Future New York Print

I'm going to try to dedicate Tuesdays to Steampunk art (for your home). I ran across this print of a future New York City -- with Airships drifting above it -- on Art.com, and thought you might like it. You can get it matted or framed, which might be a timesaver. (How many years have I had posters and prints rolled up in the back of a closet, festering in the dark due to lack of a frame?)

'Future New York' with Airships, Fine Art Print, 11x17

Wireless Home Router

Ah, the clever Radio Rental... he's disguised his wireless router as a... clock? radio? All I know is that the dial on the front is not just for looks: The rev counter is a rough aproximation of the traffic utilisation between my home network and the internet. (perfect for telling when the youngsters are downloading something illicit?) The entire how-to is here on instructables, in case you'd like to do the same.

Roger Wood's Studio

I'm fascinated by people's workshops. I was considering featuring some of the unique fine art clocks from Klockwerks, and indeed they are wonderful, but I've gotten much more distracted by the artist's workshop.



I love all the antique cabinets and the layered oriental rugs.



Don't forget to go check out his clocks, too!

Steam 90%
Punk 80%

update: The klockwerks website has been redesigned, so these image have moved. Go see them over here.

Desk Idea from the Steampunk Laptop Workshop

While the steampunk laptop was fascinating, it wasn't exactly an "everyday use" sort of object. In poring over the pictures of the original fabricator's workshop (display shop?), however, I glimpsed something that I thought would be: a sewing table used as a desk. This is a simple, elegant idea. Sewing tables are relatively easy to find -- sewing machines were as ubiquitous in households in the 1800s and on through the 1950s as a personal computer is today -- and a very quick search of ebay yielded multiple affordable options. This one was my favorite:



Sewing machine tables have a lot of clever engineering that would suit our current working styles. The tabletop on the left of this one probably drops down. The treadle would make a nice footrest for the height-limited among us. It is hard to tell on this specific one, but often the tops of the tables where the sewinng machine sits was designed to flip down making a solid tabletop for laying out patterns or cutting -- or for putting a laptop? I'd remove the sewing machine (or find one where the machine is already removed) so that it wouldn't get in the way. The drawers on the sides would be convenient for many things -- power supply cords, pens, i-pods, etc. etc.

Steam -- 80% points off for getting rid of the machine
Punk -- 30% for reuse

Steampunk Laptop

After sending TinkerGirl the modded Underwood No. 5 I stumbled across (courtesy of The Practical Archivist), I ran across something even wierder and more wonderful. Via the Dark Roasted Blend we have a Steampunk... laptop. Look closely boys and girls -- I believe the mouse clicker is actually a clicker from a telegraph station (although I'm sure that's not the technical term for it...).

Follow the link for more photographs, including closeups, or check out the original fabricator's Japanese site.

Art of the Week: Grace Palmer

There is so much wonderful steampunk art out there... but I just ran across Grace Palmer, a wonderful artist (and costumer!), on the steampunk fashion group. Some steampunk art tends a bit much toward the gothic or horror, but Grace's has, well, grace. Her windup animals (all sold, it seems) could be woodcuts out of a fairytale book. However, I fell in love with her Inventor, pictured above. One of the few female *creators* instead of *createds* in steampunk imagery.

Her prices are all quite reasonable -- if I read her site correctly, you can get a 5x7 print of the above for a mere $10.

Steam -- 100%
Punk -- 100%
(a rare homething that manages to be entirely steampunk!)

p.s. Don't miss her be-goggled, gun-toting adventuress!

The SteamPunk Table: Beer "Glasses"

Although an argument can be made that in your Victorian style steampunk future, you'd still use traditional glasses for imbibing beverages... I was taken with the sci-fi style of these pewter pint glasses by Alchemy. In addition to the traditional lager glass, they also have a bitter, ale, and continental style glass.

Steam 0%
Punk 70%

NeoVictorian before NeoVictorian was Cool

Here at the Steampunk Home, we do not simply recommend home furnishings for your gentle abode. We wish to assist you in bringing a steampunk perspective and value to all of your homemaking endeavors. To this end I would like to introduce you to one Judith Martin. I would consider Miss Martin, in some realms known as Miss Manners, an integral part of the Steampunk home. Mr Brumfield and I own many of her books, and refer to them often when deciding on an appropriate course of action in a particularly sticky situation. (I must admit Mr. Brumfield is decidedly better at this than I am...)

