Paper jewellery by Nel Linssen

WE'RE SUPPORTING

Chicago-based photographer Adam Ekberg has a knack for transforming the mundane into the poignant. He creates minor spectacles by carefully positioning and capturing his subjects. Read more

WE'RE THINKING

Great British artist — I love his paintings — and this is a great little insight into how he works. Whenever I read interviews with artists, it’s always their working process I find most interesting. Cooke’s multilayered approach is not dissimilar to my own, though clearly his work is very different. Read more

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is a reminder of why the medium of film is so special. It features first rate visuals, performances, direction and acting, all of which fits together into one of the most insightful, powerful and touching pieces of cinema ever. Read more

WE'RE TRAVELLING TO

While I’m definitely not into the whole Lord of the Rings thing, I’m convinced Tolkien stole his inspiration from Göreme, in Turkey’s central Cappadocia region. After a mammoth volcanic eruption around 2,000 years ago, the landscape eroded to form a series of valleys, filled with peculiar, phallic-shaped tufts that the locals call ‘fairy chimneys’. Early Christians hollowed out the tufts and turned them into houses, churches and monasteries. These days, most of them are still in use and a few have been converted into cute hotels and hostels. If you’re not too claustrophobic, I’d highly recommend doing the hobbit thing and spending a night in one.

WE'RE READING

This Is My England is both the blog and the pen name of a Londoner who looks at things up close. The photography zooms in on the small details of the decay and strangeness under the surface of the taken-for-granted things all around us. Many of the short poems here do roughly the same job.
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WE'RE LISTENING TO

So much of the Baltimore scene seems geared towards day-glo-clad party people, so it’s nice that introspective, country-tinged folk is also well represented here in the form of Noble Lake, a Wye Oak-related project fronted by James Sarsgaard, who I hope won’t mind me calling the second coming of Townes Van Zandt.

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WE'RE WEARING

With her collection of Skinover gloves, Rotterdam-based artist and sculptor Silvia B has taken a somewhat natural approach to the task of keeping hands warm — warts and all.