CW&T: Pen Type-B
This is the ultimate writing instrument. It’s everything we ever wanted in a pen. Nothing more and nothing less. We use it everyday and carry it with us everywhere.
CW&T: California Tree
Our friend’s dad, who grows trees from a seed as a hobby, gave us a tiny sapling in a tiny pot 5 years ago. It’s grown so much! We call it the ‘California tree’ because all we know is that he picked up the seeds for it somewhere in California.
CW&T: Haystack Spatula
This spatula is maybe our most prized kitchen tool. We spent 2 weeks at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts running their Fab Lab. On one of our last days there, we saw the blacksmith technician finishing this beautiful iron spatula that he had forged from scratch. When I saw it, I jokingly asked if I could have it. Then a minute later, I broke down and was about to beg for it when he handed me the spatula and sandpaper to finish it myself. This thing is so beautiful and so well made. I wish we had a cast iron pan that was worthy of this spatula.
CW&T: Global Chef’s Knife
Best knife ever. Looks good and cuts well. Not sure what more you could want from an everyday kitchen knife. I bought this for my mom as a gift, but she refused it for superstitious reasons, so I got to keep it. I bought another one for a friend who didn’t have any sharp knives in his kitchen. About a month later, he told me several people in his kitchen had been victims of the knife. Maybe my mom is right.
CW&T: Daruma
We received this at our friend’s wedding as a gift. It’s a traditional Japanese thing. The idea is to fill in one of the eyes when you make a wish, and fill in the other eye when the wish comes true. Our Daruma lives in the kitchen and watches us eat.
CW&T: Egyptian Magic
Taylor’s mom introduced us to Egyptian Magic. She swears by it. The name says it all. It’s a magic moisturizing cream. We use it for everything.
CW&T: Ring holder & rings
When we started dating, we decide it would be cute to wear rings, so we measured our fingers with calipers and bought 2 bags of silicon o-rings on mcmaster.com. These ended up becoming our engagement / wedding / friendship / forever rings. For our engagement, just to make things feel more serious, I milled an aluminum case for 2 stacks of o-rings. This might be the only thing we’d save in a fire.
CW&T: Neon Light
Our beautiful neighbors and friends, Cesco and Veer, made us this neon sign as our wedding gift. They apparently argued over whose handwriting it should be, compromised and did half and half, then Cesco sabotaged the whole thing and made it all his handwriting, or maybe it was Veer. Not sure. Either way, we love it.
CW&T: Calipers
We have so many calipers. We’re not sure what we’d do without them. We have them all over our studio partly because it’s an indispensable tool, but also because they’re beautiful tools. Che-Wei keeps one in his pocket so he’s never without one.
CW&T: Orange Gaffer’s Tape
We started using Orange Gaff tape on everything back when we met in grad school in 2007. Orange tape goes well on almost anything. These days we mostly use it to cover other people’s logos. We also ended up making a circular orange patch to cover logos everywhere.
CW&T: Boxcutter with auto reloader
Shopping in Tokyo is amazing because you encounter all kinds of products you never knew existed. I grew up walking through Tokyu Hands everyday on my way home from school. I’m pretty sure that shaped much of my product mindset now. Anyways…this is the best boxcutter in the world and is available at Tokyu Hands. I’m not sure why it’s not available everywhere because it’s by far the best. There’s no reason anyone should be using boxcutters that hold single blades. This one holds a stack of 6 snap off blades and auto reloads blades as you dispose them. I get super pissed whenever this tool goes missing.
CW&T: Sealline bag
Before we started dating, we went on a trip to Cambodia and Vietnam. To prep for the trip, we bought 2 matching Sealline dry bags. Big ones. We’ve used them on every single trip since then. They’re super simple; no fancy compartments. It’s just a super durable dry bag.
CW&T: Alien Llama
Rebeca Raney was throwing out tons of artwork when we were helping her move out of her studio, so we scored this amazing piece. It’s our rideable guardian alien llama. It looks huggable and squishy, but it’s actually stiff enough to sit on it.
CW&T: Ice Cream Cone Shelf
This is our super practical solution for solving the “storage for little-things that-need to be accessed all the time” problem. Someday when we have a collection of buttons, it would be amazing to have a wall of these shelves with color sorted buttons in a million cups.
Taylor: Soft Star Shoes
A couple years ago, Taylor got a running injury and switched to wearing minimal running shoes. Ever since then, these are the only shoes she wears. They are essentially thin leather footbags with barely any sole. They are custom made in the US and she must walk funny because they always wear out on the right heel.
Che-Wei: Wrangler Jeans
I used to buy fancy jeans but fancy jeans also wear out and eventually crumble. Now I wear what cowboys wear everyday. Wranglers are cheap, sturdy and I like their cut. I’m on my 8th pair. At any time I have 3 pairs on rotation. One is my newest crispiest fancy jeans, then my slightly worn everyday jeans, then my workshop jeans with holes, paint, glue, and grease on it.
