Turquoise

Boise Idaho's Chair Affair 2013

2013-04-26T12:05:00.000-07:00

Last year I was a guest speaker for the Boise Idaho's design community for the chair affair and this year they asked my best friend Jordan Cappella to be the guest! Jordan was on last seasons Design Star for HGTV. He spoke about how his experience was working on a reality television show and how he started his career and also showed some of his fabulous furniture Lucite designs.

You can view his amazing portfolio HERE.

Each year students and professionals make by hand chairs and tables to be submitted and judged by a selected few from Idaho's design association for the chance to win in certain categories at the Chair Affair Gala, held Saturday evening.

My dear friend Kirsten Grove of Simply Grove, who lives in Boise took me to some fabulous vintage stores and I even brought home some great vintage finds! Really loved Jillopy, and we even hit up some antique malls where I found some brass birds and a brass mirror.

Idaho is really a great place to visit and if you get a chance please stay at The Modern Hotel, its really a jem of a place!

Above our images from our trip and dinners out with friends! Thank you Kirsten for always showing me a great time! And thank you Jordan for letting me pall around with you. And thank you Kristen Montgomery for taking care of us!

Thank you Kelly Edwards: The Design Cookbook

2013-04-26T08:00:00.000-07:00

If you haven't purchased the new home decor book by Kelly Edwards called The Design Cookbook, make sure you do!

This massive book is full of all types of wonderful interiors and is sectioned off by different rooms so its easy to locate other great looking bedrooms or dining rooms.

I was so happy when Kelly asked me to be a part of her new book and above are images of some of my interiors in the book. Please pick it up HERE on Amazon.com. You will love adding this new book to your collection!

PATH: New Charity Design Project

2013-04-14T12:03:00.002-07:00

Vanessa Kogevinas and I are decorating a new charity project this month and need your help! We are furnishing two apartments in Glendale for a local organization called PATH to help find people permanent housing in Los Angeles.

They came to us after seeing our work with the Good Shepherd Charity Design Project near downtown Los Angeles.

We had a meeting last week and knew we had to jump on this project. We are super excited about creating a new home for these people, but need LOTS of furniture donations. Please look around your home, garage even ask your neighbors and see what you don't need any longer. Tax write offs are available and we need the items asap we install in 2 weeks. If you have large items we can make the PATH truck available for pick ups.

Below are the items we need: (Ikea and vintage pieces are just fine)

Queen and Full sheets

Queen and Full headboards

2 Coffee tables
3 rugs
Chandeliers
3 curtain rods any color - long length
2 credenzas
4 long dressers (not high boys)
2 desks
4 stools

Frames, mirrors, vases, silverware, pots & pans and dishes

Please email me a photo or a direct link and measurements of the items. We need to see images so we can properly place the items the in two different apartments. They are actually located in two different areas. Unused gift cards to Ross and TJMaxx would be great too! We need all the help we can get!

If you don't have anything to give and would like to help by decorating then please email me if you would like to help out.

We look forward to hearing from you and hope that you will help us make these two apartments amazing for these people who have struggled and are going to having their own place to call home!

(Above our images of the Mary Magdalene Project we decorated last year. )

Venice Beach Bungalow REDO: Post #1

2013-04-01T09:34:00.005-07:00

In the last few months I have been super busy with my client projects, selling on One Kings Lane, plus gearing up for our new charity design project and not to mention a NEW Magazine Show House I will be installing this summer in Northern California. Clearly I have a lot on plate and have been trying to blog more too. But I have been itching to redecorate my home and lately whatever time I have left I have been tackling this little house.

So I sold almost everything and decided to start fresh with new design ideas for my beach bungalow. If you don't know this already I have lived in the same little beach bungalow for years and every couple of years I sell everything and redo EVERYTHING.

The color palette for my home is white and brass. Yep thats pretty much about it. White and brass.

There are hints of indigo blue and light grays and some red but almost everything will be bright white and shiny brass with a dab of chrome. I just picked out some fun geometic wallpaper for the kitchen that only comes in chrome.

Attached is my inspiration board (so far) for my living room. The space is actually almost done. I still need to add some more art and install the brass sconces featured above.

