Sunday, March 23, 2008

Happy Easter!


Today I hosted my very first Easter. I made all the food for Nick and my families, expect for the ham. Everyone jokes that I don't know how to cook, but I think I proved them all wrong today. I love Easter, it is a low pressure holiday you get to enjoy with beautiful spring flowers. Happy Easter!

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Moral Question


I have been collection Vera scarves for a few years. I found my first one at a thrift store in Fort Wayne, IN while coming home from college. I have a few favorites that are silk and I would never consider altering in any way. However, I do have a few polyester ones that I still love, but I just keep in an old hat box and never get to enjoy. I have been toying with the idea to make them into pillows for our new couch. I saw something similar in Barney’s New York, and think it would a fun way to add color. But can I destroy the scarves? I don’t think I can attempt this sewing on my own, I am thinking of using a seamstress to make sure I do the scarves justice.

What it could look like with a few of my scarves.

Small view of the sofa's in the Barney's shoe department. Ignore the celebrity.

Jackpot!


Today I stopped at Half Price Books and found a bundle of old Canadian House and Home, British House and Home and a copy of Creole Thrift. Plus my April copy of Domino arrived. I don’t know when I am going to find time to read through all of these, but I cannot wait!

Saturday, March 15, 2008

New obsession: engravings

I have a new art obsession, architecture and garden engravings. I was watching a House and Home episode awhile back and the featured home had a grouping of architecture engravings. I loved how simple and detailed each piece was and how they looked great in mix-matched frames. I have been hunting ebay and local antique stores to find some that are reasonably priced. I love the Natural Curiosities collection, but I will need to save up for awhile before I can purchase one.

Below are Natural Curiosities from Mecox.




I missed these two on Ebay over the weekend.


Back from Philly

We had a great time in Philly last weekend. The Philadelphia Flower show was really interesting with lots of interesting flower displays. We also had a great time visiting the local shops and walking the row house lined streets. Here are some images from the flower show.




Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Heading to Philly for flowers and shopping



We are heading to Philly for the Flower show this weekend. Nick is opening a retail nursery this spring (so excited) so we are going to look for trends, vendors and competitive shopping. Anthropologie is opening a garden boutique called Terrain outside of Philly and we are hoping to visit the space. Nick is trying to make his space similar to the English boutique garden centers and inspire the young professional crowd to get interested in gardening. I am just hoping that I could start selling house wares someday.

Besides nursery research, I am excited to go shopping and the Philly Anthropologie store is high on my list. I am sure being located in the headquarters hometown the store is filled with unique antiques and test merchandise. I have also printed the Design Sponge shopping guide to Philadelphia and have highlighted my must stops: Petulia’s Folly, Kellijane, Matthew Izzo and Open house.

I have my great pink Cyber Shot so I will have lots of great photos to share when we get back.

Monday, March 3, 2008

The Look for Less - Z Gallery

In my previous job I learned about retail patterning and saw how sometimes it can borderline the rules of copying. Not sure how I feel about Z Gallery’s recent patterning, some items are a little too close to the originals. I find myself tempted to purchase the cheaper Cellula Chandelier, but when I see the pillow that matched Kelly Wearstler's Imperial Trellis I am thinking twice about buying the “look for less.” What do you think?





(all images from ZGallery)