pop*eye...Labrador

LABRADOR is the muical project of FLEMMING BORBY. Flemming started his carreer in Copenhagen, Denmark back in the middle of the eighties as a drummer in local bands as The Poets, Alter Ego and Janes Rejoice.
In the beginning of the 90´ties he joined the band Greene, where a.o. Jens Unmack and the Olesen-brothers acted as musicians. Through the 90’ties Greene did 3 albums and a lot of touring all over Denmark.
Meanwhile Flemming finished his degree at the Royal Danish Academy of Music.
After the dissolvation of Greene in 1998, Flemming formed LABRADOR.
First album “Goodbye Susanne” came out in 2002, on Flemmings new started label DIVINE RECORDS, including the radiosingle “In A Blue Balloon” which became “Ugens Uundgåelige” on Danish National Radio P3.
The Album came out in Japan and whole Scandinavia as well.
Second album “Instamatic Lovelife” was released in 2004 in Denmark, Japan and Germany, and Flemming and Labrador did concerts in Japan, Germany, Denmark, France and England.
Looking after musicians for the 3rd album, Flemming ended up in Pablo Milanez´ studio in Havanna, Cuba, in January 2007, and recorded a couple of songs with some local brilliant young Cuban jazzmusicians. The result was so good that he returned in March to do an whole album. Overdubs was made in Copenhagen and Hamburg, and the first radiosingle is now ready, and to hear on this page.
The whole album will be out in the beginning of 2008.

Labrador - Instamatic Lovelife (2004)

Labrador is a Danish band led by Flemming Borby. It was formed in 1998 after the break up of the very praised danish band GREENE. In 2000 the first demo was out, and became “demo of the month” in GAFFA (Dainsh no.1 independent music-magazine) January 2000. In 2002 the first album “Goodbye Susanne” came out and included the single “In a Blue Balloon” which became a big radio-hit on Danish national radio P3. In 2004 second album “Instamatic Lovelife” was released in Denmark and Japan. The style of Labrador is contemporary popmusic, popmusic made in the beginning of the 21th century with inspiration from the great popartists of the sixties and seventies. Soft trumpet-lines, airy female-voices, flying guitars, blended with Flemming Borbys voice, makes you think of the time when Herb Alpert and Burt Baccharach was young, Brigitte Bardot looked good, and Serge Gainsbourg was alive!
"This is a hands down no brainer for Scandinavian number one of the year.Everything we love about pop music from the past 40 years was distilled down into this album and made new again.What's more, he made that difficult feat seem effortless.A milestone."

Labrador Space

Hot and Covered...ROGUES GALLERY SPRING PREVIEW

Photographs by Carter Smith

Hot and Covered...Maine Attraction!

TIME MAGAZINE:

Porta's Look!...More and More Mag . . .

2009 saw the rise and blossoming of some great magazines, which have become my ‘close friends’: A Great Magazine of all the Vintage and casual wear designers and briefing on global affairs, business culture & design.
Now I got inspire from these magazine.

Free&Easy

Japanese Magazine for The Young and The Young-at-Heart

MONOCLE
Clearly one of the best magazines ever…

"Did discover Monocle through Monocle's editor-in-chief Tyler Brule. He has a weekly column in the Financial Times Weekend edition, called Fast Lane. After several lectures, jumped into his chef d'oeuvre, Monocle, something not to be missed. Something? Wander the printed magazine and online edition, you will jump into a 360º reality, from business to fashion, lifestyle, travel and politics. It is neither mass market nor exclusive and elitist;
food for soul, body, brain and heart."

Huge Magazine
Huge Magazine is a Japanese fashion magazine designed for men. The magazine, featuring a wide array of different styles of street fashion is well known in Japan for its coverage of the varying styles that permeate street culture, as well as the overlay of European style in the Japanese fashion industry. Combining the various aspects of an eclectic sense of style, the magazine speaks to an increasingly wide audience.





