Back to Design

Well, one of the reasons I haven't written this week is that I have been finishing a project I have been working on for a few months. My clients, a family with a set of adorable twins with a third on the way, renovated the front part of their home in an effort to return it to some sense of its farmhouse style roots. It was heinous! Someone had haphazardly (with an emphasis on the hazard part) done some handy work in the '70's including turning a porch into an extension of the Living Room, carpeting and all, and adding a picture window to this 1910 gem. Really, people who do this to architecture should be hung by their toenails for a few days, then made to write a billion times "Houses have feelings too."

Paul Udris of U+B Architecture (www.uplusb.com) was the architect who did a great job of keeping the architecture quiet, tasteful, and edited so that the space feels essentially modern. Choice Wood was the contractor - really beautiful work.

We suddenly had a deadline - she was giving a party tonight - and that seemed to motivate her, so ask if I could pull things together quickly. I got to work scouring local antique shops and our best little independent retail stores and found everything I needed, some of it for a song. She just got out of my way and let me do my thing! "Oh, just do whatever you think," she would say, while she went about her life. So, I did. And now I know I probably do my best work this way. Thank you, Rebecca.

Here's the result: It will be on my website in a week or so. I am really happy because it is so calm. I'm into calm these days. Not doing much with color. Ask my mother, who asked me recently, "Why do you only wear black, honey?"

Oh...and my favorite spots:

NOLA Home in Bryn Mawr for the great rugs and Chinese vase
The Guild on Excelsior for accessories
H & B Gallery on Hennepin for the rattan woven bench
Hunt & Gather on Xerxes (yes, for that amazing white bird lamp!)
Zachary at IMS - always my first stop for accessories including the great Chinese garden stool
CW Smith for the lovely Asian furniture - the Tibetan leather chest / table and Chinese chest
The beautiful 19th C. mirror is from Center 44 in NYC