A work hazard

So, I am posting a link to something I found on the web.  I LOVE IT.  Yes, I am yelling.  I don't watch much tv, but one of the inevitable work hazards of what I do that comes about when watching tv is that I have to layout the floor plan of the sets in my head.  That is quite a confession to "layout" there in the public domain.  So, right here: FantasyFloorPlans.com, I have found to scale layouts of the sets of my favorite tv shows.

There were a couple discoveries like the Friend's apartment that I absolutely knew and still could picture, but I had not gotten a handle on the new Don Draper and Megan Manhattan apartment.  Well, lookie there, what do we have but that new Manhattan digs!  I also, still had vague areas when it came to Carrie Bradshaw's apartment in Sex and the City, but lo and behold, all of those areas, closets and all were laid to rest from the same site.  They even have Frasier's space, what a piece of post modern crap that is!  And, they have the Sopranos Jersey, stuck in the '80's, nouveau riche abode that would simply make me cringe every time I watched the show.  I would always hope that there wouldn't be a scene in the house, because it was so bad.   

The lady does it the old fashioned way, drafting by hand with ink on vellum.  I like that!  I want her to do the giant Downton Abbey house!  It isn't on there yet, but I bet she is working on it, but maybe I'll drop her a line and mention it so she can get busy!

fantasyfloorplans.com

Let's Get Personal

Monday I am going to give a five minute talky thing at Grange showroom in Denver for their Runway to Room themed cocktail event.  Thank you Liz for inviting me to take on a subject that I hold dear to me.  Lizzie, an amazing stylist, from Etcetera is showing their spring line of stylish togs and I am going to talk about the connection between fashion and home decorating.  Obvs, right?  Well, kind of...

Anyone can look through history and see that certain things trickle down or over to the home furnishing market.  In the past it was a bit harder to track, because these were the pre-internet years people.  And now that gap has been closed significantly, of course. We all scope out what is new and exciting on the runway within hours of the couture shows posting the latest and greatest shots.  I love that Jezebel.com posts the most highly anticipated shows on their website almost as soon as the runway closes.  You can get a down and dirty look at what you think the trends will be before the mags start their dictation of what we should adhere to.

So we of course have the Armani line that has moved itself into home fashion, as well as Calvin Klein, all preceded by Pierre Cardin in the happenin' '70s.  Smart move considering the home industry is a 700 billion dollar market, even with recession... So here we are, we can talk about Rodarte doing fabrics for Knoll, we can discuss how certain colors are seen on the runway and then in the home.  We can argue about the hippest styles whether they are modern or not and how we have seen them evolve into home "apparel".  But here is the key for me.

When it comes to fashion I know what I like, how it will suit me and what kind of image it will hopefully project.  I know when I might die if I do not acquire the new Louboutins I just saw at Neimans.  I knew when I saw Dior's reissue of the Samouri 1947 handbag that I would literally expire if I did not acquire it for a very significant birthday.  We all have stories like this in some form or another, right?  So, we know who we are when we are dressing ourselves.  We all have our standard uniforms that identify our style at a basic level.  So, humor me here for a sec while I go all Oprah on you, but, when we are dressed and done up properly, not uber fancy but we have taken the time to pick the outfit with care and out and about I feel like I do better.  I am more successful at whatever I am trying to complete that day.  We tend to feel better about ourselves when we look good. Period.

 Do you hear the angels singing as you look at this?

 So, shouldn't we feel this way when we come home at night after a crappy day as we enter our abode?  The same care should be applied to your home as you do when you dress for the day.  Trust when I say I have my share of Target Go International finds that are awesome with my Dior bag or Manolo shoes.  It is about knowing your style.  There is amazing stuff out there that is old, new, cheap, expensive, and off the hook just for you.  Again, it is easily understood that of course this is the way it should be, however, is it the way it is?

About 10 years ago I was really debating if I wanted to continue in this career, I felt what I was doing wasn't curing cancer and was quite shallow.  Stunned aren't you, considering how much I love design.  I had several years of trying to find the value in what I did.  I joined charitable groups affiliated with design.  I gave back to the community when I could, and I still wasn't feeling very fulfilled.  I continued on while the low grade hum of pathetic-ness buzzed in the back of my head.  I had a client that I dearly loved (still do) and when we were done with their massive renovation and decorating project (that got blasted both nationally and locally) the client cured my ill.  His career helps solve our worlds ecological issues.  He is at the forefront of working on global solutions to our earth's problems.  He told me that what we did for his home changed how he went out into the world to do his job! There it was, and when I listened to what the clients said about the work I was doing in their homes what was coming back to me were similar stories.  We were doing work that affected them personally and how they interacted with their world.  It made their world a better place to live as well as those who interacted with them.

There it is, how can you change your environment on the micro level?   How can you make yourself happier in your home and have it translate to the world?  What does that look like to you? You know your personal style, the same should be said of your home.  Your home is one of your most intimate reflections of you, it should be individualized to you.  What describes you: Stylish, elegant sophisticated, comfortable etc. and where does that fall in the scope of reality?

