Happy New Year - Lucky 13!

Wishing you all a healthy and prosperous 2013!

Happy decorating,

Design Tip Tuesday - Artwork Arranging

When I'm styling a space and need some art to decorate with, I don't immediately turn to paintings or framed prints - I try to think outside the box as well as always keep in mind the client and what they're tastes are and what they enjoy doing (or have done).

Image Via abode love

Art can be a beautiful painting that speaks to you, a photo that takes you back to a certain place or an object that holds special meaning to you. Art is anything that makes you happy and stirs an emotion within. Keep an open mind about what art can be.

To me, a perfectly decorated room is one that tells the story about my client, and nothing does this better in a room than the accessories - artwork included. I often try to incorporate objects that are special to clients onto the wall ... perhaps I'll frame an object that has sentimental meaning to them or incorporate the object onto the wall even without being framed - a hat perhaps hanging on the wall. 

Whatever you decide to place on the wall, unless you have an entire wall dedicated as a gallery, you need to hang your art in relation to the room’s surroundings. You don't have to necessarily match art to your furnishings, but make sure they relate and create a connection - either by subject matter, style or colour to create a unity. 

Image via Brabourne

Match the shape of the art to the shape of a wall – hang vertical art and groupings on vertical wall spaces and horizontal art and groupings on horizontal wall spaces.

Image via Little Things

Art over the fireplace should be sized to fill from 2/3 to the full width of the mantel – do not extend mantel art beyond the mantel’s width and art less than 1/2 the width of the mantel will look too small proportionately.

Image via House and Home

Art should be no higher than 5″ to 9″ from the back of a sofa or chair or the top of a table in order for the furniture and art to read as a visual unit. A single piece of art or a grouping of art should ideally cover approximately 2/3 of the width of the furniture it hangs over. In order for the proportion of the art installation to work well with the furniture it should never be wider than the furniture and never less than half its width – aim for 2/3.

Hang art to increase the visual weight of a piece of furniture. If you have a bookshelf that is tall and a bit narrow, hang art on both sides to increase its visual width. If more height is needed on a wall, top a piece of furniture with a piece of art.

Image via decorpad

Create groupings in which the individual art pieces relate to one another in terms of subject, colour, material, or framing. For example, don’t mix colour and black and white photographs in the same grouping – stick with one or the other. If grouping floral images arrange them so the colour is balanced throughout the installation.

Image via time worn

When hanging multiple pieces make sure the frames are the same or complement each other well.

Image via ipo Pinterest

Hope these quick art tips inspire you to create some great 'art' walls in your homes!

Happy decorating!

Monday Muse - Grohe Ladylux Faucet

Being an interior design professional I'm constantly being asked about my favourite products, so I thought it would be a neat weekly feature - my weekly product muse if you will.

So, for my first Monday muse, I thought I would introduce you to my favourite faucet.

Meet LadyLux. 

Beautiful, yes. A work horse, yes.

Grohe as a name has been around for years - since 1911 as Berkenhoff & Paschedag and since 1936 as Grohe. And there is a reason this company has been around so long - quality. They put out a super product and a warranty that leaves you feeling confident in your purchase.

Made of professional quality stainless steel it looks and feels like a top of the line product - but to me the most impressive part of this faucet is the pullout hand spray that is weighty in hand and boasts a tension spring that allows the hose to glide smoothly and retract easily.

One of my pet peeves is a faucet that feels cheap - and the majority of the pull out sprays available at big box stores have a plastic hose pull out that is awkward to pull out and feed back. Who has time to fiddle with that?

The LadyLux is my personal favourite for kitchens. It's always at the top of my mind when I spec for a kitchen. The price tag may be a bit more than most are used to spending on a faucet - but its worth every penny. It always amazes me that clients will reno their kitchen to a cost of $50k plus and when it comes down to the faucets (usually at the end of a project when the budget has taken a bit of a beating) they try to cut corners. It's an instrument in your kitchen that will be used daily - many times a day - it needs to stand up to the wear and tear. If you cheap out, you'll be reminded of it every time you turn on that tap.

If you know me you know that I'm a form girl - but function is never far from my mind. In some cases form takes the lead over function, but in the case of a faucet, function trumps form. It's much more important for this type of item to be functional rather than beautiful. But, luckily in this case, the form is quite appealing too!

