Damn cool. Adobe’s new point-and-shoot app for the iPhone allows you to instantly pull a color palette from whatever image your camera snaps.
FREE & AWESOME | Have you seen Adobe’s new Kuler app?” my friend Giorgio Verzoletto of vanhit.com asked when we met up for coffee last Monday. “Watch this,” he said, waving his iPhone camera at the Frugalbits website displayed on the laptop screen in front of us. As G gestured with his phone, five circles on its screen bounced around like metal balls in one of those old-fashioned handheld puzzles, changing colour repeatedly depending on where the phone was directed.
When he snapped a shot, the circles turned into rectangles forming a band of the dominant colours in the image and creating what Kuler calls a colour theme on his phone screen. “These themes can be used, modified and shared in so many ways,” G said. “Anyone who works with colour is going to love this.” Or anyone who loves to play with colour, I added. Read more
The Stick Can Ease Muscle Aches & Pains
/1 Comment/in Exercise, FITNESS, Fitness & Health, HEALTH, View All Fitness Stories, View All Health Stories /by EditorThis little piece of equipment may not eliminate the need for professional massage, but it can help manage muscle pain.
MONEY WELL SPENT | If you workout routinely and experience soft tissue aches or muscle knots as a result, The Stick, a self-massaging tool used by gym rats and sports physios alike, could be your ticket to relief. Read more
How To Paint A Canvas Slingback Patio Chair
/9 Comments/in Chic & Easy Projects, D.I.Y., DECOR & DESIGN, DIY, HOME, HOW-TO KNOW-HOW, View All DIY Stories, View All Home Stories, View All How-To Stories /by EditorTransform this plain canvas beachside staple into a chair with style and presence.
THE CREATIVE SOLUTION | Being fashionably dressed is expensive enough, but imagine the financial damage you can do creating the “latest look” for your home—which is why most of us play it safe with our furniture by sticking to classics. The trouble with this approach is that sometimes safe can mean boring. Fortunately there are ways to be current without taking a vow of poverty.
I suggest using quick changing accent pieces to modify your décor. Here I put my DIY skills to work transforming a classic—and already attractive—slingback patio chair—into something more topical and unique. Read more
Inexpensive Tortes That Take The Cake
/12 Comments/in Easy + Quick = Delicious, FOOD, Food & Drink, View All Food Stories /by EditorIf you’re in a rush or dessert from scratch isn’t your thing, one of these inexpensive frozen tortes will take the cake.
EASY & DELISH | Whenever I have a dinner party and, pressed for time, serve the attractive ready-made gluten-free dessert pictured here, my guests are often astonished to learn it was purchased at a home furnishings store. “No way,” was how one incredulous friend who knows my penchant for purchasing sweets put it recently. “I would have sworn you picked it up at some pricey little Euro-type bakery.” Read more
6 Fun Objects To Move Around The Garden
/0 Comments/in Design, GARDEN, Home & Garden, View All Garden Stories /by EditorSix objects—no chairs or pots among them—that can be relocated around the garden again and again to make it look revitalized.
SWITCH IT UP | Because so many elements of a garden’s design are fixed I sometimes like to shake things up by introducing objects that can be repositioned according to the season or to whim. In my own garden, I have three metal crows that travel from tabletop to fence top routinely, and two, old wooden obelisks that have at one time or another bunked in every quarter of my suburban lot. Read more
Paul Smith’s Charity Mitts For Movember
/0 Comments/in Diffusion Collections, Fashion & Beauty /by EditorHolt Renfrew has teamed up with Paul Smith to make some pretty classy mittens for a very good cause.
GET TO GIVE | Do real men wear mittens? I don’t know, but real women do. I could totally see myself mittening manfully (thanks Dylan Thomas) on all sorts of doors wearing these stripped hand warmers designed by—that’s right, you guessed it—Britain’s coolest menswear designer Paul Smith. Smith’s mittens, produced exclusively for Holt Renfrew as a Movember fundraiser to help support men’s health causes, come in three colour-ways and two sizes, the smaller one being most likely to fit my dainty lady hands. Read more
How Cool Is Kuler, Adobe’s Colour App?