I am excited to show you all more and will post more sneak peeks of my home in a couple days. If you cant wait and want to view more, you can follow me on Instagram - HERE. Enjoy!

Rope Mirror DIY

2013-04-01T09:15:00.002-07:00

Back in January Jordan Cappella and I went to Las Vegas for Vegas Market. We had a blast visiting tons of showrooms and meeting lots of new vendors in the interior design industry. While looking around I spotted this rope mirror. And loved it. Then last weekend I have been trying to come up with a way to redo or revamp or add a mirror to my bathroom.
I am redecorating my home. I will post lost of pictures of the progress soon! And remembered a mirror I saw at Vegas Market and went out and bought 2 bunches of rope and dusted off my old glue gun and started gluing away.

I have never used a glue gun, not even sure why I had one in the first place and I must say the mirror turned out pretty good. Funny right before I decieded to buy the rope and try to make the mirror I ended up seeing it at a store (but it had some bag seashells on it and some fake sea glass).

The entire project cost me around $4.00 not bad for a new mirror.

If you have made one yourself or have one, please post it in the comments! Enjoy!

Thank you Casa Sugar / Lil Sugar!

2013-03-08T09:20:00.000-08:00

Thank you Lisa at Pop Sugar for featuring my latest babys room project on Lil Sugar yesterday! I gave some great tips on how to start the decorating process of your own babys room and you can view the full article and more images of the post here. Enjoy!

If you want to view all the images from the room, click here.

Also thank you to Angela from Casa Sugar for the original introduction. Photo credit Irene Lovett.

Olio Board Charity Causes / Olio Hop

2013-02-18T10:24:00.001-08:00

Im very excited to be a part of the Charity Causes Olio Hop with Olio Board this month! Olio Board has chosen a few designers who are working on various charity projects and we are previewing each of our mood boards on our blogs and social media. Please follow us all on twitter, Pinterest, Instagram and Facebook and search the tag names: #Oliohop, #CharityCauses to view our boards and information on each project.

My Olio Board is a bedroom for a young man. I chose browns and blacks and a hint of some color in the art work to give the room a masculine feel but a fun play on color with the artwork. I didn't want the room to be too fancy or too gender identified and was trying to create a room that would fit the needs of any man's age. I added darker furniture and lots of chrome and soft edges. The felt ottomans are always a great way to add more seating to a small room and the bunk beds with storage provide extra beds without taking up too much room. I also added a cool brown lounge chair that doesn't take up too much room and can easily be moved around. And last but not least I included a high impact rug that had a great modern pattern to it!

Please check out the list of designers and their boards here on Facebook. Click on the Charity Causes link for more information.

The charity project I am working on is called Freehab and at this stage our press release has not gone out but we are excited to share with you the people behind this amazing project.

Right now we are looking for deigners to come aboard and lots of bedroom and living room furniture. You can read more here on my blog post last week.

Enjoy the Oliohop and hope that you will donate to our cause!

New Press: Glo MSN

2013-02-09T12:40:00.000-08:00

Thank you Elizabeth Jenkins for including me in your latest story on Glo MSN about "Shopping Secrets from Design Pros". In my quote I mentioned a lamp that I purchased from Big lots that I used to decorate the Good Shepherd Charity Project. I had it painted blue and it totally reminded me of one of Jonathan Alder's early style of lamps.

You can view it here.

Anyway in my original quote I said that my sister and I used to say that if we bought something from Pic 'N Save (the original name for Big Lots), we would call it Kip and Eva's - which was Pic 'N Save backwards. Just to keep it on down low... we didn't want to give away our secrets! So EVEN though Big Lots is Big Lots and Stol's Gib just really doesn't sound that cool, we still call it Kip and Eva's!

Anyway was hoping they would add my funny story to the quote but now I guess I get to tell me version of it!

Do you have a funny name for a store like Targe' for Target or Needless Markups for Nieman Marcus?

Would love to hear your own story!

New Charity Project - HELP!

2013-02-08T10:58:00.001-08:00

Vanessa Kogevinas and I are excited to announce that we are about to embark on our biggest charity project to come! We are excited to be working with Lauri Burns from The Teen Project, I worked with Lauri last year on her project crash pad in Venice. A rec center for homeless teenagers and foster kids to feel safe in.

