Bibliothèque François Mitterrand

Bibliothèque François Mitterrand is such a beautiful building. It even has its own forest surrounded by the library towers.

Paris patterns

Old school

Paris in colors part II

Paris in colors part I

£117,000,000.00

There is a huge jackpot of £117,000,000.00 in Euro Millions lottery today. It is too much money for one person, but I would not mind waking up to a phone call from National Lottery tomorrow. The music clip above is the legendary theme tune of the Finnish national lottery, called Lotto.

Bad mistake

One very worrying thing draw my attention in Gillian Tett's article about globalization of manufacturing of goods in FT's Weekend Magazine. Skim through this paragraph:

"Take a look, for example, at a fascinating paper recently produced by the Asian Development Bank, which looks at where an iPhone is made. In this case, the company - Apple - is American; however, components for iPhone are variously assembled in China, Korea, Taipei, Germany and the US, involving almost a dozen companies which are hard to pigeonhole with any ethnic label."

Did you notice anything strange? I agree, the supply chain has become complicated. But far more worrying is the writer's attitude. She is listing countries and counts Taipei as a country. Maybe it is a mistake, but I think that is a strong and worrying pattern that is very common in the western way of thinking. Asia is being thought as a one big area and many people do not even know the countries in Asia not to mention the different cultures. It is just cheap labour or two weeks in Thailand for many. It is terrifying how little people know about the future's financial drivers - even at FT.

I used to think the same way. My two years in Hong Kong and Singapore opened my eyes to a new world I had totally neglected earlier.

Red moon

In fact, no you

More signs of spring

Colors of the SS11 season seem to be white, green, purple and a hint of yellow.

Bauhaus hut

This funny hut, maybe for ventilation purposes, stands somewhere near Thame Path between Bermondsey and London Bridge. It has a strong Bauhaus styling.

City of London panorama

A pub

I am not really a pub person, but I love how the pubs look like. This pub looks beautiful in the evening lights.

Gorbachev's jubilee

Who would have guessed that Mikhail Gorbachev's 80th birthday will be celebrated in London and the event will be sponsored by Vertu, Nokia's luxury product line.

Moss

Canary Wharf in CMYK

Cyan

Magenta

Yellow

Key black

Bread patterns

Good bread is hard to find in the UK. That is why I always bring excessive amounts of rye bread with me every time I go to Finland. Anyway, I saw good looking bread in London yesterday. The beautiful loafs above were on a display window of a small corner shop off Pall Mall. Unfortunately the shop was closed, so I have no idea are they just lovely on surface or is there more to it.

Carpet patterns

This beauty was on display at a Persian carpet shop along Piccadilly.

Chairs needed

Pictures from boknas.fi

This week I read some interesting news. Finnish design furniture retailer Boknäs is starting the reproduction of Eliel Saarinen's Blue Chairs in collaboration with furniture maker Adelta. The art deco style Blue Chair was originally designed in 1929. I love the shape of the chair, not to mention the patterns! I would love to get a pair of Blue Chairs for my hopefully-new-home-to-be.

From painting to pattern

La Madonna della Rondine by Carlo Crivelli

My friends know my love of patterns. One of them gave me a small book about patterns in renaissance paintings, called From Painting to Pattern which is a collaboration of the National Gallery and Moleskine. The book reveals interesting details in paintings that most people might not notice. The rich patterns in the paintings come to live when they are printed as bigger surfaces in the book and one can really see how detailed subjects the artists have been painting.

So near but so far

The hideous block behind could use the help of a painting company.

A dessert pattern

Some of my friends are very good cooks. A couple of weeks ago I witnessed the birth or burn, how you like it, of this delicious Crème brûlée. I think I need to buy my own flambé kit and give it a go.