Lost AT E Minor

Cheeks Bakery, Brooklyn

Disregard the buzz that surrounds those other cupcake shops in New York City. Cheeks Bakery in Williamsburg houses the best cupcakes that I’ve eaten. The clean and understated decor extends to the menu, where being fancy doesn’t rule on the cupcake shelves. Cheeks offers, simply, vanilla and chocolate cupcakes with either vanilla or chocolate cream. But if you do want more, Cheeks has that as well, a limited selection of pies and cakes.

A Cultural Guide to New York: Barcade

We asked some of New York’s more creative residents where they like to hang out in the city, and got a mixed bag of responses back. We’ll be running their insider tips over the next few weeks. This is illustrator Marcos Chin on his favorite arcade bar, aptly named … wait for it … Barcade: ‘Barcade is a time-warp into the 1980s when going to the arcade was the major past time for many of my friends and I. Lined throughout the space are a series of classic 25 cent video arcade games, like Q-bert, Donkey Kong, Arkanoid and Tetris. There’s also a pool table near the back of the space, and a terrific selection of beers to choose from. And yes, you can drink-and-play. It’s located near the Lorimer stop on the L train, at 388 Union Avenue, in Williamsburg’. Read more

Kali Ciesemier

Recent MICA illustration graduate, Kali Ciesemier posseses a particularly bold and versatile sensibility. She is clearly having a blast experimenting with different styles which ought to appeal to a wide range of clients. I particularly enjoy her poster section where she explores everything from textured pen and ink, to clean digital lines - all to extraordinary results. Having already illustrated projects from theater sets, to posters, to editorial, Ciesemier has hit the ground running having only graduated this May. With her wide range, it will be exciting to see how defines her work in the successful years ahead.

On the cattle ranch with Erika Larsen

Erika Larsen’s cattle ranch photographs have a surreal yet timeless quality to them. I would never have guessed that they were commissioned by a business magazine. We caught up with the New York-based photographer recently to find out about her time on the ranch. Read more

The haunting imagery of Sarah Wilmer

New York photographer Sarah Wilmer creates dark, nightmare-inducing photographs that have a strange sense of innocence about them. They’re like movie stills, a cross between Lost Highway and Pan’s Labyrinth. We interviewed her recently to get the inside word on the inspirations behind her work. Your photos have a cinematic quality to them. What films (or other medium) would you consider to be influences? ‘I love the work of Dario Argento, Roman Polanski, David Lynch and Alejandro Jodorowsky. Their films are so beautiful and interesting, I would say all of them have influenced me in one way or another’. Read more

Alex Prager’s photographs

I was listening to the Brazilian singer, Gal Costa, when I first came across Alex Prager’s photographs, which provided the perfect collision of music and imagery. We asked the Los Angeles-based photographer a few questions about her process and influences. Read more