But finally... I must have my style is simple when the outside matches the inside.

More and more interesting Best Magazines now.
I buy these magazines at the shop Kinokuniya, World Trade, BKK.

Porta's Eyes...Perfect Hight Street

GOOD HOOD
- Ideal world

Preface

Everyone loves an urban village but few cities know quite how to get the mix of retail, services and residents right. London recently decided to grass over Trafalgar Square temporarily to celebrate its urban villages while onlookers wondered what it had to do with their increasingly dull local high street. Monocle has taken inspiration from its favourite neighbourhoods to engineer the perfect precinct.

issue 05 . volume 01 . July 2007

Credits
Writer: Tyler Brûlé
Writer: Thomas Calvocoressi
Illustrator: Gaku Nakagawa

more @ MONOCLE

Porta's Eyes...The Perfect Community

Curated Community
-Ideal world

Preface
Last year we engineered the perfect neighbourhood and received praise from the World Health Organisation for putting small business at the core of our high street. This year, we've come up with a better borough.

issue 15 . volume 02 . July/August 2008

10 key community elements:

01
Natural lakes for swimming

02
Variation in building scale and architectural style

03
Round-the-clock service

04
Cosy local bars

05
A rolling terrain

06
Trams, trams, trams

07
Plenty of pedestrian/cycle highways

08
A policy to promote small businesses

09
Open windows rather than air-conditioning

10
Local grow-and-sell initiatives




Credits
Writer: Johnny Davis
Photographer: Satoshi Hashimoto

Twenty days a year. That's what you lose if, along with the large majority of the population, you spend an hour commuting into work in the morning, and another hour commuting home in the evening. "It's an impact on quality of life that is completely unnecessary," says Alejandro Gutierrez, associate director of global design and business consulting at international architecture firm Arup, headquartered in London.

Gutierrez's specialist field is integrated urbanism, and his recent work has included such large-scale urban projects as the regeneration of London's ­Battersea Power Station, the re-imagining of China's Guangzhou University and the revealing of Dongtan, an 84 sq km new ecocity on Chongming island, near Shanghai.

Gutierrez believes that the 20 wasted days commuting, along with a not inconsiderable list of other modern ills, are simply the result of bad urban planning. With this in mind, Monocle asked Gutierrez to come up with the perfect borough - an environment where form and function become effortlessly integrated to improve everyone's daily routine. "Any good neighbourhood should function like an organism," Gutierrez explains. "There should be a symbiosis between infrastructure, open space, energy resource efficiency and noise pollution so that things combine, and instead of being a problem they start to become a positive attribute of those neighbourhoods."

Number one on his hitlist is climate change. He doesn't subscribe to the theory that the next generation is doomed if we don't address this now. It's far worse than that, he says. "If we don't tackle it now, we won't have a future for our generation, never mind the next. A death toll of 20,000 people in the hot European summer of 2005? It's already here."

A neighbourhood where residents could walk to work is a start. That would take care of the 20 lost commuting days and a lot of car journeys. But residents must also be able to walk to leisure facilities. The central focus of Monocle's perfect neighbourhood is a network of paths that link not just residential with business areas, but educational with commercial enterprises and green spaces.

Our greener neighbourhood is one characterised by trams but also a huge recycling centre - rebranded a resource centre - where waste can be transformed into building materials. Real-time digital displays in both homes and central locations keep track of individual and, ­crucially, collective impact on the environment. That way "you can understand your own resource efficiency and the impact of your actions on the planet," says Gutierrez. "So you're not just guessing what you're doing is wrong. You're understanding it in a detailed way." Meanwhile, use of roof space for the planting of crops, plus local hydroponic growing markets in place of supermarkets create a unique food culture.

