(Flåmsdalen, Norway)

(Hemel-en-Aarde, South Africa)

Roof slant

The high ceiling in this home is positively wonderful on a hot day.  Site of the ingenious lighting system, featured previously.  

(Eastern Province, Rwanda)

White Heart Door

(Kirehe District, Rwanda)

The Perfect Island Cottage

The perfect island cottage.   With a perfect island view.  And of course there's a stone beach with an ample supply of throwing stones.   The island in March.  

 

  

Lunchtime Dance Party

Sometimes you just gotta dance.  What started off as a rainy day lunch turned into an all-out dance party thanks to the inspirational and truly pioneering moves of Silas.  Enjoy. 

  Then a song came on that instructed to take off one's shoe.

Mfangano

Ok, well, since I've been pretty lax in updating lately, here's a bunch more photos from Mfangano Island. 

  Community mobile charging at its best

 Repairing fishing nets

A Perfect Thatched-Roof Home

 A perfect cozy home.  One of the nicest I've seen in all my travels.  Sleeping under a roof like this in the rain must be kind of like sleeping in a tent--much better than the metal roofs that seem to be so in vogue these days.  Need to learn the alphabet or numbers 1-20?  Just write it on the window cover, of course.

 The insides of these homes are serious works of art. 

A different home, to be fair, but definitely fits the theme.  True wallflowers. 

We Like To Play in Cars

 The neighbor kids love to play in the car that sits in our backyard.  It provides hours of entertainment for us all, in fact.  Some folks play with cars, and others play in cars!  Sometimes we have photoshoots, and they always love to look at the pictures on the camera screen, giggling and coming up with new poses... one of these days I'll print out a bunch for them to keep.  The day was ending when I took these, so they're a bit dark, but they should give you a little taste of the fun we have out back.  The Tiriki Embassy (our new home) can been seen in the background of the shot below, which is one of my favorite shots.

The Bird Nest in My Office

 I knew something was slightly unusual when little tiny twigs began fall on my desk at work.  Looking up, I realized that I was in fact sitting below a very dynamic bird nest.  For some reason the birds keep adding twigs to the nest even though they have plenty already, so the excess nest keeps trailing down the wall and falling onto my computer.  I don't mind though.  At my last office, in a cube, I only had a cactus (thanks to a kind workmate, Lynda), but I must say having the cozy home of a family of songbirds so near makes work seem a little less like work.  That's what it's like on the island. 

Alexandre de Betak's Stone Home by the Sea

 photo by Jason Schmidt

I've been thinking a lot about homes lately.  This home in Mallorca, recently featured in Sunday's T Magazine, is pretty near perfect--bright, cozy, quirky amusing, reliant on natural materials, in harmony with the landscape, designed for both intimacy and hosting big parties, and firmly rooted between the mountains and the sea--on an island of course.  Oh, and the infinity pool and sleeping nooks for the kids is the cherry on top.  What you see here is the child of design genius Alexandre de Betak, a fashion show producer known as the Fellini of Fashion - think Rodarte, Christian Dior, etc.  As he says, “For 10 years I was dreaming about it, for five years I was looking for a spot for it, for two years working on it, for another two years building it, and finally here it is.”
For more about the home, including a video, see the article at the New York Times magazine blog or a pdf of the article as it appeared in print, via Bureau Betak blog.  For more about the man, check out a minimentary by crane.tv.

 photo by Jason Schmidt

 photo by Jason Schmidt

 photo by Jason Schmidt

 photo by Jason Schmidt

 photo by Jason Schmidt

 photo by Jason Schmidt

photo by Jason Schmidt