Posted January 31st, 2012 by Rachel
I traveled to North Carolina last week and, as I always do, I stocked up on fashion magazines for the flights. It’s my little “hey, I’m going to be stuck in a cramped seat on a crowded flight for way too long” indulgence.
Valentino Spring 2012
As I flipped through magazine after magazine, a particular trend caught my eye.
Louis Vuitton Spring 2012
Designers were embracing lace.
Dolce & Gabbana Spring 2012
A LOT of lace.
Which means that the current trend for vintage lace in interiors is only going to get stronger. But how do you embrace the look without going full on frilly? Here are some suggestions….
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Posted in Inspirations
Tags: design, etsy, Fabric, fashion, Flooring, lace, Lighting, linens, Spring 2012, trend, vintage
Posted October 17th, 2011 by Rachel
As a young(er) woman, I often thought of someday running off to France to live in an old chateau for a year or so. I’m not sure what I thought I would actually do once I was there – probably eat a lot of pain au chocolat – but I always dreamed of dancing around in a room amidst crumbling plaster and ancient wooden floors.
Ah, let the dancing commence! This lustrous oak herringbone parquet, which might have been reclaimed from a Parisian apartment, country dwelling, or even – be still my heart – a creaky old chateau, is now available in the U.S.!
Imported by Exquisite Surfaces, this antique French oak flooring is not only beautiful and steeped in history, it is also FSC certified!
I love the juxtaposition of centuries old oak boards with sleek, modern walls. Each element enhances the other so well, creating a harmonious whole, don’t you think?
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Posted in Flooring
Tags: antiques, Chateau, Flooring, France, French, fsc, no-voc, Paris, reclaimed, residential, wood
Posted October 5th, 2011 by Rachel
A client and I are considering a blue floor for her laundry/sewing room. She is a little wary of the idea (it IS a commitment), but I’m really falling in love with the cheerful combination of white, wood tones, and ocean blue floor. Take a look…
via Metropolitan Home
via Desire to Inspire
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Posted July 13th, 2011 by Rachel
Can you see the 1.7 million square foot building in this picture?
How about if I pan out a little bit?
See it? Next to the bridge? No? Well, see that big neighborhood right in the middle of the shot? OK, now look underneath it… Read the rest of this entry »
Posted June 22nd, 2011 by Rachel
I just ran across this rug and had to share. Be prepared to scroll a bit…
If that isn’t a whole lot of vintage Swedish design deliciousness, I don’t know what is! Of course, at 9’8″ x 23′ (!), I’m not really sure how many homes could accommodate it, but I bet it would look amazing in the right setting.
Currently available from a curated collection of vintage Swedish Kilim rugs by Mansour.
Posted June 14th, 2011 by Rachel
Usually when I post about a design element I believe is trending it’s because I’m seeing it more and more in magazines and other design forums. However, in this case I decided to write about one of my favorite looks more because I’m seeing an increased interest in it from my clients.
Penny rounds, and their design sibling “hex tile”, have been around for over a century, as anyone who has been in the lobby of the old apartment building, or the bathroom in an older home would know. Recently there has been a revival in interest for penny rounds, whether for reasons of nostalgia or the fact that just so darn cheerful looking. The great thing is, they can also be very sustainable. Here are some of my favorite looks:
image via Apartment Therapy
I’ll start out with, Savoy, a pretty ceramic version with over 20% recycled content from Ann Sacks. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted May 3rd, 2011 by Rachel
Reclaimed wood is HOT right now. Whether it’s an old factory floor, wood from a crumbling barn, or ancient floorboards rescued from homes slated for demolition, people can’t seem to get enough of the stuff. And I think that is GREAT! Not only does it save precious resources to re-use these materials, it also gives interior spaces more character than they could possibly get from some glossy, mass produced product straight off the shelves of the local mega-building store.
But what if even barn wood doesn’t have enough quirkiness for you? What if you want to have something nobody you know has yet? Well, maybe you should look into one of these unusual reclaimed wood floors:
Wine barrel flooring by Fontenay
1. Wine Barrels - Created out of salvaged wine barrels, this flooring still bears all the stamps and other markings from its previous life. Now you can eat off the floor and read off it too!
Trestle flooring by Trestlewood
2. Train Trestle – There was once a gigantic train trestle (bridge) that spanned across Utah’s Great Salt Lake. Rendered obsolete by the construction of a solid fill causeway in the 1960′s, the wood sat dormant for years. Recently, a salvage operation began rescuing the tens of millions of board feet of Douglas Fir, much of it given a unique look due to “pickling” for almost 100 years in the briny water. I love the gray streaks in the flooring above. Here’s a little video that will give you a good idea of how enormous the trestle was: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted April 13th, 2011 by Rachel
Glass tile is becoming increasingly popular for bathroom and kitchen backsplashes, and we are even starting to see it used in place of wallpaper in living rooms and bedrooms. People can’t seem to get enough of the beautiful depth and color you can achieve with it, and sustainably minded designers like myself can’t get enough of the inherent recyclability of glass in the bargain. So perhaps it was inevitable that we would want to continue to expand on the idea by trying it out on floors too. Take a look at these installations and then tell us what you think.
Interstyle
Oceanside Glasstile
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Posted January 18th, 2011 by Rachel
While I start the recovery process from the nasty flu bug that had me bedridden for the last week (hence not a peep from me on this ‘ere blog in awhile), I thought I’d share some images of one of the latest sustainable design trends – recycled leather flooring…
TORLYS
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Posted August 3rd, 2010 by Rachel
Here’s a fascinating natural product that exists for a really cruddy reason. Behold what climate change has wrought…
This beautiful “Blue Pine” flooring, by Greenway, LLC, isn’t the result of a clever dye job. Instead it is a natural effect of Mountain Pine Beetle infestation on Lodgepole and Ponderosa Pines in many parts of North America. The pine beetles are thriving – decimating vast areas of forest, due to global warming and the subsequent lack of the really cold winters needed to kill off the beetles.
Image by Erich G. Vallery, USDA Forest Service - SRS-4552, Bugwood.org
When the bark beetles infest a tree, it introduces a fungi to the sap, which impedes the tree’s ability to fight off the beetle’s damage, as well as turning the sap blue. This blue color remains in the wood once it is harvested.
So what to do with the (sadly) increasing amount of what is sometimes referred to as Denim Pine? Read the rest of this entry »