The result is a greener, healthier and, above all, more enjoyable neighbourhood. In fact, so good would quality of life be in our idealised neighbourhood, where food is grown locally, green spaces are open to all, and automotive transport is kept to a minimum, that we predict there would be scope to rethink the way the doctor's surgery operates and to reduce the need to travel abroad for holidays. The only problem Monocle can envisage is how to while away those extra 20 days in your new borough.

01
Green space

"Two things that I think are really important are elevation and slope," says Gutierrez. London's Primrose Hill, with its commanding views of Regent's Park in London, is a popular destination for precisely these attributes ("It has characteristics in common with a beach, which is why it gets really crowded on summer days.") In our ideal neighbourhood, green spaces would range from communal gardens running along the back of houses to squares to larger open parks. "Green spaces should have different levels of control, catering to different levels of the public, basically. Such a tiering system would have an enormous impact on quality of life."

02
Streetscape

In some Italian neighbour-hoods, public lighting is almost irrelevant, says Gutierrez. Instead of lamp-posts, wires with lamps attached could be strung across streets. A digital screen in the city centre not only keeps a real-time tally of the aggregated ecological performance of the neighbourhood, but serves as a modern update on the town hall noticeboard. "So you can exchange books, old kids' clothes and unwanted items within the community." Today's neighbourhoods often miss what Gutierrez calls "a degree of softness", something we can overcome with an "urban sofa" - a thick rubber bench for relaxing and soaking up the perfect environment.

03
Retail

"Growing markets" would replace supermarkets. Food grown hydroponically would supply local food and drink firms, restaurants and caterers. Next to the market is a "resource centre" (formerly recycling plant) where everything from plastics to mattresses are turned into building materials available to buy. Other retail would be staggered depending on housing density and would be a mix of independent, innovative retailers. Recognition of clients makes for happier patrons and a healthier community.

04
Transport

A top-flight tram system removes the stigma associated with public transport, making connections a joy. At junctions there is no separation between traffic - all road signs and speed limits are removed. This scheme has already proved highly effective in front of Geneva's Gare de Cornavin. "It's fantastic," says Gutierrez. "Cars go slow because they're scared of people, and people go slow because they're scared of cars. You get this situation where everyone is aware of each other and flowing smoothly."

05
Buildings

High density doesn't have to mean uniformity, and a close-knit neighbourhood of staggered three, five and eight-storey buildings would inform a "sensorial relationship" with the streetscape. "I have always admired the scale of Italian renaissance towns such as Verona," Gutierrez says. Ill-thought-out contemporary planning often means 20-storey buildings are jammed next to six-storey buildings and the resulting windshear means windows have to remain shut. In Monocle's quartier, windows open. Less windshear also means that roofs can be used for wind turbines, providing a local energy source. Buildings may be cooled through deep-water piping leading from a harbour or local reservoir.

06
Urban density

The single key factor in any successful neighbourhood. "A bad example of neighbourhood planning is Detroit, Phoenix or any American suburb," says Gutierrez. "There are simply too many examples in America." There, huge tracts of land developed with single houses each with one or two cars on the drive mean there's just not enough density of population to make local services, schools, energy and public transport systems feasible. Again, we might look to successful "cities within cities"; areas such as London's Notting Hill and Stockholm's Södermalm, as ideals of cost-effective infrastructure and resource networks.

07
Health care

Gutierrez has a big problem with the current choice of either a hospital or a local doctor. Instead, he proposes a third way: a "doctor's surgery on steroids" where a dozen doctors each dealing with a certain demographic - children, teenagers, the elderly - share a building, each able to dispense targeted advice. Meanwhile, a healthier neighbourhood in which food is produced locally, resources are contained, green spaces are plentiful and walking and cycling is the norm will conspire towards generating a healthier population - and reduce the need for medical assistance. These "super clinics" could also keep the sick closer to home.

