Actually, I like Brooklyn. But my friends at Yoko Devereaux (very much an intrinsic part of the cool newly minted BELT area of South Williamsburg) have started a new blog devoted to fashion, cocktails, music, books, restaurants and bars, travel-all the finer things of life. They asked for some of the photos I wasn't able to use for my story on Portland, Oregon for OUT and I was happy to share.
One of my favorite things in Portland is the near perfect Ace Hotel-it's just the right mix of a casual, funky atmosphere offset with some extremely bold and inspired style choices. On the mezzanine overlooking the lobby the complete lyrics to Leonard Cohen's 'Suzanne" are printed on the wall right behind a filing cabinet (above), a remnant from when the building was a bank.
The cabinet is beautiful, but it's what has wound up in those drawers that is really magic. See what; after the jump.
Pull the drawers open and you'll find stacks and stacks of handwritten notes on Ace statonary. Apparently, when the hotel opened people began spontaneously leaving these in there-they are confessions, professions of love, declarations of freedom, of depression-intimate and silly and moving and quite a remarkable phenomenon. There are hundreds, if not thousands. Even I left one in there-it was very liberating, the anonymous revelation, deposited into the company of so many other's. I almost hate to apply any kind of commercial or inorganic considerations to this, but they've got a book there. Below is one of the most striking ones I came across:
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