This project is a rehab center backed by some really wonderful celebrities and powerful people. At this time (since we have not publicly made our announcement) we cannot name any names. We already have some wonderful vendors and designers that have signed on to help but we still need more products and designers to help on our big project. We have more meetings coming up and will have more information in the coming weeks.

Right now we are looking for large vendors of office furniture, bedroom furniture, plus TONS of sheets. If you have items to give please send us images or links of what you have. Anything helps. Please do not tell us what you have, you must include images or links. If you have a connection with a large vendor or retail store please email us and can fill you in on more information and details to what we need. We have over 150 beds to to fill! And thats not counting the meeting rooms, offices, kitchen areas, lobby and more!

Anyway we look forward to working with you and hope you will join us in this project. Vanessa K and I love giving back this is our mission! And are excited to make this new facility our next project.

Sherman Oaks 6 - Baby's Room - New Project!

2013-02-07T20:45:00.001-08:00

Im so happy to share with you a new babys room I just completed in Sherman Oaks. I loved my client who said I am not decorating this for the little guy but for me, the room needs to reflect who I am as a mommy just as much as who my baby is as well. This was music to my ears. Its so nice to create a room for the mom too.

The client loved green and blue and selected a perfect shade of lime green for the Ikat fabric we used for the valances and Serena and Lilly sheets, some touches of more green in the baskets and then bought all modern white furniture. The crib and changing table came from Beginnings on La Brea. Great customer service and our items come just in time for the babies arrival.

The rooms paint came from Valspar Thank you Valspar for the paint!! And the decals were from WhatisBlik-that I had actually won them at their 10th anniversary party in Marin Del Rey.

The toy box and cabinets are all from Ikea that perfectly fit in the corner of the room. We bought new feet that we cut down and spayed white. I personally don't care for those metal Ikea feet that they sell with this piece. And inset the feet in a little so that the unit would be flushed against the wall away from the floor molding. You actually cant see them because the crib is in the way, but they are inset just a little. And we had the bamboo shades custom made with black out attached to them.

Over all the room came out very sweet and my client likes to call it the club house because of the white panels on the wall. We are off to decorate the living room, dining room and entry and slowly but surely so I hope to get those pics added to my blog and website as well. Enjoy!

You can view all the pics HERE!

Sneak Peek - Echo Park Radio Studio

2013-01-07T12:24:00.001-08:00

For the last few months I have been working on a redesign for a radio studio in Echo Park. The radio station InTraffik is broadcasting from Bedrock Studios a sound studio on the Eastside of town. My client wanted something fun and comfortable for the studio and wanted lots of space, storage and a proper desk to file and get interviews for her guests comfortably.

We first started with the design for the walls. The walls are carpeted from about 36" up from the floor so we chose some pretty wild colors purple red gray and white to balance the dark gray carpeting. I worked with my cousin Clark French, who is the most amazing painter and he was able to create the most perfect and straight lines for the wall design.

Above are some sneak peeks of the wall design and some furniture pieces we added to the space. Will be shooting the room in the next few weeks and super excited to share this fun project with you all.

Hope you enjoy the images!

Thank you Cottages and Bungalows Magazine

2012-12-21T14:43:00.000-08:00

A few months ago I was approached by the editors at Cottages & Bungalows Magazine to be interviewed and they wanted to feature one my projects for the January 2013 issue. I was so happy and excited to see the issue came out early and I wanted to share with you the almost 10 page spread of my adorable clients home in Sherman Oaks!

I want to thank everyone at Cottages and Bungalows, the issue looks great! Please enjoy the images below...

Thank you Adore Magazine

2012-12-14T00:22:00.001-08:00

I am so happy to share a project I designed and decorated in Venice is featured in the new Dec/Jan issue of Adore Magazine! Thank you Loni for featuring my clients home in Venice! To read more about this home and find similar resources from this project, click here - the feature starts on page 114. Thanks again Loni!

