Tiaras are magic, ask any girl who knows how to turn herself into a princess. Bompas & Parr’s Magic Crystal Tiara kit, created to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, makes magic even more magical.

As Bompas & Parr say –
Crystals are probably one of the most mysterious things on the planet and so is the Queen. Since the dawn of time crystals have been used for ancient ceremonies and rituals like the coronation. Grow your own magic crystal tiara by adding the crystal solution to the tiara and watch it blossom with white crystals. Don’t drink the solution though – danger of death.

This little kit provides the tools to make magic – on sale at Selfridges on Oxford Street, London for the month of May 2012.

Photo credit: Bompas & Parr

Interactive technology that takes it slow and fast at the same time – The Walker Art Center created analog tweets for the 2012 American Association of Museums Annual Meeting & Museum Expo in Minneapolis.

The idea – You write it, we tweet it. The analog tweet system was created in partnership with Lunalux’s Jenni Undis. It’s a system for connecting with people but done on two very different scales – There is an in-person one-to-one exchange of hand written messages with lovely letterpressed card. Those notes then get sent out to the great wide twittersphere of Walker’s twitter & facebook followers. So that’s one in-person smile and a message out to roughly two thousand people at the same time.

On the Walker blog, Scott Stulen explains how it works:
We partnered with local print shop Lunalux to create telegram-like letterpressed cards. Each card contains metered spaces for the 128 characters (140 minus the #analogtweet hashtag). You are invited to compose your message, remove the perforated receipt, and we will tweet the message and include a picture of the physical card. It is actually hard to compose a tweet without the ability to have characters auto counted and writing it in one draft…don’t worry we have scratch paper!

If you missed the April conference, you can still stop by and send out your own analog tweet through the summer at the Walker’s other long-time lovely project – Open Field.

Photo credit: Scott Stulen

Visiting the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, you’ll reach the very top floor with a sun-filled terrace where gracious Blue Bottle Cafe staff serve great coffee. It feels like an oasis within the museum journey. But the story gets better.

Coincidentally, a recent New York Times article by Edward Rothstein speaks to the rooftop cafe oasis experience – Rothstein describes the phenomenon of ‘Museum Mind’. You know the condition, the fatigue which sets in after so much art gazing. Visitors need to let their brains take a break, refocus before diving back into more consumption. As the author mentions, this is why you’ll find visitors flocking to gift shops to decompress.

What if you could design a better way to let people decompress, not necessarily stop thinking about art, but just shift thinking?

This is what you find on the 5th floor rooftop terrace. Here’s the magic. Blue Bottle Cafe bakers make their own cakes. It occurred to them that they could start making treats to accompany coffee, inspired by the art in the museum. Each treat is a little experiential treasure.

Sculpture Garden Cookie Plate
It’s a scavenger hunt. Clues come in cookie form and helpful hints are printed on the accompanying napkin. See that stripy cookie? Have a look at the rooftop of the building across the street and see if you can find the stripy sculpture.

Frida Kahlo Mexican Wedding Cookies
Celebrating a moment frozen in time by a painting – the wedding of Madame Kahlo and Diego Rivera. You’ve got to go down to the 2nd floor to find the 1931 original.

Tony Cragg Ice Cream Cone
Eat your gorgeous stripy ice cream cone while standing next to the real thing.

Build Your Own Barnett Newman
Just what it says in the title – instructions included in the package, plus a handy postcard to re-create the whole setting in miniature at home. *HINT: Can you find one of the other scavenger hunt cookie sculptures in the photos?

What happens in the Blue Bottle Cafe? The overall rhythm of the museum journey is improved. For a little while, there’s a space that lets you breathe easy. You’re not separated from art, but you taste it, get curious after tasting it to go and search for it, maybe revisit a piece you’ve already passed but see it in a new way. This is what gives visitors the energy and incentive to stay a little longer, and even get more excited to consume art. Check out the full menu of delicious offerings in their dessert gallery here. Be forewarned, gamely staff will give clues but NOT the answers to the scavenger hunt!