Art Collecting for the Not So Wealthy

D.D. has been collecting art for some time now and he recently purchased some outsider art pieces from ebay for somewhere in the neighborhood of $20. I have always wanted to collect but always imagined that it was beyond my reach. I've been doing some research and have come across some pretty amazing things. This one below can be found on http://www.3fishstudios.com/ and comes framed for $90. I'm in love with it! Maybe i'll cave in and get it instead of that new pair of shoes i've been eyeing....

Design Inspiration: Neon and Retail

These pictures are a bit old, but I found them in my files and they were just another example of the use of neon. These were Louis Vuitton's window displays.

Design Inspiration: Grey Goose Headquarters

Antwerp designers Puresang have completed the interior of a bar at the headquarters of vodka brand Grey Goose in Brussels, Belgium.

The bar features a faceted wall composed of blue, triangular mirror-tiles and has a conference table at one end of the bar. A conference table at the end of the bar? Can I please attend those meetings?

I really love the look and feel of the room, it's almost cavernous or spaceship of the future dining room. I relaly enjooy the use of facets and reflective materials. It works for me, but I'd be afraid to have too many drinks in here, it might get very disorienting very quickly.

Repotting: IN NEON!

This time of year I always have plants on the mind. Mine have been growing so quickly since the weather has warmed up. One of the major pluses of the new apartment is the abundance of sunlight compared to the lack of it in my current space. I'm sure my plants are going to be so much happier. Since they have been growing so much, I have had thinking about repotting soon - since they will be reaching the limits of their current containers. I've been looking around for pretty pots and I found the ones below at Adonde and I am obsessing over them. I just love the combo of the wood grain and the neon pink and the gray. It's just perfect!

The nearest location that they are sold is Montreal and even so they are pretty pricey....at the very least they are a very good source of inspiration for the sort of container I am looking for.

Inspiration Room

This color is very close to Glass Slipper:

Light Captured as a Table

I love these tables from Glas Italia so much! They are so colorful and cheerful and bordering on the wonderfulness of neon but in table form. They were designed by Johanna Grawunder who is a former lighting desginer who just recently made her debut as a furniture designer with this series. Drawing on her lighting experience for inspiration, Grawunder has designed XX console and XXX low table - two fruit salad tinted tables - to emanate light without the need for electrical interference. Constructed from x shaped glass bases and topped with rectangular and circular surfaces, the tables were uncovered this week alongside the rest of Glas Italia’s 2009 collection. In my opinion, I think she did a great job nof translating her work with light into furniture.

Glass Slipper & Palest Pistachio

This past weekend, with the help of my darling boyfriend, we painted my new living room Benjamin Moore's "Glass Slipper." It was reccomended by my good friend Craver, from Decor Craver, and I must say that I am more than pleased with it. I've seen it in several different ights now and it changes from a glassy pale green blue to a deep gray blue and everything in between. There are tones of blue, green, gray and even purple at times. I just love it.

The bedroom is going to be tackled next weekend and it's going to be Benjamin Moore's "Palest Pistachio." The rooms are going to feel lighter than air, which is effect I was hoping for! I can't wait to get my new digital camera to show you guys the rooms.

Design Inspiration: Mismatched Chairs

I love the mismatched chairs for this dinning room table. I own one dinning room table and four mismatched chairs. I feel awkward at times because of the hodgepodge look, but it's nice to see other people doing the same thing.

Hello Again!

I know, I know, it's been ages since my last post. In my defense, my day job was kicking my butt...but, now it's summer and things at the office are winding down and I can begin to focus on the things I love again!


Even more exciting, I'm going to be moving to a new apartment and that comes along with so many new ideas for a new space. This weekend I am going to be painting and here is my color inspiration:

My good friend Craver helped me pick out a beautiful color from Benjamin Moore called "Glass Slipper" for my bedroom and in my living room I want to go with a glassy green equivilant to that color that has yet to be found. I want the colors to be bright and light and airy and feel like you're at the bottom of a beautiful swimming pool sparkling in the August sun!

I am so excited for the new space and for this summer! Posts to come more frequently, promise!

Colors

I love the colors and design used on the cover of April's issue of Wallpaper magazine.  It almost looks like a Pucci print. I love the shades of blue and diamond or crystal like pattern. I'd love to have this as a rug, tapestry or bed spread. 

Outdoor Furniture

Living in New York, I don't have much need for outdoor furniture, but I found these really amazing tables and stools. The sleek Galets series by Ludovic Renson features a low roto-molded table and stools that are chrome-painted with a bamboo insert on the surface. Cool, with just enough warmth, which is the exact look that I love. I wish there was a person in the photograph to give a clear sense of scale. 

Espresso!

I love coffee, it's in my blood. Look at this machine!

"Wheel" is an espresso machine with a 19 bar pump. turning the wheel a quater rotation, than open door and the box for nespresso-capsule move out and now you can put in an new nespresso-capsule. push the door and make a quater rotation from the wheel. the rest coffee dosen´t stand in the pipe will be that blow out with an overpressure. the water tank is a specila bottle from Vittel with Vittelwater. AND the best part? It's shaped like a C!

It's Been Forever

Hi! I know it's been forever and I doubt if anyone who actually did read this is still even looking for updates. But on the off chance that you are, here I am, updating again. My life has been in turmoil for a couple months, but thankfully, the dust is settling and I am coming out with only a few scrapes and a lot of lessons learned. 