This is where you return to at the end of the day, where you land to recharge.  The day is brushed off, forgotten and you are renewed.  Shouldn’t this part of your life reflect the same care you take with your individual demeanor?  While the fashion element we are talking about totally trickles down in obvious stylistic ways it is also a more familiar translation to ourselves than home fashion.  I think the personal knowledge of how we would like to live is more difficult to express and under explored, but more intriguing on many levels.
  
PS, I had a client say they wanted to taste a fabric this week!  I think I have found a friend for life!

Here I am.

Here I am.

I have been very busy lately.  Most of this has been a heavy dose of Spring-itis.  Being from a very warm climate during my formative years leaves me cold come January and incredibly understanding to bears and their winter habits.  While I can't say I have done anything productive other than work, I can say I have been really enjoying the color green.  Outside.  Away from my computer.  I have been studying and contemplating.

The guilt I rack up over non-accomplishment is quite massive (thank you Catholic upbringing), so I am pleased to say my brain has been very busy thinking about all sorts of things - design related and otherwise.

1.  Crime.  I had a terrible person steal money from me for a client's order several years ago.  I found her recently, as the arrest warrant is about to run out - oh yes, a 5K theft is not worthy of a renewal of an arrest warrant, in case you were wondering... and she is not arrested yet.  And wanted to post terrible, horrible things about her.  I held off.  Not sure why, I may still go off on a tangent, let me explore the legality of that.

2.  Terrible design.  Oh, now here I cannot even elaborate, as it would cause a local stir, and I am trying really hard not to be bitchy, however I have been thinking (thinking: ha! Eating at my soul is more like it.) about it.

3.  Neuroses.  Uh, do you have a year?  Me either.

4.  I want a peacock.  Really.  I don't care if they are loud, I have been priming the neighbors for 18 months with chicken noise.  Do they lay eggs?  Are they delicious?  I love peacock noise, between growing up with them in my area of Phoenix and my brother super-perfecting the call in a Phoenix mall throughout my teenage years - hey - I am ready.

5.  My temper.  WOW (!) raging here.   Is this what happens when a girl who learned "White Gloves and Party Manners" as a child hits 40+.  I secretly like raging.  HA!  I only dole it out as needed...

6.  Love: I have had some sort of epiphany when it comes to the kids and Em.  Cannot get enough of it or them.  I see it in a whole new way.

7.  I am tired of being bored.  Em said when I was in China working on the Jack and Christine Project that I was like an animal let out of a cage.  I got another taste in New York.  Dear God, I am bored out of my skull, someone please let me roam and do something really exciting.  I am starving here people!

So, hopefully I will do more in the next several weeks.  I guess I figure if you are reading this you are in it for the long haul so you will put up with the reality of me and where I am.  This is how I do what I do, even when I am annoying myself.

xoxoxo,
L

Fruition

I do love the process of design.  I get so inspired by so many things, when a project comes in the door, whether it is new or a continuation, my brain just starts to hum.  This week I am beginning a bathroom for a client I have done work for in the past and I am completing a basement remodel for a new client.  The previous three weeks have been spent working on some very creative proposals for new and very interesting out of state clients.  So, you aren't here to read about how I schedule my days, but for me the timing of these things has crystallized what is so appealing to me about the creative process.

First, I had weeks spent sitting in my head, sketching, searching, viewing and then putting it into a plan.  I love Virginia Woolf and have read her biography on several occasions.  I relate to her search for the perfect words, the structure of the sentence and then its context within the story.  I see that within my work.  That effort to make the concept harmonious while being interesting.    The concept growing up around me, it is so exciting to see that development, it comes from my head but there is still a level of detachment that has to be in place to ensure a cohesiveness.  An insurance policy that the client's vision is in place. A natural symbiosis if you will.

Then, upon returning from presenting this out of state project, I jumped into a new idea and completed another at the same time.  While this timing isn't exactly new to me, I have been breaking new ground on how I look at the development of a concept from beginning to end. Engagement at this level has yanked my head in so many new directions that the relationships between beginnings and endings have taken on a new perspective.

 The Coral Room, Denver

This basement completion has come together beautifully all the pieces cogently connected.  Getting there can be a hard wrought battle.  Designing space while selecting finishes and furnishings is of course how it should be done.  Seeing it come together seamlessly and months later is a whole other ballgame.  You typically know whether or not the design will hold together.  You know when a project is weak and when it is "fine" (as a good friend likes to say) and you know when you have something exceptionally strong.  However the magic that makes a project exceptional is always a bit of surprise.  Like a well earned exhale with a smile at the end.

I love the talk that Elizabeth Gilbert gives on Ted.com on the Daemon of Genius.  I really relate to that understanding of the daemon not really being mine.  It is something we are blessed with and should be thankful for, the muse that can choose to leave at any time.  Knowing that I am not the genius takes some of the pressure off too, the next design can be as good or better than the previous best. Whew!  Well as long as I am properly appreciating the muse and she wants to continue her visits.

Now I head into the new.  The small quietly elegant bath.  The bath that, because of its size, will challenge how it all comes together since you see every inch in one glance.  The client has already pushed me further than I thought we would go, not in a bad way, just in their sublime utterly understated request of pure white simplicity.  Sort of ubiquitous in a bath right?  Ah, but how to make it not so, therein lies the rub...off I go.

