I don’t know about you, but I’m loving the weather this spring; while I dread the hot and sticky and brutal Atlanta summers, I do look forward to watching my herbs sprout from seeds and eating farm-fresh veggies. One now-classic favorite of mine is Edible Estates, which will have you looking at your yard with loads of new ideas.

I also look forward to fleeing north and hitting the New England coast as an escape. Even if you don’t have a dreamy beach house to decorate, it’s time to switch out that dark heavy quilt and throw pillows for some lighter textures and colors. Take some California seaside inspiration from Interior designer Tim Clarke’s recent release, Coastal Modern, is one of my favorite new books on the market. He presents a spare and uncluttered aesthetic that’s still warm and inviting.

Going across to the opposite coast, one of my new favorite coffee table books is Yankee Modern: The Houses of Estes/Twombly. These architects have such a great way of capturing the spirit of the vernacular architecture in a contemporary way when they are designing these beautiful homes.

Well, Sal may have been unjustly fired from Sterling Cooper (I wish he’d some back!), but the actor who played him, Bryan Batt, is not only running his chic New Orleans home boutique, but also wrote this fabulous book, Big Easy Style. It’s full of great style and wit, as Batt has a discerning eye and a killer sense of humor.

What’s on your coffee table at the moment? Please share your favorite design tomes in the comments section.

If you’re not already familiar with the amazing modern bedding from our friends at Area, then you should remedy that, pronto.  Area is a small independent company that creates products for the modern life.  They have an incredible line of furniture and bedding that is based on the modern Scandinavian concept of good design for everyday living.  Area started as a collection of screen-printed cotton duvet covers and has expanded immensely since their inception in 1990, and now they make a wide variety of products such as organic cotton sheets, linen duvets, and blankets made in baby alpaca.

I was able to speak with Area’s designer, Anki Spets, on the phone about a month ago and was struck by her dedication to a product that encompasses beauty, simplicity, modernity and practicality in design. Her talent for imbuing her products with both refined design sensibility and a human touch is what makes each collection truly distinctive.

Anki and I spoke about the most important place in the home – your bedroom.  A bedroom should feel comfortable and peaceful, and your bed is the place where that comfort begins.  I was recently researching Feng Shui for the bedroom and stumbled across an article which states “a ‘good looking’ and well-balanced bed is very important in creating a perfect feng shui bedroom. A good mattress, solid headboard and high quality sheets from natural fibers are also very important in creating harmonious feng shui energy.”

What does your bedroom, and namely your bed, look like?  Are you creating a peaceful environment for your mind and body to rest and recharge or do you have a mish-mash of bedding products that just make you look, well, confused?

Area wants to help you by offering one of our very lucky readers the chance to do a little spring cleaning in their bedroom, and give their bed a complete makeover. The winner of our giveaway will receive the following from Area - 1 fitted sheet, 1 flat sheet, 1 duvet cover, 1 blanket, 2  pillow cases, and 1 body pillow with insert.  That’s a value of over $1,000.

To celebrate, we’re also offering 15% off of Area’s new EDITH & SWEA lines which are both gorgeous and decadent.  Also, don’t let the giveaway stop you from purchasing something – if you win the contest and you’ve purchased the bedding, we will fully refund your money – so make sure you snatch it up now while it’s on sale!

Ready to enter – we have lots of ways to win!  See the entry form below — good luck!

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A couple of years ago on a work trip out to NYC I was booked into the Dream Hotel in Manhattan.  At the time, I had never heard of the hotel, but the girl who made my travel arrangements told me it was, and I quote, “A totally cool, modern, sorta trippy hotel” that I would love.  She was spot on – I photographed my way through the hotel to the point where my Facebook friends called a moratorium on hotel photos.  Well, it seems that Dream Hotels have recently expanded and now have a second location in Manhattan, this one even cooler than the original.