/5 Comments/in DECOR & DESIGN, Goods & Services, HOME, HOW-TO KNOW-HOW, View All Home Stories, View All How-To Stories /by EditorDamn cool. Adobe’s new point-and-shoot app for the iPhone allows you to instantly pull a color palette from whatever image your camera snaps.
FREE & AWESOME | Have you seen Adobe’s new Kuler app?” my friend Giorgio Verzoletto of vanhit.com asked when we met up for coffee last Monday. “Watch this,” he said, waving his iPhone camera at the Frugalbits website displayed on the laptop screen in front of us. As G gestured with his phone, five circles on its screen bounced around like metal balls in one of those old-fashioned handheld puzzles, changing colour repeatedly depending on where the phone was directed.
When he snapped a shot, the circles turned into rectangles forming a band of the dominant colours in the image and creating what Kuler calls a colour theme on his phone screen. “These themes can be used, modified and shared in so many ways,” G said. “Anyone who works with colour is going to love this.” Or anyone who loves to play with colour, I added. Read more
The Best Way To Lace Your Workout Shoes
/1 Comment/in Exercise, FITNESS, Fitness & Health, HOW-TO KNOW-HOW, View All Fitness Stories, View All How-To Stories /by EditorWho knew there were so many corrective ways to lace up your workout shoes?
GOOD TO KNOW | I have a very narrow foot with a very high instep, which is no biggie for me except when it comes to buying workout shoes. Very few athletic shoe brands fit my feet straight out of the box; usually, I need to add orthotics. Recently, though, I’ve been able to eliminate this extra purchase by lacing my sneakers using a method that actually improves the way my workout shoes fit my feet. Read more
Get The Beadboard Look For Less
/7 Comments/in DECOR & DESIGN, HOME, Home & Garden, View All Home Stories /by EditorHow to get a fantastic beadboard look for your walls without hard labour or a super high price.
THE LOOK FOR LESS | As much as I try to squeeze it in, my sunny dream cottage by the sea just won’t fit my budget. But the fresh, cottagelike look of a bright wainscoted room can be achieved without using high-end, labour-intensive classic tongue and groove boards. Read more
Alternatives To The Multitier Wedding Cake
/6 Comments/in Entertaining, FOOD, Food & Drink, View All Food Stories /by EditorInstead of a single—and expensive—multitier wedding cake, some couples are serving up something different.
TREND ALERT | Traditional multitiered wedding cakes are expensive. Top Vancouver pastry chef Peter Fong of Ganache Patisserie charges on average $9 per guest for his wedding confections, while Sweet Thea, former pastry chef at some of B.C.’s very best restaurants, charges between $5 and $6 for hers. There’s no doubt that both of these talented cake makers make cakes that look and taste exquisite, but with so many other expenses plus guests to wine and dine, is it really necessary to spend between $600 and $1,000 (for an estimated 100 plus guests) for a delicious, eye-catching wedding cake? Read more
Rescue Me: How To Escape A Sinking Car
/0 Comments/in Goods & Services, HEALTH, HOW-TO KNOW-HOW, View All Health Stories, View All How-To Stories, Well Being /by EditorHow to escape a sinking car—plus an inexpensive tool that could make the process easier.
HOW TO SAVE A LIFE | When an Alberta truck driver hauling an oversize load struck a steal beam on the Skagit River Bridge in Washington state last week, sending a segment of the bridge and two passenger vehicles plunging into the water below, the thought crossed my mind, as I’m sure it did yours, what if one of those vehicles had been yours.
How would you react if you found yourself in a sinking car? What should and shouldn’t you do? Are there tools you can have on hand that will facilitate your escape? Read more