Sure, you could measure pasta without Studio Lievito's handsome marble Spaghetti Meter, but that's incredibly risky and we wouldn't recommend it. The Meter is dead simple to use: the carved shapes on each side of the block hold just enough pasta for one, two, three, or four people. Simply rotate the meter to the correct number of people you're feeding, fill with spaghetti or whichever long pasta you prefer, and cook. [via It's Nice That]
The Spaghetti Meter debuted during Milan Design Week. Check out more of Studio Lievito's kitchen wares, like hand-blown glass pasta holders and marble utensils, online.
The Costume Institute's PUNK show at the Met continues to be a source of quite interesting contrasts and, well, let's just call them contradictions. Today, show sponsor Moda Operandi, which sells high-end runway clothing before it hits retail, released its punk boutique collection. The exclusive collection includes over 100 items, including new pieces from designers Balmain, Eddie Borgo, Thom Browne, Givenchy, House of Waris, Moschino, Prabal Gurung, Rodarte, and Vivienne Westwood—plus rare vintage fashion and art objects, many of them exclusive. Shredded T-shirts, Germs LPs, Patti Smith photos, even a faux mohawk are on offer. Prices range from $100 to $13,000. Are you annoyed, excited? Not sure?
“The enduring appeal of punk’s avant-garde ideology is that it inspires designers across the spectrum of design sensibility,” said Lauren Santo Domingo, Co-Founder of Moda Operandi. “Each designer has created pieces for this capsule collection that expresses their unique vision of punk’s rebellious spirit.”
On the critical side, some might say this is punk drained of any rebellious content or context, and presented purely as consumable, expensive, designer-associated fashion. They'd say high price tags and punk-by-elites goes against the very foundations of the subculture.
What right has high-end fashion and online retailing to stake its claim on punk, anyway? Perhaps no right at all, but in an age where continued relevance is everything, there will always be savvy, if faintly ridiculous, attempts to plant high-end designer flags in unclaimed territory.
On the plus side, we tend to give highly artistic fashion designers—many of whom slogged it out on the fringes before making it big—the benefit of the doubt. One can't deny that the looks from Westwood, Gurung, and Givenchy wouldn't exist without punk inspiration.
And it is somewhat reassuring to know that the elites don't quite get the PUNK show theme, and Monday's gala looks might actually be a trainwreck of badly managed style. The ultimate punk revenge?
At the end of the day, the "Chaos to Couture" collection highlights an issue that's been ever-present since '77. Putting "punk" in the same sentence as "high price tag" always has a hollow ring to it, and yet punk still looks (and sounds) great after all these years.
Visit modaoperandi.com to browse the PUNK collection.
Lee Hunter Black Stadium 733 P-Bass Electric Guitar Signed by the Ramones
Patti Smith Kneeling photo by Lloyd Ziff
Search & Destroy fanzine
Limited Edition Blue Logan Punk Playing Cards
Back in March we wrote about the amazing "Pencil to Pixel" exhibit that was on its way to New York. This week, the exhibit finally arrives in Manhattan, courtesy of the type-giants Monotype.
In addition to a few digital installations concerning typography on the web from Typecast, Monotype will be exhibiting printed matter and typography artifacts from the last 100 years or so of printing. The impressive offering includes original sketches and molds from the first run of iconic fonts like Gil Sans and Helvetica. If a century of typographic history seems a little overwhelming, don't fret; free guided tours to the exhibit are available.
"Pencil to Pixel" runs from May 3-9 at the Tribeca Skyline Studio. 
Eric Gill’s 1928 pencil and ink drawings for Gill Sans Italic
We saw our share of woodsy campsite lookbooks in 2012, so the urban jungle of Left Field's SS13 images by photographer Pepper Davies are a welcome alternative. Shot right in Left Field's homebase of Ridgewood, Queens, the photos feature Greenpoint Tattoo Co., where Left Field founder Christian McCann can oft be found. We're excited to get our hands on the new collection, which features rough and ready and all American-made (from American and Japanese materials) camo shorts, tough T-shirts, selvedge canvas chinos, and work shirts. It looks to rate highly in wearability, durability, and style longevity.
Visit Left Field NYC online for city-tough, American-made threads.
Some of us like a contrast between urban grit and city chic, some well-worn infrastructure with our tony brownstones. We like seeing the logo of the local metropolitan transit authority on strange buildings tucked away between alleys and elevated trains. Then there are those of us more sensitive to preserving the "charm" of upscale city hoods or maintaining their historic aesthetic. It seems the transport authorities fall into the latter category in several instances, at least in the case of the fake townhouses exposed in New York, London, and Paris on messynessychic.com today, one of which is even cited in an Umberto Eco novel. All three were devised to hide air shafts for underground trains.
Know of any other fake townhouses? We'd like to hear from you.
In its own words, The Thing Quarterly is a periodical in the form of a object. Each issue is created by a different guest contributor and usually comes in the form of a somewhat useful "thing." Past issues include Dave Eggers' shower curtain, and artist Mike Mills' pocket calendar.
The latest issue, number 19 in the series, is a travel wallet from the Glasgow-based artist David Shrigley, complete with a printed leather sleeve, a 24-page passport notebook, and four double-sided phrase cards. All the cards are in English, and bear the self-aware and understated humor Shrigley does so well.
Recently, Shrigley designed the cover for Stephen Malkmus' Record Store Day Can covers LP, and in 2011 he released a book of collected sculptures and drawings called What The Hell Are You Doing?
After releasing collaborations with Andy Warhol and Keith Haring, it seems natural that Uniqlo's next artist collaboration would be with their '80s contemporary Jean-Michel Basquiat. The Basquait T-shirt collection, like the Warhol and Haring wearables, features signature elements of the late artist's work in several different colors and designs. Basquait's influential graffiti-derived shapes can be seen on nearly all the pieces as well as his crown logo and signature. Unlike a real Basquiat, these Uniqlo versions come in at just $25.
The Uniqlo X Basquiat collection is now avaiable for purchase from Uniqlo.
Los Angeles label The Quiet Life just released a very limited Mahalo Girls Pack of caps and bucket hats for spring and summer. They're out front in terms of pattern that explodes with color. If you can rock this much flavor, then rock it now, we say. Get on it now, only 100 packs (each with three hats and one bucket) were made available to stores.
The Mahalo Girls Pack available in select stores and online at thequietlife.com
Just around the corner from the main factory for Barbour jackets in South Shields, England lies a very special repair shop. Michael Williams, of "A Continuous Lean" fame, popped in for a visit and found his Barbour repaired a few hours later. The shop does everything from rewaxing to major surgery. To a Barbour lover's relief, the shop can extend the life of the jacket for years and years. The ACL post has us thinking about buying better and keeping longer in general, but also wondering where our local repair shops are—good places to know, we tend to think.
Visit Barbour online for more info on jackets that last a bit longer.
The clutter of objects and mismatched fabrics in Jonas Wood's paintings give his work an overwhelming sense of reality. Which makes sense, because for his domestic scenes Wood didn't look much further than the apartments and studios he inhabits every day. The details that show up in his work, like the printing of a baseball card company name on a cardboard box, give his images a kind of humorous awareness and subtlety.
Jonas Wood has a self-titled show running until May 12 at the David Kordansky Gallery in Los Angeles. 
