Design Public

Lately I’ve been a bit bored with design, in the sense that I’ve felt oversaturated with it. I read too many design blogs, I receive too many design magazines, I have too many gorgeous design books. At least that’s how I was feeling before the holidays. Now that we are into boring January and I’m laid up with a headcold, I’ve been able to peruse all my glossies at my leisure without guilt, enjoying and studying the beautiful spaces (BTW, I stopped counting at 6 hand or foot sculptures and countless Suzanis - in fact, it became a challenge to find an issue without a suzani in it).

Sometimes a space just jumps out at you as just right. Although everyone and their brother seems to have a Saarinen tulip table and these wonderful chairs from DWR, this eating area is just right. I love the colors, the funky, unique, vintage-looking light fixture , and the amazing framed piece of vintage wallpaper framed from floor-to ceiling. How great to pull up a crazy modern paisley upholstered bench up to the round table. They shot is styled to casual-looking perfection. Bravo and thanks to Metropolitan Home, photographer John Ellis and Interior Designer Sasha Emerson!
photograph from Metropolitan Home Dec 07, photographed by John Ellis.

I’ve been on a total Woody Allen kick lately, most recently catching Manhattan. It started me thinking about directors who make the city a star in a movie. Who do you think does it best? Here’s a short list for me:

Woody Allen and New York City, in most of his movies:

Also, Woody and London in Match Point: (more…)

Do you have something that holds a permanent spot on your inspiration board, that has helped your ideas flow for years and years? I loved this charming piece on the author Douglas Coupland in Sunday’s New York Times. It figures that the author who captured the zeitgeist of Generation X and the technology bubble (Microserfs - personally I liked that one better, maybe because I am a member of Gen X, I don’t know), chose this cusp-of-the-eighties postcard from Fiorucci 1979. It did seem a sign of everything that was to come, and it affected Coupland so deeply that he dumped science for art then and there. I don’t think a postcard has ever done that much for me, but I do know that are quite a few images from bulletin boards that seem to make the cut during every clean-out and every move. Care to share yours?

photo from Bayne Stanley for The New York Times 

Remember when I told you about Rebar’s PARK(ing) Day last year?  This year, it has continued to spread nationwide here in the states and even oversees (the above photo is from London in 2006). PARK(ing) day will take place on on September 21st.

Have you checked out Vanessa De Vargas’s post at Turquoise about the showhouse she and her pal Jordan Cappella re-decorated? It is absolutely sumptuous! The house is Jennifer Siegel’s OMD Showhouse, a 12′x 60′ pre-fab, portable house the currently sits on Abbot Kinney in Venice California. Thanks to Vanessa and Jordan, it is full of genius interior design moves.

Here is the house heading over to its temporary foundation:

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“The wine cellar holds 700 bottles!”

“That will only hold half of my collection.”

I have to admit, while blog-hopping around this morning I had VH-1’s Really Rich Real Estate on in the background, and I’m hooked. This show is a mix of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, Cribs, and a how to be real estate millionaire infomercial. Basically, they follow the Westside Estate Agency real estate agents as they list homes and try to find homes for their clients. The clients are where the fun comes in:
1) A rocker from Lit whose Hollywood Hills house dream is demolished by his wife, who has to remind him that having a 20′ railing-less drop off to the pool doesn’t mix well with having a three year old.

2) Some huge developer trying to buy the last hilltop in Beverly Hills from some Saudi royalty. Apparently his $30 million offer was just an insignificant drop in the bucket to them - they didn’t even bother to counter.

3) Master P (I think he’s worth a couple hundred million bucks) looking to find all the best modern amenities, like a custom TV that comes out from under the bed. I don’t think having a flat screen under one’s bed is very feng shui…

4) Speaking of feng shui, the most entertaining client to watch was Ileana Douglas, who brings a feng shui advisor named Carol with her. As I watched her agent Max Shapiro (clad in a crappy T-shirt and jeans (more…)

I recently had a chat with Mark Cutler, an L.A. interior designer who is able to create beautiful spaces for a range of clients, including quite a few celebrities. Mark doesn’t let trends push him around or influence his vision, and he spends a lot of time getting to know his clients to assess their needs in order to personalize their homes.

Describe your design philosophy. How has it developed over the years? Who/What/Where have inspired you the most?

My design philosophy is summed up in the phrase “the luxury of simplicity”. (more…)

I love picking up the Thursday NYTimes, and today I actually remembered to do so before they sold out.  There are Thursday Styles, the Arts, and House and Home sections, and let’s face it, world events are too depressing to read about these days. I’ve been posting about efforts to preserve modern architecture lately, and it sounds like Michael Govan, the new director of the L.A. County Museum of Art is looking to do his part. He wants to “collect siginificant pieces of midcentury residential architecture, including houses by Rudolf M. Schindler, Richard Neutra, Frank Lloyd Wright and his son Lloyd Wright, and to treat them as both museum objects and as residences for curators.” Click here for the full article. The photo on the left is the Gehry House, Frank’s ongoing experiment with planes and materials. (Every time I have seen that image in a slide I’ve giggled and though “I bet his neighbors just LOOOOOVE that one…they’d probably rather have the neighbor with the cars on block and old rusty fridges in the front yard.”)

Over in the House and Home Section, there was an interesting article about reclaiming old growth wood from structures in Thailand: (more…)

I have been obsessed with Eichler ever since that book I already told you about arrived from Amazon the other day. While I was surfing around trying to find modern houses for you to tour, I came across the Eichler Network website. This is a fantastic source for all Eichler fans and for those who want to help keeps his ideas and existing neighborhoods alive. The site includes real estate for sale, the house doctor (full of helpful renovation tips), chats, and breaking news.

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This week’s photo comes to us from Beth Herzhaft , a professional photographer in L.A. who is new to our flickr group .  This photo really made me laugh - it’s called "an uneasy truce."  I’m not sure which one of these patterns is waving the white flag, as they seem equally, ahem, strong.

I contacted Beth to see where in the world this was taken, and it is from a hotel in Palm Springs (my guess was Reno).  She says of her work "what I seek to do in my urban and suburban landscape work is to reveal in a poetic manner things we so often take for granted or ignore.  I am not at all interested in the generic ‘beautiful’ images or in the ‘decisive moment.’ Instead, I inhabit the space between ironic and heroic imagery."

For more of Beth’s photos, check them out here. I am looking forward to learning more about how Beth lives and what her space is like in an upcoming customer profile.