML.

For the uninformed, FML is internet slang for “f**k my life.”

Best change ever. Do we really live in a society in which A) people automatically think “f**k my life” when they see those three letters in a vicinity near each other and B) is the abbreviation FML really so offensive the MTA needs to create a new way to display the info? I guess we do. In a few days the sign will read FL and have the M line displayed below.

I find the whole thing ironic. This weekend I hopped on the subway not too far from where the “FML stop” is. As I sat down, a huge group of teenagers jumped through the door before it could close. The string of profanities I listened to for the next thirty minutes not only broached FML, but also a lot of things involving a lot more creativity and imagination. And it’s not like the teenagers were the only ones. This is NYC we are talking about, not bible belt Missouri!

So thanks @huffingtonpost – now I know I need to head to the 14th street stop ASAP so I can get a picture of the infamous FML sign before it is gone.

Other perspectives:

CNET

The Village Voice

Disinformation

City chic.

Image from Come Out and Play

Remember when I said New York is the city that never sleeps – well I forgot to mention that New York is also the city that never goes out of style.

I live most of the year in Columbia, Missouri. While the city will always be near and dear to my heart – its closest relationship with high fashion comes via “guest” designer lines at Target. New York fashion is an addicting drug and I am the desperate addict. No matter where I go I’m confronted by temptation and my brain just cannot say no; Marc Jacobs, Michael Kors, BCBG, J. Crew,  YSL, Zac Posen, Anthropologie, American apparel – pick your poison. The best part is, you don’t even need to be rich to afford these indulgences. Places like Century 21 and Feline’s Basement practically give away goods for free (aka 70% off) or you could always adventure into some dark warehouse in Chinatown to haggle your way through an “it fell off the truck” deal (not that I would ever do that… on a regular basis).

But it is more than just the designer names and a shopper’s compulsion that drive me to these conclusions. It is the people of New York that truly make it a city always in style. A morning commute on the 1 Line proves this. The red subway path runs from The Bronxs to Brooklyn and stops at every major New York attraction in between – Columbia University, Central Park, 42nd Street, Rockefeller, Battery Park, NYU – it has it all. The people on the 1 come from every background and each have their own flair (and not the type from Office Space). The business suit sits next to the gardener jumpsuit who sits next to the artist smock. At some point during their early morning bumpy ride below the living city, each passenger’s style rubs off on the other. That is what keeps the city perpetually in the lookbook and that is what makes New York uniqely fashionable, no high-end labels necessary. Great news for a broke intern…