For My first post back, I'll keep it simple. Check out this super cool wall sconce. You know I love a good sconce. Stepping into DecoTech, Andrei combines state-of-the-art design with the manipulation of indirect and direct lighting. Designer Brian Rasmussen pays tribute to Andrei Tarkovsky's film Nostalghia by incorporating pleated mirrors that provide a fragmented reflection to the viewer. You know how much I love mirrors and reflective surfaces. Available as a sconce, floor lamp, or chandelier. You can find it here. 

Wabi Sabi

I recently came across this book and it has opened up a whole new concept to me. The wabi-sabi aesthetic comes to us from ancient Japan. It is centered on the idea that nothing is permanent, nothing is perfect and nothing is ever finished. Wabi-sabi "occupies roughly the same position in the Japanese pantheon of aesthetic values as do the Greek ideals of beauty and perfection in the West." Andrew Juniper claims, "if an object or expression can bring about, within us, a sense of serene melancholy and a spiritual longing, then that object could be said to be wabi-sabi."

Characteristics of the wabi-sabi aesthetic include asymmetry, asperity, simplicity, modesty, intimacy, and suggest a natural process.

When looking at actual wabi-sabi objects, I must admit, i don't like them very much. I do, however, LOVE the concept of findign beauty in the imperfect, the transient and the unfinished. 

Mock-ups to Generate Ideas

Mock-up 1 Escavara - by Christopher Grace on Polyvore.com

Dining Room Mock-up - by Christopher Grace on Polyvore.com

A Soft Spot for Neon

Being from Miami, I have a soft spot for palms, stucco and neon among other things. I found these amazing lamps made out of neon tubes by Roger Borg. I would love to have one of these. His philosophy is that  there is no longer a need for an interior bulb.  "The bulb is the shape.  The shape is the light."

In other news, this past weekend I redid these two darling plant stands that D.D. and I found one night coming home drunk. I painted the wire frame an ivory cream color and had new tops made for them out of a bright orange see-through plastic. They look fantastic! I wish I could post pictures, but my camera died and I need to wait until I can get another one. 

Further Thoughts on the White House

As I am sure many of you are, I have Inauguration on the brain. I've been thinking a lot about the new first family and what they represent. I have also, of course, been slightly obsessed with the history of the White House. I read a great article in the American Museum Association's January issue explaining the history of the White House and how it was only fairly recently (thanks to Jackie) that the White House and it's contents were treated as a Museum. Since the Kennedy administration, the White House has been  a living museum with unique curatorial challenges. These challenges are mainly the fact that the house keeps changing as it's occupants change and most first ladies take it upon themselves to make the house reflect their personal tastes, the image they wish to project and the physical requirements of their families (Teddy Roosevelt had six kids living in the house!). Another challenge is that the furnishings and rooms are in constant use with continual wear and tear. 

The interiors of the White House have passed through three distinct phases and made a full circle, from neoclassicism to Victorian and then back to a consciously revived neoclassicism after 1902. Before 1961, the furnishings of the previous administrations had simply been removed, sold or thrown away, without any attempt at preservation of the house's history. Most of the original furnishings were sold at auction by Chester A. Arthur to finance the Victorian redecoration of the mansion. When Mrs. Kennedy moved into the house it was decorated in mostly governmental department store furniture circa 1948 (eek!) and she sought to revive the old house and place it back on the map of noteworthy design. She also realized the importance of trying to regain the original furnishings of the house and created the post of White House Curator to assist her in the task. For the first time in it's history, any furnishings or objects that entered the doors of the White House became part of the permanent collection. No longer could President's and their wives dispose of furniture and objects in the house, they are now removed to a secure off-site storage facility for preservation and cataloguing.  

Thanks to Jackie, the White House now has one of the most impressive decorative arts collections in the world. The focus is on American furnishings and decorative arts from 1800 to 1825, the Federal Period. The aim is not to create "period" rooms, as Jackie once said, but rather elegant, usable rooms that enhance the sense of American history. First Ladies have the entire collection at their disposal when redecorating the White House. What a dream! to have all ofthat historical furniture to mix in with contemporary pieces! In short, I LOVE JACKIE, well I mean, what she did was ensure that even though the White House is in constant flux, reflecting the politics, interests, tastes and composition of the president's families, she ensured that all of the objects would receive museum-like care, scholarly seriousness and would be preserved in a permanent collection. 

My previous post sounded very disdainful towards the rumored interior designer that Mrs. O might be using but now that I have read more about how the interiors of the White House work, I like the idea that the Obamas will be leaving their imprint on the history of our nation's house. 

White House Redecorating

The online design world is abuzz with rumors that designer Michael S. Smith has been tapped by the fabulous Mrs. O to redo some of the rooms in the White House. Take a look at his portfolio and share your thoughts. My thoughts are - safe, expensive, conservative (is that the same as safe?) yet trying to be "with it" by injecting modern art, "ethnic" pieces, and Buddah statues - In short, everything you would expect from somebody meant to redecorate the White House in a faux edgy way. (vomit!) 

Knots & Knitting

Check out this new line of interior seating by Bauke Knottnerus called Phat Knits. These can be very cool for a lounge or TV room. Anywhere really, where casual seating and flexibility are key. As soon as I saw them I thought of D.D. and his love of knitting. I love the massive gray threads - the largest could work as an individual chair and with a few carefully selected pillows the other would make a fabulously squishy sofa.