Go Here // Flora Farms, Los Cabos

I came across Flora Farms some time ago and I recall that it immediately struck me as one of those perfectly mythical places, the kind I daydream about owning and running should my lottery windfall ever come to fruition. But in fact, this 10-acre working farm actually exists in the mountains above Los Cabos, offering visitors a farm to table experience through their on-site bar and restaurant.  A lucky few have the opportunity to own a part of it through one of several "cottages" that also dot the property.

The farm began 10 years ago, serving local chefs and hotels through the weekly farmers market. Eventually, it opened its doors to the public with its own kitchen, serving up a gourmet brunch, lunch and dinner menu with fresh fruits and vegetables grown on-site in fields still worked largely by hand. Meats served at the restaurant are humanely raised on a nearby ranch also owned by Flora Farms.

In addition to the kitchen and bar, which serves up carrot margaritas and other organic concoctions, visitors can also pick up fresh produce from the grocery to enjoy back home. Farm tours are also available to patrons, providing a holistic look at the history and hormone/pesticide free farming methods the farm is committed to. 

There are 10 luxury culinary cottages that dot the property, offering an upscale stay right on the farm with privileges that include a private harvesting privileges from the farm, pool and spa, private beach club and a family pond for swimming.

Properties have been sold, but some offer rental stays with all the privileges of ownership extended. 

What I wouldn't give for an extended stay, with time to cook in that kitchen!  For now, I'm content to long for the day when I can visit the Field Kitchen restaurant and sample homegrown and hand-prepared dishes like radish ravioli and Neopolitan style pizzas prepared in their authentic brick oven. Authentic Italian food with a beach view in Mexico, the stuff my vacation dreams are made of.

Airport Beauties

All the recent travel we've been doing lately has reminded me that set apart from the traffic and congestion and suitcases scurrying about, an airport can really be a wondrous place - particularly when you consider all the planning and design that goes into one. I have this romantic view of air travel anyway- probably because I grew up in an era when there weren't yet thousands of flights happening simultaneously and the ability to travel across the world in a just a few hours was not taken for granted. Admittingly, I forego the sweat pants and still dress for a flight, even if in some small way just to honor the majesty of what it means to experience this luxury. 

I always think of the Arrivals terminal as the grand entrance to a new city and the design and decoration of the building should be more than just efficiency. That's a difficult task when you are presented with the challenge of moving millions of customers through the doors each day. But it really is a traveler's first impression, isn't it?  Walking the terrazzo corridor at Miami International recently, with its brass inlay, I really felt special, like the city had rolled out the red carpet just for me. The thought that the city and its design team took the time to consider presentation in this day and age of "budget travel" really left an impression on me. We never even left the terminal and two weeks later I'm still daydreaming about it - and frankly, what lies just outside the doors. 

This idea lead me to do a little more research into the majesty of airport design. Below are a handful of beauty shots and some background on a few of the most gorgeous welcome mats in the world.

The tensile fabric canopies used in the design at Denver Airport is an iconic interpretation of the famed snowcapped Rocky Mountains in the background. But the design is environmentally responsible as well. The fabric allows 10% of natural light to penetrate the canvas drastically reducing the need for electricity, while reflecting 90% of solar radiation in the high altitude environment.  The airport also has it's own solar farm, generating 3.5 million kilowatts of electricity annually.

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Designed by local Denver Architect Curtis Fentress

Image by Ellen Jaskol via Architonic

A Walk on the Beach is a half mile art installation just past security in Terminal 2 of Miami International Airport. Passengers board and depart across an illuminated corridor comprised of two thousand unique cast bronze elements embedded in a dark gray terrazzo matrix with scatterings of mother of pearl - all meant to evoke the plants and sea life of Miami's shallow coastal waters.

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Designed by Michelle Oka Donner

Images Via: Miami International Airport

The Terminal 2 departures lounge at Benito Juarez International Airport, Mexico City. The sustainable structure was completed in 2009 and constructed to flood the terminal with natural light without any thermal gain. Water is treated in house and the building is naturally ventilated. The terminal also has it's own data center which regulates water, electricity and media, making it a truly state of the art design.

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Designed by Serrano Monjaraz Arquitectos

Images Via: Formness

Menara Airport, Marrakech. In 2008, the airport was extended with a contemporary wing complete with 24 rhombuses and printed glass depicting ancient Islamic motives. One of the primary objectives of this project was to give arriving passengers a view of modern Moroccan architecture while preserving traditions. It's all about the light when it comes to this project. The adjacent outdoor canopy provides filtered shade while indoors, the lighting is meant to reflect a similar atmosphere found in a traditional mosque.  

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Designed by E2A Architecture and CR Architecture

Images Via: Virginia Duran and Lower Hotels

The ceiling at Barajas International Airport, Madrid. With 200,000 M2 of gently curved laths, this is the largest bamboo project in the world.

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Designed by Richard Rogers

Image Via: Archello

The Arrivals tunnel in Terminal 6 at Los Angeles International Airport. This storied wall tile was lost for decades when the tunnel was closed for airport renovation. To the delight of design enthusiasts everywhere, it re-opened to more efficiently usher arriving passengers to baggage claim in 2011. The tiles are meant to depict a journey across the United States.

