roosters and goats roam the streets

i would like to live here, please.  obviously wealth generated but undeniably pleasing to look at and i'm sure live in.  my future dream cottage involves a sauna (and swimming hole in close proximity.)  this book about russian country estates looks like it could be real good.  i added it to my books to buy someday list.

my weekend included a sleepover with alice.  we did a lot of walking around town and in the arboretum.  did i spell that right?  i don't feel like checking.  we ate a dinner which was about my perfect kind of dinner involving my favorite kinds of cheese, goat and fresh mozerella, with fresh vegetables and bread.  then we went to the fleamarket.  perfection. 

i'm adding a bunch of new buntings to my shop later today.  plus some new vintage items.

and i can't stand how much i like the accordian (drama queen.)  this girl is too cool for school:

x,
liane

fancy dacha

The Art Nouveau Dacha

russian correspondence

1940s russian correspondence. i think it's a great loss that we don't write letters to each other anymore.

via CoolVintage.

russian paper money

circa late 19th early 20th century.  via CoolVintage.

Wooden Churches of Vologda Province

Photography by Richard Davies.

Wooden Churches of Vologda Province

Deb from Kickcan and Konkers sent me the link to this site.  Deborah, I love it!  Thank you so much.  The photographs were taken by Richard Davies in the Russian North.  Here's an excerpt from the introduction on the website:

The integrity between the landscape and the architecture of this wooden world is as striking to us today as it was to Bilibin. The basic simplicity of the log cabin construction and the extravagant fantasies superimposed on it are just as startling. Although the churches that remain are in varying states of decay and despite their neglect and the wrecking of their interiors, these extraordinary structures have a spiritual presence which commands respect even in the absence of their gilded icons.

I have to say that part of my fascination with this part of the world is spiritual.  I am going to post some of my favorite images of the buildings from the outside later but these interior shots are...well, no words.  At least for me.

*please click the images to view large.

what do you think about?

What do Russia and auctions have to do with one another? Ah, nothing. Except that's what fills my brain today. I've also been looking at videos by the Lithuanian director Sarunas Bartas. Here's an example:

Yep. More Reindeer. I'm thinking about Siberia and I'm thinking about reindeer and I guess it's all a bit dark. But I don't feel dark, just so you know. And I'm wondering about the idiosyncratic wanderings of your mind. Will you share? Seriously. Don't hold back. What do you think about? Do you wonder if anyone else thinks about the same things?

Oh, that upholstered chair up there. It's up for auction tonight.

And. It. Will. Be. Mine.

*images via panoramio, national geographic, auction zip

color photography from russia in the early 1900s

Breathtaking. Taken by Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii who was hired by Tsar Nicholas II to take a photographic survey of the Russian Empire between 1909-1912, and again in 1915. This was a time just before World War I and the coming revolution. See many more images at the Library of Congress website.

*definitely click images to enlarge. it's worth it.