Love and Toast Eclectique

Love & Toast is a naturals line which had its premiere at Urban Outfitters. Margot Elena Wells, the creator, designer and formulator, was conceptually envisioning a loose creative vibe with Love & Toast, what she refers to as “Brit Pop Folk Art.” Drawing influences from Japanese design, Love & Toast also has a Swedish feel about it with its bright colors and simple iconography and many will also notice a nod to the ‘80’s.

Margot Elena took it a step further with Love & Toast by deliberately choosing environmentally friendly packaging to convey her commitment to the natural ingredient deck she worked so many years to perfect. Almost all of the Love & Toast packaging is recyclable, and the paperboard is made from annually renewable and sustainable resources. Margot Elena chose to use vegetable ink because it has proven to be most kind to our eco system as it is derived from a wide variety of sustainable crops.

Margot Elena is also creator of Lollia and Tokyo Milk.

What's Your Fortune, Baby?

"It's astonishingly simple. Mysterio Predicts your baby's future on a t-shirt. There are 12 possible futures, each shirt sewn into a muslin bag, sealed until the parent pulls the red string, revealing their child's exciting future!

The battered wood display crates were printed (and treated) roughly to give the impression that they just got thrown off a boat from exotic, foreign lands."

Designed and Illustrated in-house by Wry Baby.

Absolut Brooklyn

A collaboration with Spike Lee, it has one of the most unique Absolut packaging changes…can you believe they Spike Lee’d the seal?!?! Adding glasses and baseball cap on Lars Olsson Smith! Additionally they have a line from Lemon Andersen’s spoken word poem “Somewhere in the world Brooklyn in da house and you know we won’t stop spreading love cause that’s our way.” on the bottle alongside the silk screened image of an illustrated Brooklyn Stoop, which is #165 as a nod to Spike Lee’s brownstone roots. As for the flavor ~ it is a Red Apple and Ginger flavor ~ “its flavor evokes the spice and vibrancy Brooklyn brings to the big apple”… it’s quite delicious, though a bit jolly rancherish.

Get a Whiff of This...

An article in Slate from took a closer look at human sweat and the Body Odor Wheel to make better sense of it. The article is based on findings by researchers at Firmenich.

"In January, a Swiss fragrance firm concluded after years of study that female perspiration smells like grapefruit, passion fruit, and onion, while male sweat smells more cheesy, rancid, and animalic. Several years earlier, the same firm had analyzed male sweat and detected these flavor notes: chicken broth, butter, vinegar, onion, and grapefruit. The presence of grapefruit and onion--the scent of a woman--in male sweat gives the lie to the notion that men's B.O. is from Mars while women's is from Venus. For this reason, the B.O. wheel expresses gender differences on a gradient."

Vivienne Westwood Bubblegum Scented Shoes

Brazilian shoe brand Melissa makes plastic shoes that smell like bubblegum. From their FAQ: A few years ago, to add to the melissa experience, the decision was made to infuse all melissa shoes with a sweet bubblegum smell. The smell will not last forever – but it does remain for quite a few months and is one of the most talked about features of melissa. Our customers love it! Shown above, two shoes from the Vivienne Westwood collection. On the left, the Lady Dragon shoe, about $150 at Zappos or Saks. On the right, a version for children.