Grohe sales offices can be found in throughout the world and production plants in Germany, Canada, 
Thailand and Portugal.

Do you have a favourite kitchen faucet?

Happy decorating!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hi everyone!
It's officially Autumn and nothing makes it feel like Autumn more than Thanksgiving weekend. The leaves are all changing colours - beautiful reds, oranges and yellows - the days are sunny and crisp - my favourite time of year!

Hope you're all enjoying your Thanksgiving weekend with family and friends!

Happy decorating!
Lenore

Thank You Mr. Jobs ...

On the one year anniversary of Steve Jobs, I thought I'd repost then entry I did on his death. Also, here's the video Apple has shared for the anniversary.

 

Thank you Steve.

Steve Jobs. I’m sure the name is familiar. The world lost a truly genius man - extremely creative and ahead of everyone else. In the last few days a lot has been written about this man. I have taken the opportunity to read many of the articles to get to know the man behind that famous icon - the apple.

As I suspected, the reason I didn’t know much about him was because he was truly a private person - but during his 2005 Stanford commencement address, we were offered a sneak peek into the life of the man that spearheaded everything behind that icon.

Below is his address

"I am honoured to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College [Portland, Oregon] after the first six months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned Coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the seven miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and sans serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But 10 years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something – your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky – I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz [Steve Wozniak] and I started Apple in my parents' garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2bn company with over 4,000 employees. We had just released our finest creation – the Macintosh – a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling-out. When we did, our board of directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down – that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologise for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me – I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over. I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the world's first computer-animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful-tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, some day you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "no" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7.30 in the morning and it clearly showed a tumour on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for "prepare to die". It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumour. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful, but purely intellectual, concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life. It is life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but some day not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And, most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called the Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors and Polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of the Whole Earth Catalog, and then, when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words "Stay hungry. Stay foolish". It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay hungry. Stay foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you. Stay hungry. Stay foolish.

Thank you all very much.”

What a beautiful speech ... I think that we can all learn from him and his address ... my favourite part is the following ...

“...Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And, most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary...”

As someone who runs two businesses, this snapshot from his address is very meaningful and inspiring. 

This man is truly behind a lot of what I have accomplished professionally. Twenty years ago I began using a Macintosh - the LCII. It was so exciting to be doing layout electronically at the time. After that I moved on to the Mac 8500, then the eMac, then the MacBookPro, then the iMac (which is what I still use today). I have always been able to rely on my Macs - unlike PC’s that would come and go in my life, the Mac never let me down. I haven’t touched a PC in over ten years and know that I will always be able to count on my trusty Apple products.

The Mac revolutionized the way that graphic designers could work, making layouts easier to create and type setting a work of art. Today I continue to create all of my corporate and personal graphic work as well as my space planning plans on the mac. I run two business with it - create quotes, samples, invoices ... anything needed to operate a business. It continues to make tasks easier and work a pleasure.

Along with my professional life, my personal life relies heavily on everything Steve Jobs has created. My trusty iPad accompanies me everywhere and keeps track of all of my personal contacts, photos and any other information I want handy. My iPhone never leaves my side - and in my opinion - no other ‘smartphone’ even comes close to what this little machine can do along with how beautifully it can do it.

Thank you Steve Jobs ... you won’t be forgotten.

Interior Design - A Designers Tool Bag

Every interior professional has their own set of trade tools and today I thought I'd do a fun post and show you some of the things I use on a daily basis - hope you enjoy!

Big Work Surface

My desk, while big, never seems large enough. Although I consider myself to be an extremely organized and tidy individual, my desk never seems to convey this. Once I'm into a project - it completely takes over my work surface - it's no wonder I'm always losing my phone beneath the piles of papers, samples and books!

Coffee

To stay and to go! Especially needed when budgeting and trying to stay on top of the daily paperwork that unfortunately goes along with what I do - I much prefer the creative side. 

View

A good view is essential to inspiration - this is mine daily (Toronto looking South/East) from my desk and on the road too!

Computer

My trusty Apple computers have been my business partners since I began designing (a long time ago). Today it's my 27" iMac - great for multitasking on screen. When I'm on the go, my iPad fills in. 