The building was designed in the 1960′s by Albert C. Ledner for the National Maritime Union, and is appropriately dotted with portholes.  The Dream Downtown was given it’s modern twist by the team at Handel Architects who decided to keep the portholes and incorporate other awesome features like the glass-bottom pool.

I particularly love the lobby lounge and garden walk which are outfitted with teak wood, and allow light in from the glass-bottomed pool above.

You’ll find the Marble Lane Restaurant sunken in the middle of the lobby, dotted with what seems like a never-ending supply of globe-shaped lights.

And then, there are the rooms.

I just love the incorporation of the portholes into the design of the room – every room is different and you’re not quite sure what you’re going to get.  I think I’d request a corner room like the first photo in the room section above to get as much light as possible!

What do you think of the Dream Downtown?  Would you stay here?

Photos 2, 4, and 5 courtesy of Bruce Damonte.

All other photos via the Dream Hotel.

Hey all, have you been poking around the web this week? What caught your eye? Did it bring up any big questions, other than “Is Jessica Simpson having quintuplets or what?!?!?!”? Let me know what you found (or what you wrote) in the comments section. Here are five things that I enjoyed this week.

Why I blog by Coffee with an Architect. Jody Brown is so witty and smart and takes all of the pompousness out of architecture. He takes it out, blows it up, and makes fun of it. It’s awesome. I loved his article about how and why he started doing it, which he wrote almost two months ago, but I’m just getting around to. Trust me, once you go “have coffee” with him, you won’t want to leave.

I was so entertained by the stream of consciousness inspiration over at Modern Sauce. It’s like reading e.e. cummings with pictures of cool stuff, and not worrying about having to write some lame high school paper about it later. Somehow it bounces from the title of a fan fiction writer’s bondage book title to ombre tights to Lisbeth Salander haircuts to modern buildings and it all just works.

image by Drew Kelly for Dwell

Anyone who checks in here at Hatch knows I have a cargotecture fetish. I have no idea why. This dude in Dwell has his home office in one, which is atop another one that serves as a bedroom suite, all inside his loft. Check out the entire slideshow over at Dwell.

The Designer Pad: I just really dig this blog. Love the layout, love the font, love the taste, love the little icons down the left side. It’s smart, it’s easy on the eyes and it is a nice way to take a little break from work each day. It even made me click on some super expensive air filter ad on the side, and I actually thought about buying it.

One of the toys that I remember most from my childhood was the awesome art easel that Santa brought me one year for Christmas.  On one side it was a dry-erase board, and on the other it was a chalkboard (where Santa left me a note, in his famous block handwriting). It was fabulous – one of the best presents that I ever received.

So, you can imagine that when I spotted the P’kolino Little Ones Art Easel here at Design Public, I found myself overcome with a little twinge of nostalgia. I immediately added it to the list of things I was planning to buy for my kids, pronto. I mean, c’mon – how great is this?

Thanks to our friends at P’kolino, Design Public will be the only place that you can find this easel in white.  Did I mention that you can also use the easel for puppet shows?  It even comes with two “coloring book scenes” that your kids can use as backdrops for their big production!  Oh, and it’s a complete steal at $89 and free shipping.

To celebrate this exclusive product, we also have two deals going on with P’kolino that you’ll only find at Design Public.  With the first option you’ll get 10% off of the Little Ones Table and Chairs (also in white) with the purchase of the easel.  Or, purchase the special deal that includes the Pkolino Little One’s Art Easel in white, the Little One’s Play Table and Chairs set in white, AND the Clothes Tree in White and you’ll get 10% off of the Table and Chairs and the Clothes Tree.

You really can’t go wrong with any of the products from the P’kolino line – I especially love the P’kolino Storage Chest with Chalkboard lid (hey – my kids like to color on everything already, so why not beat them at their own game!), the P’kolino Elephant Wall Easel, and the P’kolino Craft Table.

Like what you see?  Check out the entire P’kolino Line at Design Public.