08
Residential

Gutierrez is a fan of the Victorian British model of residential planning, "where you have both a lower and an upper ground floor". A design that separates the pavement from the house, but maintains the main rooms of those houses "just above eye-level with the street". Holland provides another reference, where modern terraces promote a density of population essential for making public transport viable. Denmark and Germany's allotment culture of community vegetable gardens should also be applied to roof space, currently badly underused. Similarly, basements and garages should no longer be used for cars, but as spaces for the hydroponic growth of crops or light industry. Monocle would also advocate a Kyoto-scale network of side-streets with low rise residences opening directly onto the street.

09
Education

A pedestrian and bike network of paths forms the core of our neighbourhood. And at the heart of this is our school. Gutierrez: "The network path will change the life of every parent, because you no longer have to drive your kid. They walk, or cycle. Or you walk or cycle with them." The pedestrian network path will also link to the high street, shops and community centre. Tall trees will act as a noise buffer around the school building, which will be flanked by the back walls of the resource centre, the food centre and office space, providing further insulation, security and "a degree of impermeability."

10
Leisure

With office space a short stroll from residential areas, the inhabitants in our environment have time for breakfast at a café on the way to work, and a glass of Riesling on the way home. "That activates the neighbourhood, not with people who are rushing to work like at London's Waterloo, but people who are enjoying their environment." The result: a clear upswing in quality of life. Climate change will ensure our holidays to Spain are limited in the future, so the urban leisure industry will start to grow exponentially. As much more time will be spent locally, the concept of two-week blocks of holiday will be replaced with more staggered long weekends spent relaxing with neighbours.


@ MONOCLE

Hot and Covered...GQ: BEST NEW DESIGNER IN AMERICA 2009 NOMINATION!

more on GQ.com

The Lonelyhearts - Dispatch (2005)

The Lonelyhearts' Dispatch is a phenomenal album. If you read no futher - do grasp that. Given the name of the band, the album cover - a bare floored but sunlit room complete with a bed all a mess - and track titles that include "sell the house, the car, the kids... I'm not coming back" - you likely shouldn't expect the next wave of electronic new wave to fill the air around you when putting the needle to this record. Then you get to the music and lyrics - the broken heart of the matter and you begin to realize this is an album of despair, setbacks and minor / major downfalls.. . just as the images and titles hinted at.

Two guys - John Lindenbaum and Andre Perry - from the SF,CA area are responsible for the emotion and effort on Dispatch, their second release (note: find debut album immediately). Hints of Black Strawberries-era Unbunny, the Kingsbury Manx (with a shot of sadness) and Neil Young (the acoustic style and the vocals at select times are spot on; see: "Patriot Axe") are all here for human absorption - all here fleshed out and realized in eleven songs that are bound by a common structure of loss. Example? See "Seasons Past": "I waited for you at Macy's / I sat with Santa Claus / I asked him for presents / He said I was old and lost" - Christ, that's some seriously sad shit, right? Imagine those lines being about a grown man and it gets infinitely poetic. Hand-stitched with minimal percussion, a couple of blue guitars, sparse synth and brief moments of studio ambiance/texture - The Lonelyhearts have forged an album that may have emerged from nowhere but will be kept company with repeated listens and an evangelical mission to get it heard. "Sherrif have you seen my boy?", a line from "Halo", the tale of (I gather) a father attempting to find his lost son reminds me of why I first fell for Al James of Dolorean and his lyrical imagery - The Lonelyhearts share this gift of chilling storytelling.

What I mean to say is Dispatch is a phenomenal album (see the start) that should be thoroughly enjoyed with the albums gifted lyrics in one hand and a deep, 90+ proof bottle in the other. The only time this album should be allowed to gather dust is when I die and fail to will it out to my lover.. . sad songs are (still) my new friends.

Perfect!

Lonelyhearts Space

New Modern Classic...Porter Classic

Porter Classic is a new line created by Katsuyuki Yoshida (the founder of Yoshida & Co.) and his son Leo Yoshida. Their first collection took two years in the planning because Katsuyuki Yoshida and Leo Yoshida wanted to create products that they really liked. On December 25th, they opened their first Porter Classic store in Ginza, Tokyo at the International Arcade. If you have a chance, be sure to drop.

