CraftWerk is a bi-monthly craft fair featuring the best and brightest of the Wellington craft scene. The inaugural CraftWerk launches at The Paramount Theatre on the 13th of July from 5.30pm.

CraftWerk will feature a diverse range of: art, handmade items, and indie designer fashion, representing New Zealand’s handmade revolution. What sets CraftWerk apart from any other fair is our intention to foster and inspire kiwi crafters without profiting at their expense. Simply think traditional fairs with a twist and you have CraftWerk.

The Paramount Theatre Wellington’s oldest Cinema and now its hottest events venue is where CraftWerk calls home. The Paramount’s lounge bar is stocked with a wide range of beers and wines as well as soft drinks, snacks and Kapiti ice-cream. This relaxing atmosphere, in the middle of Wellington’s hub of entertainment and nightlife, Courtenay Place, allows vendors and shoppers alike a break from the bustle and a chance to absorb the CraftWerk experience. Read more…

Art Espenet Carpenter, a self-taught woodworker whose spare but sexy furniture received national acclaim and influenced generations of master craftsmen, has died at age 86.

Carpenter suffered a fatal heart attack Thursday at his home in Bolinas, the Marin County town he helped make a haven for artists after another house he spent eight years building and furnishing was featured in Life magazine in 1966, said his son, Tripp Carpenter.

“He didn’t like any of the furniture he had seen in his life, and he thought he could make something better and more beautiful,” Tripp Carpenter said of the eye-catching designs his father started turning out after World War II. “I think that was a freedom for him, not having any training, starting from scratch.” Read more…

Multi-tasking furniture allows you to really maximize the use of space in your house. Though you can’t claim it as extra square footage when you’re selling, a piece with more than one function can easily double the utility of the room it’s in. In the case of the Material Furniture Flipper Screen, it can divide a room and, with a simple flip, can unite it. Circular cut outs on the screen turn out at 90-degree angles, creating extra shelving on which to store or display just about anything you can think of. It’s also a great way to serve appetizers or other snacks during a party. The screen is made of either maple or walnut and has a clear satin finish. Each of the three panels measures 24×72-inches. Price: $1,800. water.luxist.com

Will it be an ancient Greek marble sculpture of a lion, a majestic portrait by Titian of King Philip IV of Spain or a shoulder mask by the Baga people of Guinea? The choice is yours in the People’s Art Poll, in which the public is voting for the Cincinnati Art Museum’s No. 1 work of art. Museum curators sifted through the 60,000-piece collection to come up with the 25 nominees.

The Top 10 will be announced Aug. 6 and the winner Sept. 30. Each Sunday, we are profiling the 25 nominees in A&E. Read more…

Handicraft made by Felda settlers can one day make inroad into Harrods in London if they are unique, said Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.

He threw a personal challenge to Felda handicraft entrepreneurs to make their products as unique and special as possible so that they could be exported.

“I want Felda handicraft entrepreneurs and businessmen to take the lead in the industry. “You should make your products commercially attractive and create a good brand name to boost your sales. Read more…

Local handicraft entrepreneurs, in efforts to draw foreign investors, are taking the opportunity to promote their products at the Non-Aligned Movement Coordinating Bureau (NAM-CoB) Ministerial Meeting which starts here tomorrow.

The Melaka branch of the Malaysian Handicraft Corporation is among the organisations that have set up booths at the exhibition held in conjunction with the four-day meeting at the Putrajaya International Convention Centre (PICC) here.

Its designer, Ruziyati Garan, said Friday that entrepreneurs in Melaka produced high quality handicraft items from metal, ceramics, textiles and rattan which were well-received by local and foreign tourists. Read more…

Hollister architect has hands in many pots, and an eye for the county’s aesthetic beauty

A bluesman who pushes for affordable housing and green architecture, David Huboi understands that architecture is a philosophy-driven science and an art that reflects the natural flow of a community.

Everything is interrelated, a concept the Hollister architect began to instill in his designs even before he moved to Hollister 12 years ago from Los Gatos.

Huboi’s latest project, the Honda Powercenter, that will be located where Hollister Lanes Bowling Alley once stood, was recently submitted to the San Benito County Planning Commission. Read more…

Along with the pleasures of fresh-cut flowers, homegrown tomatoes and backyard barbecues come the responsibilities of mowing, watering and weeding.

Grass happens. And you’ll see that no matter how busy you are, you have to make time for the lawn or make room in your budget for someone else to tend it.

Taming the grass can be a burden, but growing a garden can be bliss. “Those of us who enjoy” gardening “are very lucky,” says Ann Simpson, owner of Smallscapes, a landscaping company near Kansas City, Mo. Read more…

T he National Hardware Show and Lawn & Garden World had their annual exhibition earlier this month at the Las Vegas Convention Center. The best one-word description of the event was big. Oh, my aching feet, it was big!

Show manager Rob Cappiello, said there were 3,280 manufacturers displaying their products in more than 767,000 square feet of exhibition space. Every guy and a lot of gals love to cruise the aisle of a hardware show looking for new stuff, but after five or six hours with no place to sit, you get a little numb. Read more…

A futuristic, tailless aircraft design that could be used for military tankers and transport aircraft will be flight tested later this year at NASA Dryden Flight Research Center.

The X-48B, a joint NASA, Air Force and Boeing research project, is testing a design concept called the “blended wing body” that researchers believe provides more lift, offering greater range and as much as 30 percent greater fuel economy.

“We believe the BWB concept has the potential to cost-effectively fill many roles required by the Air Force, such as tanking, weapons carriage and command and control,” said Capt. Scott Bjorge, the Air Force Research Laboratory’s X-48B program manager. Read more…