Thank You Real Simple Magazine

2012-11-01T11:15:00.001-07:00

A few months ago I was contacted by the editors at Real Simple Magazine letting me know that they were looking for new content to add to the "Decorating" category on the website and if I could send them some images. Well I just found out that they used a bunch of my photos on the site! I am so honored to have so many images featured, WOW!

I was able to find three of the images under "Modern Bedroom"s. But you may want to take a look at the other categories, there are tons of great inspiration images and DIY and decorating ideas on the site.
you can click HERE to view the other categories.

Thank you everyone at Real Simple, you have certainly made my day!

The Hollywood Reporter Design Hollywood Show House

2012-10-30T18:09:00.001-07:00

Today I had the pleasure of getting a private tour of the The Hollywood Reporter - Hollywood Design Show House from Vanessa Kogevinas who was the project manager on this gorgeous project. The show house is decorated over 2 apartments with designers Kathyrn M. Ireland, Waldo Fernandez, Nickey- Kehoe, Marmol Radziner and Associates, Trip Haenisch, David Pheonix, Oliver M. Furth, Natasha Baradaran, Cliff Fong, Adam Barm Straus, Jane Hallworth, Joan Behnke, Robert A.M. Stern Architects and Tim Clarke.

I was so impressed with all the amazing details to the space including so many types of wallpaper. Not to mention the different types of treatments including bark and plaster wall elements that were such elegant touches to the rooms. Each of the rooms have a million dollar view from which you can easily see Santa Monica.

Major sponsors include, Calvin Clein Home, Circa Lighting, The Rug Company, Farrow and Ball, Grace Home Furnishings and Stark Carpet.

I fell in love with the minimal details of Waldo Fernandez' living room and loved the wonderful yet plush details in his room. Another room I really loved was Nicki|Kehoe's room that was the drawing room. Even thought the room was the dark I loved the vintage details of lights, tables and chairs. It had such a lived in feeling that felt like staying a while. The opposite wall had a bookcase made of chain that featured wallpaper as book. Such a clever idea.

If you want to watch the before and after video and view more images of the space click HERE.

Please visit this beautiful show house there is so much inspiration and wonderful rooms to view.

If you live in LA and would like to see the Show House in person - I have two pairs of tickets to give away. For the first two people to comment below will receive the two pairs. You really don't want to miss this as the show house will be up till November 15th. If you miss out on the free tickets you can buy them for $40 a piece, here.

Good luck everyone!

Yahoo!'s Ultimate Surprises {Reveal Video}

2012-10-17T10:23:00.001-07:00

Last month I was hired by Fishbowl Media who produces online segments for Yahoo's show Ultimate Surprises, to transform a bare class room into a new music room for a surprise for Mr. Sollecito in Torrance CA.

For two weeks I prepped the project and also shot with Ikea at the Burbank store who donated a wonderful gift card towards our project. I was also able to secure paint by Valpsar and the generosity also came from Lamps Plus and House of Blues. I also begged borrowed and pleaded for decals, art and hooks - basically anything that could be used in the room. And so many amazing Etsy designers came forward to donate tons of products!

The episode just went live and CLICK HERE to view the reveal video!

I also want to thank my wonderful friends Marilynn Taylor, Jordan Cappella and Typhanie Peterson and her wonderful husband and sister for lending extra help. There is no way we could have finished on time if it wasn't for the help!

Hope you enjoy the video!

Radio Studio {Renderings}

2012-10-15T09:00:00.000-07:00

I've been prepping and shopping the last few weeks for a new Radio Studio project at Bedrock Studios in Echo Park. Inside the studio we have some pretty stark white walls and I came up with an idea to paint the walls in a color blocking/stripe design.

Above are some of my renderings for each of the walls.

The colors we chose for the room are Chinese red, dark purple, light gray and white from Valspar.

Above are some of our ideas for the walls. We will start painting next week and cant wait to share with you our pictures of the room. Above is also our inspiration board for the space that was posted last week.

I also just found this vintage sample fabric which is the same colors of the room. Wish me luck I hope I can find more of it to reupholster the vintage office chair I bought!

New Items for Sale

2012-10-11T11:38:00.002-07:00

I am very excited to announce I will be selling more vintage pieces on my site! With so many flash sales like One Kings Lane and Fab.com that I have participated in, I certainly have the selling bug again and am excited to add all these new pieces to my website and share these new found pieces with you all!