Paper

Notebooks filled with project notes and inspiration are always in my hand, no matter where I am. Projects are kept in files - white of course, and in office on clipboards hanging on the wall for easy access by anyone to quickly jump in and take over. 

Music

I just couldn't possibly work without music in the background - selection changes daily depending on my mood. Lately there's been a mixture of Daughtry, Ricky Martin and Kenny Chesney - I know, eclectic right?

Writing Instruments

Pens, markers and highlighters are constantly strewn across my desk - as most of you know, the G-Tec is my absolute favourite pen - there's nothing like it in my opinion. For quick/rough sketches and drawings I reach for a .3 or .5 black ink marker - highlighters are used in my notes as reminders.

 

CAD Tools

Floor Plans and Elevation Drawings are completed mostly with CAD tools. I love it because its an add on to Adobe Illustrator which I've been using since school (about 20 years). Makes dimensioning and scaling a breeze with the added drawing features of Illustrator.

Number Tools

A measuring tape is always at my side when planning, sourcing and on site. Stanley tends to be my favourite but I have a few 'prettier' ones that I use from time to time. A calculator is always useful for budgeting and converting.

Reference Materials

I'm a major book lover. I have dozens of books - on design mainly - I never tire of looking at them and am always eager to get my hands on the latest one. And I can very often be found at my local library researching and signing out more. (Love that I can manage holds and requests on-line these days.)

Photographic Equipment

My large Canon is great for capturing finished rooms and finished custom furniture. My smaller Canon is handy to have in my purse to snap a photo of something I'm sourcing. And my iPhone is used when I want to send a snap of something that could be perfect for a project to an assistant or client for quick approval. Also always handy to capture inspiration and the canvas being worked on.

Phone

Ahhh ... my iPhone. Don't get me started on this - there is no better phone - I'll stop here. Keeps me connected in every way and backing up to my iMac and iPad is a breeze thanks to iCloud!

Glasses

What can I say, I need them daily.

Markers

They make my CAD drawings come to life and help to pull a colour concept together - I'm a fan of Prismacolor - guess it's due to the fact that it's what I was trained with.

 Templates

I have a template for everything - it's the compulsive organizer in me. My budget template keeps things on budget and ensures nothing gets forgotten when procuring.

  

Swatches

Fabric swatches and  paint chips help to pull a colour scheme together and create the direction and mood for a space. I get lost in paint chips and even more so in fabric samples. Right now I'm loving all the traditional patterns done in modern and contemporary ways. And as for paint colours - any grey with a mauve undertone is working for me.

Bag and File Case

I spend a big part of my week on the road meeting with suppliers, sourcing and seeing clients. And there is a lot I need with me - so, my oversized leather bag is big enough to throw everything into and chic enough to not look like a 'work bag'. My travel file case is always in my truck - it's the template thing again.

Flowers

And last but not least, something pretty. There is nothing better than getting to your desk to start a day with some pretty flowers next to you. Always makes me smile!

So, I hope you enjoyed my post on my daily tools - there are more, but these are the most used ones!

Happy decorating everyone!

Lenore

PS - We're posting daily decorating tips on our facebook page - Like it to receive them daily!

Highgate - Interior Design Closing Day! - Part One

Hi All!
I'm always asked what it's like to finish a room for a client and how we do it ... so, I decided to blog about it with visuals - it's not a glamorous day, but certainly rewarding in the end. There are a number of photos I want to share with you for this post, so I've decided to break it up into two entries. This one will feature the rooms before photos (provided by the client pre consultation) as well as the start of the closing day photos.

First off ... the before photos ...

Closing days are always bustling with activity - from installations, to deliveries, to set up, it's definitely hectic. It involves packing my truck and assistant's car with all the accessories and props. Draperies and hardware are also packed with us because drapery installation is usually one of the first things done on this day - and we don't want to be waiting for them to be delivered.

Props and accessories area ... yes, it's messy - always best to close when the client isn't home - this can be scary for some!

Drapery hardware goes up...

Drapes hung and rug in place...

Some furniture delivered and set up...

Starting to come together...

Now that all of the large pieces are delivered and in place, my assistant and I get to work on organizing all of the elements and placing accessories and props for the client's reveal.

Want to see the finished space? Check back soon for part two of this post which will feature all the afters and details.

Happy decorating!

Lenore