Edith Zimmerman

The “stranded island test” is a good way to think about the products you use that you really, truly love. I asked the Apartment Therapy editors what one small appliance they’d bring along if we were all whisked away to an island in the middle of nowhere (where electric outlets may or may not exist, but that part isn’t supposed to matter).

While natural beauty guru Rachel Winard (of the cult-favorite brand Soapwalla) and I were talking about good, easy facials to make with food that might currently be in your kitchen, I also asked her for pointers on how to start an essential oil collection. Essentially: What are the essential essential oils? She suggested these five (for which you could come up with your own mnemonic, too — my first attempt is “let little ponies eat … tea trees.

Ever since reading Farhad Manjoo’s ode to the high-end toilet-seat bidet in the New York Times in 2015, I’ve been curious to try one.

I often fall asleep listening to YouTube videos of a stranger speaking softly while she pretends to braid my hair (or make me tea, or massage my scalp). Or while she whispers about the candles she’s making, the starchy shirts she’s crinkling slowly, or the towels she’s folding. What matters most to me about these videos isn’t what she says but rather the quality of her voice (calm, soothing) and the attitude she projects (do I trust her? does she seem genuine?

Last year I came across a video of a young woman repeatedly wrapping her hair into a specific bun style — a nautilus bun — and securing it with a single hair stick. It was transfixing, and it seemed to promise an old-fashioned solution to the modern-day I-don’t-have-a-hair-elastic problem, as well as a potential solution to the hair-elastics-have-been-tearing-my-hair-out-for-decades problem.

Sorry Costco, but I don't buy Saran Wrap in bulk anymore.

If you know of an old POÄNG chair that’s looking a little worse for wear, you could take a page from Philippa Saul’s book and cover it top to bottom with a glorious, hand-crocheted (-knitted and -embroidered) country cottage and garden.

Over on a Reddit thread about items that can and can’t be BIFL (bought for life), there’s a series of comments about what makes towels (and sheets, and duvet covers) good enough to last a lifetime. They come from Reddit user (and fabric expert) JessthePest (all of whose comments are delightful, if you care to spend a morning falling down various Reddit rabbit holes). I recommend the entire towel thread, as well as her extended sheets manifesto.

A cautionary tale. Or, I brushed my teeth with a stick.

Forget the Wheel of Life (and our home-oriented Life Balance Wheel) — or, don’t forget them, but after you maximize those wheels’ utility, there’s a new wheel in town: the Historic Paper Odor Wheel, developed by a team out of the University of London to more precisely describe and categorize the smell of old books.

If you’ve ever poured cups of Epsom salt into your bath while wondering, “What is this stuff, and why am I doing this?

Last year while shopping with a friend for kitchen countertops, I saw and fell for a small piece of blue-and-white polished stone that reminded me of photos of Earth taken from space. Blue bahia granite, as I learned, is quarried in Brazil and is “legendary for its beauty” (although its “stunning blue colors can be a little hard to incorporate into a kitchen,” at least according to one site).

Inspired by the Shaker tradition of room-encircling peg rails (or peg racks, or peg room wraps), and our recent rundown on Shaker style, I went digging for some modern and not-so-modern examples, in case anyone else might also be looking for some elegant-utilitarian, wall-mounted storage solutions. (Elsewhere: “A Quick History of Shaker Design” and “Cleaning Advice I Learned From the Shakers.

In the spirit of spring reawakening, I asked the wonderful Rachel Winard of natural-beauty line Soapwalla (or is it a cult? I’d join) for some easy at-home facial-treatment ideas. -Edith Hi everyone! I don’t know if winter felt abysmally long to you as well; now that lengthening days and subtly warmer temps are here, I’m itching to start new projects. One of my favorite things to do: create at-home spa treatments using food items hanging around in my kitchen.

... And turn jars into glassware, with hot water and baking soda.

Yes: "Everyone needs a big pile of shawls."

If you’ve ever needed further encouragement to stay in and binge on animal documentaries (I have not), they’ve now been shown to be scientifically good for you: Research from BBC Earth and the University of California has found that watching nature programmes [such as Planet Earth II] … increased people’s feelings of awe, contentedness, and joy. The nature programs also “acted to reduce feelings of tiredness, anger and stress.

Two longtime bookstore employees are currently transforming an abandoned Colorado cattle ranch into a “literary ‘home on the range’ for writers, artists and nature-lovers.” Jeff Lee and Ann Marie Martin of The Rocky Mountain Land Library project, who’ve collected more than 35,000 books about nature and the American West between them (they’re also married), are planning to finish this “live-in library celebrating the West” during the coming summer.

A sporadic column looking into the goings-on at America’s favorite hippie soap company. Have you ever spaced out in the shower marveling at the label on the Dr. Bronner’s bottle? Or tried all 18 suggested uses for their castile soap (or two or three or four of them)? Or peeked into Dr.