Urban Discoveries Baltimore

Recently, spending more time at home has become both prudent and chic. Even those of us who don’t have to are tightening the nonfunctional pelvic bangle, if only for appearances. Thing is, moderately wealthy people, you need to keep buying stuff. That not doing so is hip right now is exactly the evidence that you should not try to be hip. Your buying stuff keeps the rest of us in business. Our not buying stuff is only hip because we have no choice. But we would like to! So gather ye consumer goods while ye may. And we can make it palatable to do so! Below are some chill-at-home/DIY products that make looking like you’re saving money really, really pretty.

• Direct Design’s Notebook Portable Grill. A sleek, masculine retort to the old mushroom-top grills we all grew up with. Folded up, this thing is only 18” x 18” x 1” (!), so you can tote it from backyard to backyard to show off.
• Postfossil’s Sports Furniture Collection. Minimalist living room decor with a secret identity. The collection includes a coat rack/pull-up bar, a carpet/sit-up mat, a bench/bench, a fancifully fishing equipment-esque rope in a drawer/skipping rope, and a cup/sports cup. This last item works not so much in the practical, at-least-he-was-wearing-a-cup sense than in the symbolic, I’m-more-an-antique-Roman-than-a-Dane one. Beautiful hybrids all.

• The Chemex Coffee Maker. A timeless hourglass for your morning cup. This latte-predecessor was designed in the sixties by German chemist Peter Schlumbohm, and you can check it out at the Museum of Modern Art. The coffee’s not bad, either.

That’s all for now, though there may be more on the way. What’s the prettiest thing you’ve seen lately?

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