I will be adding new pieces (almost) every week so make sure you check out the furniture page on my site for new additions. I am also shipping some of the pieces too, so please make sure you view each piece for shipping quotes. I will be adding all the new updates on my blog so make sure you sign up for my blog alerts so you know immediately when the new pieces are being added.

NEW PIECES
WIRE CHAIRS: $250 EACH can be shipped for $55 each
BLACK AND WHITE CHAISE: $550 new fabric / $55 shipping cost
LUCITE SIDE TABLES: $150 EACH / $45 shipping costs per table
LINEN PILLOWS: $100 pair (brand new) / $15 shipping costs for the pair
MID CENTURY ART PIECE: $150 /shipped for $30

I accept Paypal, cashiers check or if you are local cash as well. I will be credit cards soon too.

Fab.com Sale

2012-10-08T10:17:00.004-07:00

Just a few hours left on my sale with Fab.com. Hurry up and grab them before the sale is over! Some really unique pieces at great prices! Click here to view my sale.

Thank you L7 Womens Magazine

2012-10-06T13:09:00.001-07:00

I am a little late at posting this... But thank you to Veronica Jones for interviewing me for L7 Women's Magazine. It really is a great article about how I got started and my influences in life that brought me to become a designer!

You can read the full article here. Enjoy!

New Project: Radio Studio

2012-10-04T08:08:00.000-07:00

I am so excited to share with you a new project I just started for a radio studio in Echo Park. I will be redecorating a studio at the famous Bedrock LA Studios where Sean Lennon, Beck, Fitz and the Tantrums and Ozomatli etc - have all recorded.

I will be redecorating a small radio studio that showcases new and up and coming artists which is recorded live on the show.

We are bringing in all new furniture and creating a really exciting wall mural that I will be designing with dark reds, eggplant and teal blue.

Above is my inspiration board for the project. My client was so thrilled with my design proposal she signed off on all the pieces!

We will be installing at the end of the month so if you want to follow the design process for this project and other projects I am working on, you can follow me on Instagram.

West Hollywood Office 2

2012-10-03T10:26:00.001-07:00

I just completed a contemporary office for an agent at a high profile agency in West Hollywood. This is actually the second office I have worked on for this company which was completed earlier this year. We added grass cloth wallpaper, new cream and beige carpet and new paint. We filled the room with contemporary dark pieces to pop against the light cream walls. I decided to great creative and made some of my own artwork that I made the night before.

Hope you enjoy the space and more pictures will be added to my website later this week.

Fab.com Sale

2012-10-03T10:14:00.000-07:00

So excited to share with you my new sale on Fab.com! There are lots of vintage pieces for sale including lots of great lamps. You can check it out here.

Sale is up for another 5 days so hurry before everything is gone!

Yahoo! "Ultimate Surprises" Classroom Project

2012-09-18T12:36:00.004-07:00

I am so excited to share with you a project I just finished shooting for Yahoo!'s online show called "Ultimate Surprises". I was hired by Yahoo to transform a new classroom into an amazing music room for a music teacher in Torrance, CA. The teacher had no idea he was being given his this gift of his own classroom and the look on his face was incredible when he was told the room was his.

He was also surprised and a jam session with John Rzeznik the lead singer from The Goo Goo Dolls. Above are images of the space and the episode should air next month on Yahoo!'s channel.
Enjoy the pics!

*I will post the link as soon as its posted online.

Thank you to all the Etsy artists that donated: Dabble Down, Michael Axman, Down Any Road, Popcapopca, Joy Goldstein, Raw Art Letter Press, and Vinyl Phaze Craze.

Donations provided by Ikea, Lamps Plus and Valspar.

And thank you to all the fabulous designer friends for helping me! Jordan Cappella, Typahnie Peterson, Anissa, Joan, Kadine and Lucas.

Thank you Elizabeth Jenkins @ GloMSN

2012-09-17T09:00:00.000-07:00

Thank you Elizabeth Jenkins for interviewing me for the "Are you making these design mistakes?" for GloMSN. You can click here to view the article. Enjoy!