the dreaded display window at school that was shunned by most fashion students throughout the spring semester fell into my group's hands for our finals. Until one scorching wednesday afternoon...
dear mom, i don't know any mother who was able to give birth to seven children (not all at the same time) and be able to raise them all one by one. Forget those reality tv moms. You're not one of them. raising seven children before the age of cell phones and internet was an unbelievably tough job. How did you do it without using a dishwasher, a laundry machine, a dryer or anything any other mothers could not live without? Forget multitasking here in the states. You did everything at home by hand. By your own hands. Even building a fire to cook our rice. thank you mom for teaching me the fine art of interior design. Do you still remember those days back home when you let me decorate for christmas? Maybe i was ten or eleven. I was so excited. You put me in charge of hanging all the curtains in the living room. That was my favorite house chore as a kid, not like chopping firewoods in the backyard. From then on i became the designated "window draper" in the house every time christmas season arrives. you are still as beautiful as your sepia-toned high school photographs. I vividly remember on one of them you were standing tall in your beautiful white dress. Elegant, classy, reserved and lanky but lovely. You were wearing flowers on your hair. Like a prom queen but only a lot smarter than the others. thank you for everything you have done for us and thank you for allowing me to become the sensitive one but be the best dancer in the bunch. I would never trade my life any other way as long as we have you as our Nanay. You are the best mom a gay boy could ever have. Happy Mother's Day Mom. I will always and forever love you. -noel sunnylands. They named it for a reason. I can't remember the last time i saw true grasslands in the middle of the desert.       the glorious interior. Once you walked in you wouldn't want to walk out. I stayed in for hours and on and enjoyed the million dollar view! -       the place is a modernists' delight. From the gardens, to the architecture and to the interior design, it's a close encounter of the sustainable kind. I'll show the gardens first and follow up with the architecture on the next blog. Enjoy. I did.       the graphic posters for the school's fashion department that i have been working on incessantly for the past few days is now on display in front of the bookstore. I'm so proud!    on my recent trip to LACMA, i encountered some vintage fashion which is part of the california design/pacific standard time exhibit going on for some time now. The craftsmanship and construction were impeccable back in the days not like the everyday clothes we are wearing nowadays.       as a design enthusiast, i can't help but talk about exciting spaces that i have been in lately - Fixtures. Is it a showroom or is it a working kitchen? It's both. It speaks everything about my deeply held value of the unexpected. I could live in this space and then die fabulously!       "How do you pick up the threads of an old life? How do you go on, when in your heart you begin to understand. There is no going back. There are some things that time cannot mend. Some hurts that go too deep. That have taken hold." - Frodo Baggins The Lord of the Rings, The Return of the King J.R.R. Tolkien closure. It was what i needed so i could move on. It was something that i did not have after a bittersweet breakup. It was very hard to let go when you think that you already have found someone you will be sharing the rest of your life with, without any doubt and fear at all. But before all this, there was this old life of mine that i do miss. I crave having breakfasts, having lunches, having dinners with a good friend. Lots of laughters, less of tears every time. The routines of an old life. Something familiar. Something nostalgic. do you leave a chapter in your life open-ended in order to move on to the next one? Perhaps life's ebbs and flows are similar to going from one track to the next of a shiny compact disc? Are there any smooth transitions? There are some cd albums that are an exception. Like Madonna's Confessions on a Dance Floor. It is indeed "non-stop." All the tracks are seamlessly interconnected. However, not all people's lives do not flow like Madonna's album after all. Some lives are more broken up than the other's. People even change their names partially or completely to start a new. Like Prince. He changed his names three times. From Prince to the "Artist Formerly Known As..." to some sort of heiroglyphic symbol; only to change back to Prince. I wonder if he even went back to his old life when he changed back to his old name. how do i even transition? Do i start fading the pigment of my colorful memories and eventually letting them fall off from the branches of my twiggy life? Do i get myself ready for the dark cold days of winter as i leave my bright happy days summer? What's next? There are stories great or not that need to be told, and it happened at work the other day: And so i was on top of the ladder and suddenly, "Excuse me, can you help me please?" I slowly and hesitantly went down the ladder to approach these endearing elderly couple. The old lady asked, "Where are your blinds?" I quickly pointed the location of our window treatment department. Before they proceeded, the man asked me in a slurry voice, "Do you have ..rrr oil?" "I'm sorry?" I replied? "..arrr oil??" He repeated a little perturbed. "Oh, wood oil? We have wood oil for furniture. Yes!" "Carr oil!! Carrr oilll!!!" he yelled at my face looking at me like I am idiotic while simulating driving a steering wheel. (Okay, so my whole design career flashed right in front of me. My internship at Parron-Hall. My first design assistant position at V.J. Lloyd's Design Studio. Those glamorous days at showcase homes. My four years in the model home industry. My visual merchandising with a contemporary showroom. And then this? I am standing in front of an impatient man screaming at my face looking for a motor oil inside a home furnishing store.) So I composed myself and cautiously replied, "Oh motor oil! I'm sorry, we don't carry motor oil." ... "But we carry livestock!" * * * I went ahead and blogged this story of mine against a good friend's advice to be especially careful when it involves your work. I thought maybe i share this experience because i already went full circle with my life's hills and valleys. I would not say that i had my early success and i would not say that i am a failure. I have been in places from "high brows" to "pedestrians" and it's been a priveledge to live in both worlds. I know where i came from and i know for sure where the roads lead to. Collectively to put things in perspective, what happened the other day is something that i will always relive and laugh at. And by the way, everything that happened was true except for the livestock! | ArchivesMay 2012 Categories |
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