I don’t know why but I love these kind of obscure, asymmetrical garments. They remind me of some sort of hard labourer from the ’20s, a good look in my opinion. This sweater/jacket/shirt from Porter Classic, is especially patchy and different, but good. From this single photo I don’t really know what to call this piece but it certainly looks as though it has plenty of uses. It’d look good as a shirt done all the way up over a tee, as a light jacket over a button-up with a vest or sweater, or maybe even as a sport coat with shirt and tie. Porter Classic is a new line by Katsuyuki Yoshida (of Yoshida & Co. fame) and his son Leo. As well it is a small shop specializing in vintage clothing and antique luggage. The shop is a unique space located underneath train tracks in Tokyo’s Ginza district, an area famous for it’s high end department stores and luxury flagship stores.

via CadmusFamily

Porter Classic Ginza
International Arcade #1
1-7 Uchisaiwaicho
Chiyoda-Ku Tokyo 100-0011 Japan
Tel: 03-5512-0150
Store Hours: 11:00 - 20:00
7 days a week

more on > porterclassic

pop*eye...Cocoon

A few months after releasing Panda Mountains EP, the two-piece band from Clermont-Ferrand is back with an album, My Friends All Died In A Plane Crash. This debut long-player perfectly mixes up sad and depressing folk songs (Tell Me, Seesaw...) with joyful and jazzy tunes (Chupee, Vultures...) played on the piano, ukulele and acoustic guitar. For a band named after a French lipstick, Cocoon's first album takes you to a smooth and soft imaginary country where happiness is everybody's quest.

Cocoon - My Friends All Died In A Plane Crash (2008)

It’s been a long time since I’ve seen this cute cat…I know you don’t have to judge something by its cover art but I can’t help myself to feel something nice and soft from it. It’s the kind of music you can listen near the chimney during cold evenings or maybe when you just wake up in the morning…

I gave a good listen to this album with its non-shocking title  and I really like it. Some sounds make me think of a mix between Ben Harper, Elliott Smith of the Weepies, they’re really great! They’re touring in France, I’ll try to catch them at Ramonville…everything’s here.

Mark Daumail is 22, sings, plays guitar, banjo, ukulélé & beatbox ; Morgane Imbeaud is 19, sings, plays keyboards & piano. Together they’re performing something very special, a natural symphony with their two voices. They already support on scene Emilie Simon or Jude.

So give a listen too to these 12 songs and open the door even 3 secondes to this universe they made.

Cocoon's space:

Porta's Eyes...RIDDLE ME THIS

ValetMag.com contains a cleverly named and fantastic resource for general how-to info called

The Explainer. Bookmark this handy-dandy tool for future reference.

New Modern Classic...Ralph Lauren Blucher Mocs

The boat shoe/blucher moc is obviously great. Nobody can tell you me otherwise. Ralph Lauren does the best job in taking what is classically good and making it the best. With some premium leathers, perfect contrast stitching, outdoorsy laces and a beautiful dark green tone, they have come out with the best looking blucher mocs I’ve seen. I really do like Quoddy’s mocs a lot, but it’s the color and the laces that make these Polo joints that much better for me. I have a great pair of Sperry’s that are so similar that I probably don’t need to pick up these, especially since they run $350. However, I used to buy the same sneaker, just in different colors, so buying a slightly different model by a different brand might be enough of a difference to justify.

Merry Christmas Everyone...the manics

"Christmas Ghost"

more on > http://www.manicstreetpreachers.com/07/index

City Of The Year

Portland

“The City of Roses” is too nice - people are friendly, service is excellent, and motorists actually give way to pedestrians!

The country's most original Fashion , Music and Movie Style, Portland is In.

more about seeing Portland Trips > http://thisisnaive.com/?page_id=201