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Commissioned in 1961 and installed at the direction of Interior Designer/Architect Charles D. Kratka, this installation is considered to be his best known Modernist effort.

Images Via: Burning Settlers Cabin

The view above Newark Airport in the intro image was captured by Photographer Jeffrey Milstein and is a part of his series "Flying" which takes a look at airport design from above, shot from low altitudes.

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Image Via: Slate

Travel Bound // Essentials + Little Luxuries

I've always had a bit of a wanderer's heart. I can even remember feeling the desire to get out and travel from some of my earliest memories. In grade school, I used to busy myself by penning little travel adventure books. My main character: Snoopy of all things. But in my mind's eye, that Snoopy went everywhere- London, Egypt, San Francisco- places I had not yet visited, but only heard about. True story (and note to self: hunt those suckers down for a good laugh). 

For much of my years, I daydreamed of traveling to distant places until one day in my early twenties, I quit my job, packed my bags and set off on a little european adventure all by my little self... and it was the best thing I've ever done- for me. I've done a bit more since then, but in all honesty, I've had to make some compromises and give up one of the things I've truly ever loved in order to gain some others. 

So this morning, I woke up particularly grateful that travel is once again in my future. We actually have two dream trips planned within just a couple months of each other... and get this... we're actually booked.  I can hardly believe it. It's no longer a fluid little daydream, but we - The Mister and I actually have tickets.

So it is then, that I've set about making plans and daydreaming of all the little treasures I will be packing in my suitcase. 

These two trips could not be more different in location and necessity. But I'm trying to find similarities so that I can parlay some of what I acquire between locations. We will be doing quite a bit of air and train travel between the two, so I'm zeroing in on essentials like versatile walking shoes, a good convertible cross body bag and scarf to keep me comfortable. I've been on the hunt for durable, lightweight (and affordable) luggage as well.  

one // two // three // four // five // six // seven 

Both of these two trips are almost once in a lifetime type events and I'm looking to pack a few extra luxuries to make them even more special. I've highlighted a few above that I've earmarked for a little pre-flight shopping spree.

eight // nine // ten // eleven // twelve // thirteen

Gypsyland

There's a famous scene at the very end of the 1980's film adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis' novel Less Than Zero that has always encapsulated the California desert for me.

Jarred by the visually raw and graphic scenes that have come just before it, the audience is seemingly presented with a welcome break in the action and now sees an aerial shot of a vintage red convertible winding it's way back to LA from Palm Springs on a deserted back road, through a field of wind turbines.

With it's filtered, early morning sunlight and the lone image of that shiny red car carrying three lifelong friends home, it's a scene that is at once hopeful as it is foreboding. In it, the desert almost becomes another character, fashioned for sole purpose of driving home the consequences of the story's characters.

The hazy sun seems to signify the smoke clearing. The long and winding road through the battered desert landscape now stands far in the background, while the spinning turbine blades continue to imply danger. And then, sheer solitude settles in, as the audience learns more and the camera pans around the car and back out into the horizon.

I consider it one of my favorite places in the world, but California's low desert has always been a bit spooky and melancholy to me. As we often drive the Coachella Valley into Palm Springs, I find myself growing quiet, almost solemn as I stare out the car window and into its vastness. That movie scene probably has something to do with it.

This past weekend, The Mister and I awoke to sunny blue skies and borrowed his mom's convertible for a little road trip out to Palm Springs. On our way back home, we took a detour out to Desert Hot Springs so I could stop in and peruse the vintage finds at a little gem of a store called Gypsyland (I scored by the way!). The Mister lives by GPS and somehow our shortcut back to the freeway put us out onto an isolated stretch of backroad we've never seen, nor heard of. And how fortuitous. It's called Dillon Road.

Weary from our day of deal hunting, I was finally seceding to my heavy eyelids.

"Open your eyes and look up, " he said with a nudge.

I threw my head back to find us traveling beneath those wind turbines we'd until now, just viewed from a distance, their blades cutting purposefully through that hazy desert sunlight.

I couldn't believe what I was seeing and jumped out to snap some shots. The sheer magnitude of each tower was exhilarating.  I jumped around laughing and yelling out into the desert as he watched smiling from behind the wheel. I nearly didn't want to get back in the car it felt so good.

It's amazing how getting up close and personal can bring new meaning to something you've only viewed from a distance.

Suddenly, it all no longer seems so scary.

* All images taken by Holtwood Hipster

Jet Setting

I think it was embedded in me right from the start. This urgent hunger that creeps up every now and again that must be fed. When I was a little girl, my uncle would take my sister and I to the airport. There was this little area right off the runway at LAX where you could park and a descending plane would fly, engines screaming right overhead. I swear if you reached your hand out just far enough you could touch it's belly. We would sit for hours as he schooled us in the various makes and models of each one. I grew up dreaming I'd be an airline stewardess.

It's back. It's been back for quite some time but I'm finding it harder and harder to ignore. I always say a trip abroad is good for the soul. It reminds us that there is a great big world out there and that the myopic worries that weigh so heavy on us at home are really minuscule when we travel outside our comfort zone and see just how small an island we really live on each day.

Maybe it's just that darn Pan Am TV show making me daydream about the few, but stylish accessories I'd take with me on my next adventure.

Via: Pinterest / 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5