A must for every home? Miss Manners' Guide to Domestic Tranquility: The Authoritative Manual for Every Civilized Household, However Harried.

If you have children (although I read well before I entered the child rearing portion of my life), I would recommend Miss Manners' Guide to Rearing Perfect Children

You can tell, just by the titles, that even if Miss Manners hasn't read a lick of science fiction in her life (although I strongly suspect she has) she would be charmed by the steamier side of steampunk.

100% Steam
50% Punk -- in today's world, having exquisite manners is definitely punk. :)

"Used future"

If you haven't figured it out yet, I'm a big fan of Firefly/Serenity.

Browsing the Wikipedia entry for Serenity, I ran across this analysis of the look of Serenity:

The cramped interior of the Serenity ship itself appears to be strongly influenced by the 'the future looks worn down' precedent set by the Millennium Falcon^[69] but devolved even further. In a similar vein to Star Wars, Serenity goes for an occasional underdone look, or "used future", as Star Wars creator George Lucas refers to it.

The "used future." I like it. I've been drawn to recycled goods as part of the steampunk look, but I couldn't articulate why it was so obviously part of it. Now I know. Thank you, Mr. Lucas, for the name and the precedent.

More on the "used future".

Steam 0%
Punk 100%

Steampunk Furnishings that don't exist but should

In my quest to find furnishings that inspire that certain steampunk feel in a house, I'd love to find the following:

1) A spaceship in a bottle. Like a ship in a bottle, but a spaceship. Preferably Serenity from Firefly.

2) Traditional looking china, like that pictured below, but with pictures of technological progress (either real or imagined) -- steam engines, computing machines, etc.

So -- enterprising young men and women -- I'm waiting...

Steam 50%
Punk 70%

Yet Another Brass Lamp

Mad Salvager, the inhabitant of Sequential Glass, has what she's calling a "DieselPunk" Lamp for sale. It's probably a tad bit too steamlined for the purists tastes, but the wonderful thing about steampunk is that it projects a future that no one is 100% sure of -- so if your steampunk future leans towards Art Deco without the chrome, I say go for it!

More of a traditionalist? Don't like the idea of rewiring your own lamp? (I guess electricity is to modern of a technology for you?) There are two lamps previously mentioned that may interest you.

60% Steam
15% Punk

It may have sucked, but the sets were nice.

Ladies and gentleman, I present to you the library from The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (the movie, not the comic book).

More images of the move are on IMDB.

Design notes: tassels on chairs. bar cart. spiral staircase. yum!

90% Steam
5% Punk

Gondola Day Bed

The Stiles Brothers, makers of the rattan travel trunk/computer cabinet I mentioned earlier, have some truly lovely pieces. A much less practical but more beautiful one that caught my eye was the Gondola Day Bed:



Doesn't it look like it was refashioned from the remnants of a balloon crash?

Yes, it's quite expensive. But you probably don't have a house large enough for it, either. One can dream, however, one can dream.

80% Steam
10% Punk

Am I an oxymoron?

From the sidebar of the Steampunk Anime and Manga site:

"If you can buy it in a store, I don't see it as steampunk..."
Anonymous user of The Steampunk Forum on a Sci-Fi genre as social revolution.

La Tour Eiffel

When thinking back to the original Victorians, we tend to focus on those subjects actually under Victoria's rule -- the English and the English colonists. I'd like to point out, however, that the French has some decidely steampunk activities going on in the same timeframes. The best known? A feat of engineer that you just may have heard of -- The Eiffel Tower. So is it steampunk? You betcha -- made of iron, it was the tallest building in the world from when it was constructed in 1887 until it was replaced by the Chrysler Building in 1930. A piece of engineer that reigns over all the buildings in the world for 40 years? That's pretty audacious.

There's a lot of inspiration in the Eiffel Tower -- for instance, the ironwork is really intricate and beautiful, and can easily influence your choice of outdoor furniture. (I'm hoping to get a table and chair set for my patio, and wrought iron seems like the most steampunkesque choice in that category.)

There's also a lot of ways to integrate the Eiffel Tower into your home decoration -- most of trite at this point, but very readily available. For only $1200 you could put a cast model of the Eiffel Tower in your front yard -- at 71 inches tall it's would definitely be a focal point. For a less overwhelming option, there's an Eiffel tower doorstop or pull chain. For the purist, I can also recommend the facsimile of Gustav Eiffel's folio on the project: La Tour De 300 Metres: Facsimile Edition

90% Steam
10% Punk