The Wilfrid

Not even a year ago Nancy and François had purchased a 175 year old farmhouse complete with 4 acres of land and a couple of barns with the vision of transforming the former dairy farm into a stylish, country getaway from the city. Situated in Prince Edward County (beaches! vineyards!) within weekend escape distance from Montreal and Toronto, The Wilfrid Boutique Farmhouse was open for its first season this spring.  Feeling particularly adult I decided to book a treat yo' self weekend and savour the country flavour.

Nancy and François really outdid themselves with the renovation of the farmhouse.  Opening up and streamlining the space for large common areas and creating three awesome guest rooms (oh and the shower!!) while maintaining the cozy county feel incited many ohhs and ahhs from me.  From the reclaimed sliding barn doors (from uh...their barn!) that leads to the crisp ensuite bathroom, to the pulleys holding the light fixtures, the attention to detail was apparent everywhere.  

After cocktails we strolled down the road to Long Dog Vinyard and Winery for some wine tasting and met the lovely owners James and Victoria.  We learned that James was involved in IMAX movie-making and that they would soon be rolling out the last IMAX movie to be shot on film.  Nooooooo! Say it ain't so!!!!  I get it, film is dead and dying and all that.  But I was secretly holding on to the idea that this crazy 70mm format would survive the transition.  Appreciating our film-nerdiness James gifted us with a couple of frames of this glorious medium.

After our last delicious and filling breakfast, we poked around the barns, played around a really old looking tractor and paid the hens a visit to gather some eggs before heading back down the 401.

During our weekend we toted around a Fuji Instax camera that is provided by the Wilfrid for guests to document their stay with the condition that we leave one image behind; creating a photographic guestbook at the farmhouse.

Connect4

This past week I was asked to help out at the merch table at the Connect4 vernissage.  The pop-up art show was brought together by the artists' themselves in conjunction with Mural Festival and Station16.  Alex Scaner, Kevin Ledo, Labrona, and Mathieu Connery busted out their works for an eager art-buying audience.

signature works by Alex Scaner

.

Plantlife! Works by Mathieu Connery

.

Left, sunflowers by Mathieu Connery  Right, a large Labrona (one of my faves!)

.

and a quick stroll down St-Laurent to try to catch some of the art in progress.  Chain-link fence work by Fafi

ok, found another Labrona in a doorway.

Roadsworth for Amnesty International

.

Winded down the art tour at Station16 where the insane felted works of Lucy Sparrow transformed a room in the gallery into Lucy Sparrow's Erotic Emporium: Le Sex Shop Feutré.  Holy moly EVERYTHING was made of felt!  From little condoms, to DVDs, porno mags, and giant butt plugs, all rendered in fuzzy felt giving the works caricature absurdity.  Do yourself a favour and check it out if you're in this fair city.

Japan photo diary

Shall we start with this image of cherry blossoms *almost* in bloom? We were a couple of weeks early for the grand floral explosions, but had enough of an inkling of what was to come.  Of course that did not deter us nor the tons of other tourists from flocking to Kyoto, known for temples, palaces, shrines, kaiseki and lesser known Kyoto style sushi. We rented some bikes for a couple of days and discovered the city with frozen toes (we are flashing back to early March here).

Tom on above-mentioned rental bicycle.  At the rental shop, the owner set us up with a "manual GPS" by clipping a map onto the basket.  Awesome.  We managed to get lost anyways.

1. At the Kitano Tenmangu Shrine

2. Shrine signage with a construction worker apologizing that there is work taking place

3. These two visitors with their masks, with a hint of the amount of tourists at the frame edges

A visitor making a prayer or offering with tons of Ema behind her. The ema are wooden plaques sold to those wanting to communicate to the gods their hand-written wishes, generally for health, wealth, happiness and good marks on an exam.

Or sometimes visitors wish for Saint Laurent, Air France Premiere seats or jewels from Van Cleef & Arpels.

Some of the thousands of Torii gates at the Fushimi Inari Shrine.

The bamboo groves at Arashiyama

Spooky deer and friendly deer in Nara

So we got ourselves onto a bullet train or a Shinkansen from Kyoto to Tokyo with a glimpse of Mount Fuji while drinking bottled water from Mount Fuji.  It was all very meta.  Speaking of meta I am typing this post while on a regular 5hr train ride from Montreal to Toronto.  The distance from Kyoto to Tokyo is almost equivalent and via those bad assed trains took about 2.5hr.  #bringhighspeedrailtoCanada #please #thankyou

1. Bright light and shadow in Ginza, Tokyo

2. Shoes almost in a line at Dover Street Market Ginza

3. A giant fallen rose by Andy Hillman for Visvim

HK photo diary

Hellooooooo Hong Kong! (Which I really enjoy calling HK.)

We took a quick jaunt to visit friends who have relocated on this unique island. HK, the home to millions, was full of wallet busting meals, bustling crowds, history and lots of dichotomy.  But what I couldn't get enough of was the density of the city. Sure New York is dense, Tokyo is dense, but for some reason I really felt the presence of the population represented not just by the crowds but also in the densely packed housing.  Infinitely photogenic, I couldn't get enough of it and marvelled at all the laundry precariously hanging outside of windows over a busy city below.

I was quite concerned for laundry everywhere I looked.

Meandering some of the little streets and alleyways of Sheung Wan.  As we wound our way we found stairways, graffiti and a hidden barbershop.

.

Okay, what about that dichotomy I was talking about?  Financial disparity of the population aside, a really awesome duality of HK is its urbanism and easy access to the outdoors.  While the Off-White store in Causeway Bay displayed some lovely greenery, HK spoiled us with tons of hikes, beaches, islands and other assorted outdoorsy-ness all while being nestled in a busy city.

.

Above:

1. walking up to Victoria Peak, viewing the city below

2. Lamma Island in the distance

3. the winding paths of Wilson Trail

.

Above:

1. making soup dumplings!

2. mall crowd

3. little HK and Chinese flags stretched over Kowloon streets. 

Last look: hitting up a trail in the New Territories with a view of mainland China yonder