Living in a Modern Way

While in Southern California for Expo West back in March, we had almost a full day off to enjoy. It was Dan and I, as usual, but we were also with two of our employees for the Expo. The whole group of us met upon arrival at the airport and then headed off. We had lunch at Seed Bistro, went for a walk along the beach, and then headed to LACMA for the sole purpose of viewing the exhibit California Design, 1930-1965: Living in a Modern Way. The exhibit had a collection of modern furniture, automobiles, photos, clothing, and other design that was marvelous to behold. The centerpiece of the design was the full Eames House living room, which has been transported in it's entirety to the museum, all  1,864 items. Having never visited the Eames House (it is currently undergoing restoration, which is why the living room pieces could be temporarily removed), it was really wonderful to see the items amongst which Charles and Ray made their home. If you are a fan of modern design, or just like beautiful, clean design, I recommend that you visit this exhibit! It is going until the beginning of June.

(Photo: A Saul Bass-designed restaurant doggie bag that I particularly liked.)

The World's Largest Dog Collectables Museum

On our most recent trip to Texas, we drove from Dallas to Austin to spend a day there hanging out with our friends and visiting some new customers. We even hired a really great new Austin demo rep. On our way driving back to Dallas, we happened by a roadside attraction that we could NOT pass up: The World's Largest Dog Collectables Museum in Waco, Texas! The museum itself is situated in the corner of a large antique mall. Nothing in the museum is for sale, but many of the surrounding antique booths have great dog-related collectables. We could have easily spent hours here and not seen half of the thousands and thousands of items in the museum, but we saw what we could. We also looked high and low for a vintage pit bull figurine, but came up empty handed. When we left, since we hadn't bought anything, I tried to leave a donation for the dog museum, but the ladies at the checkout wouldn't hear of it. The dog museum is clearly a labor of love and I can't recommend it enough if you're passing by to budget the extra time to stop and take a good look around!

(Some more pictures of the museum can be found on this site!)

Forbidden Gardens

So, this isn't a food thing, but I think it still counts as a "vegan thing" since most of my discoveries come from my travels and this is one of my favorites! One of the coolest things about traveling is when you have a free hour or two to see something local and one of the coolest "something locals" we've seen was outside of Houston at Forbidden Gardens in Katy, Texas.

I didn't know until just now when I went to look up some details about Forbidden Gardens that it is now gone, which is a tragedy. The story, as I remember it, was that Forbidden Gardens was built by a Chinese American man who wanted to encourage a love of his Chinese culture in his children. His gardens included many buildings and models constructed in the traditional way (which were, unfortunately, not capable of withstanding the Texas sun). There was a scale model of the Forbidden City and, the most impressive, a 1/3 scale model of the tomb of the first Chinese Emperor, Qin Shi Huangdi, guarded by 6,000 terra cotta statues of warriors.

By the time we visited last year, Forbidden Gardens had fallen into serious disrepair and was all but deserted as we walked the grounds. The neglect made it seem even more surreal, as we saw the terra cotta warriors beaten and broken, but still standing guard under the magnificently blue Texas sky. It is not surprising, based on that visit, that the museum was not sustainable and is now closed, but it is sad to think that we'll never look on this amazing sight again. Now to see if I can pick up a piece of history for of my own.