1) A neighborhood in Brooklyn known as "
The Hole" is thirty feet below sea level. It is so close to the water table, in fact, that local homes are not connected to the city's sewer system, relying instead on cesspools; the streets—with names like Ruby, Emerald, and Sapphire—are often flooded, on the verge of permanently returning to
marshland.
The Hole is a short documentary by Courtney Sell and Billy Feldman about this neighborhood; cowboys on horseback wander through water-logged streets while
abandoned housing developments soak up rain like giant sponges.
2) Montréal's St. Pierre River "was pushed underground long ago," we read in the
Montréal Gazette; before it was funneled through storm drains and sewers, however, the river "would occasionally flood the surrounding farmlands." This tendency to flood never went away: it just
went into people's basements. As one local homeowner explains, "The land is low, apparently very low. Before I bought the building, the inspector I hired told me the pit of standing water in one corner of the basement was no cause for concern. 'Oh that,' he said. 'That's quite normal here. The water table is very high.' Yes, it is."
The notion that a city could be so misaligned with its own water table that puddles—in basements and roadways alike—are actually the return of an underground river quietly streaming through your cellar, and your neighbor's cellar, and their neighbor's cellar, and a thousand other cellars all invisible to maps, or the self-reassertion of an ancestral marsh surfacing like a dream in the streets is fascinating, bringing to mind the possibly apocryphal tale of old men
fishing in the basements of Manhattan, casting their lines down into still existing rivers and streams that were simply paved over and forgotten, or the tempting prospect of resurrecting London rivers based on obscure
royal decrees.
(Via @wateryone and @under_the_city).
We all have excuses as to why we can't dress up at a particular moment, but this woman is proof that you can dress stylishly even while grocery shopping. I saw her at Trader Joe's and asked if I could take her photograph. She told me that she was only dressed for shopping, but I assured her that she looked just marvelous. If you're in rush throw take a cue from the lady above. Throw on a great pair of shades and a stylish scarf and you're ready to go!
[Image: Author Greg Lindsay interviewed by an impossible-to-spell architecture blog...]. 
[Images: A linear wooden forest instrument playing Bach, by Drill Inc. for Docomo].
I was looking out the window on a taxi ride to the West Village, when I spotted this gorgeous lady. I always see people I'd like to photograph through the windows of taxis and buses, but I usually don't get the chance to stop and jump out. I knew that this was an opportunity for a great shot so I asked the driver to pull over and quickly ran down the street to meet up with the lady above.
The Block Magazine teamed up with Advanced Style to cast our good friend Lynn Dell in a gorgeous editorial featuring some of the latest vintage inspired sunglasses.Since I started this blog I have seen a growing number of older models being used in campaigns and editorials. It's great to see the advanced style set getting the attention they deserve!