So there it is, finding the new, finishing the old which are really one in the same.  Each piece of the puzzle must be crafted and made and then put into the frame of the whole.  It must be beautiful and cogent and constructable. Lately I have been listening to Mariachi El Bronx, I bought it when it came out in the fall of '09, however it did not go into heavy rotation until several weeks ago when I started working on the new Cabrito.  The punk band Bronx did a mariachi album, it is in English and decidedly modern, the lyrics are sly and humorous.  The mix of the modern and traditional has really struck me, not to mention their innate talent.  I love how they created a new thing with the old style, their inspiration brought to fruition.  Hopefully, there will be a new Brooklyn, Cabrito and I can show you my combo of traditional gritty Mexican design combined with rubber coated modern Pueblo Deco.  I think I just exploded a brain cell or two.

 I have trained myself over time to see most inspiring visuals as usable material (hello, how many of you have seen the late Alexander McQueen's new fall collection?  Get on that!), then I can pull what I want or need and discard the rest.  Whatever visual candy I can feed myself that keeps me moving is my inspiration.  I now have a visual of the shark who cannot stop swimming or he will drown.  There I am, on the hunt for the visually stimulating inspiration that I can then take to completion (Jaws music plays in the background, quietly fading off).

Psychic Interior Design for Fun and Pleasure

I have been out of town for the last several days, a couple days into my trip I really wanted to post a new blog but didn't have time.  I have been percolating a new thought...  I think this is a good sign that I liked writing that last post!

So, at my office I have a box that contains random things I love.  The box holds furniture photos and tear sheets, certain fabrics and leathers, color chips, accessories, chunks of stone, pieces of trim and wallpaper samples.  What is unusual about this? Most designers have samples of product they like to use in their office, their mini library, a derivation and compendium of the showrooms they like to visit and product they like to use.  I have those samples too, but this lidded box sits away from the other samples.  The contents within the box are my absolute favorite things.  I save these things for years,  I squirrel them away because when I find one of those things I know it belongs to a client I have not met yet. 

It is funny how I find these future components of someone's bedroom or living room.  I am usually looking for something else entirely, and suddenly there, out of the corner of my eye I spot a gem.  I always know it when I see it that it belongs to a project but I am not sure of just where or when it will land. 

In the beginning I would try and make it fit into whatever project I had going on currently.  The client would never select that element, in fact they steered themselves far away from it.  I would be frustrated because I could see how fantastic this piece was, couldn't they?  So then I would put that piece away, into my box of perfection, so that at least I could appreciate it properly.  You know, stare at it on a rainy day like old photos.  Nutty.

I can't remember how it came to me the first time, that I suddenly knew where one of these elements belonged, but there it was.  The tile sample I had been holding onto for 18 months belonged in a client's home and I knew where it was going to go, I mean I really knew!  I pulled out the sample, and next stop was the client's bathroom floor.  Designer psychic.

When I have one of these moments it is really inspiring.  It doesn't happen with every client.  In fact, when it does manifest it is because the client is open to the possibilities and allows it to happen.  I have several clients that I have known over the years whose homes are filled with these things.  One especially amazing client, she must have done something very good in a past life because her home design karma has given her the most amazing project I have ever composed.  Every single element was divinely wrought.  Her window coverings are legendary.  I know you all will want to see pictures once it is photographed.

Some of these pieces fall away.  Without ever knowing who the client was or what happened, I can look at my stash of treats and know that this or that can now be retired from its place in the box.

Really cool pot I found in Mexico with random words etched

into the body, top to bottom.

Oh, to taste beauty!

I have been dreading starting a blog. I am not a writer. I am told over and over that I write how I speak. Teachers hated it, I assumed it was bad. And, here I am to write about my passion (besides my kids and my Emmett) Interior Design. I make no promises on how often I will post, I will however make my best effort.

Half the battle has been what in the world would the first post be about. Then, today, it hit me like a brand new antique velvet that comes in modern colors (Lee Jofa has the best). Objects I can imagine eating. How to explain. One of my good friends who is a great client has the same cravings. We were showing her wallpaper for her powder room, I will load a photo, and she says. "Yes, this one, I just want to lick it!" And I thought to myself, I know what she means! I see a great vase (shown below) and it strikes me. It moves me. The texture, the shape and form and I can almost taste it.

It happens often, the visceral charge of wanting to taste the beauty. I feel the aesthetic quality so deeply in my skin that eating whatever it is is absolutely fathomable.

I remember nibbling an Avon lip gloss in tutti frutti flavor ( I was probably 7 mind you) that was shaped like a root beer float while watching the Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Every time I watched that movie after that I could smell and taste that Avon lip gloss. I think this is where it began.

Where does this come from, Who knows, who cares, I like it.

 Schumacher Shulu Chinois in Lacquer
Hung in Jennifer Potts Powder Room,
Hi Jenn!

Maybe I will post from time to time, objects I want to eat, and you, who have read this will not think I am completely insane. You know, you could send me objects that do the same for you, that would be fun!