Design

designer visions

By Amy Bleier Long

The proliferation of the Internet, social media, apps, and online collaboration has prompted a handful of interior designers to offer their expertise online at discounted rates, the caveat being that you do the measuring and the shopping. But that means you can set the budget and timeline, and have a little fun!

So far I haven’t come across a service that is as much of a bargain as Designer at Home. And if you haven’t yet used an interior designer—or are on a budget—this might be for you.

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give to me your leather

By Amy Bleier Long

If you’ve been contemplating a new sofa, chair, or ottoman, now’s the time to buy: Select items from Elite Leather will be on One Kings Lane for up to 50% off retail price (OKL requires membership, but it’s free). Pieces available include the Belcourt tufted armchair, Old Course tufted ottoman, both below, and the Barkham chair from LA designer Nathan Turner’s collection. The sale starts Friday, July 23 and ends Sunday, July 26.

Belcourt chair in Grotto Cerulean

Old Course in Dover Jungle

Arkansas Traveler: Antiques & Design

By Candace Manroe

enchanté at Maison France

By Amy Bleier Long

This week, French flair touched down in New York with the Maison France exhibit—promoting French decorative arts—opening yesterday. I visited the Felissimo Design House to see a showcase of 30 French companies displaying luxury home décor items including lighting, wall coverings, and bath fixtures.

Familiar with only a few of the companies, such as Taillardat, who has appeared in TH pages previously, I was very interested to discover the others. Some of them already have a US presence—at retailer Bergdorf Goodman, for instance—but the remaining brands seek a home here.

18 of the companies carry the Entreprise du Patrimoine Vivant (Living Heritage Companies) label, which recognizes them for promoting French industrial and craft heritage. EPV-labeled brands are known for excellence, and those on display here are artisans with mastery of rare traditional or technically advanced skills, and antique machinery and/or archives. The companies present were hand-selected by the French Trade Commission.

A comprehensive catalogue featuring the exhibit’s participants is available as a free iPhone app (it also works on the iPad and iPod Touch).

The exhibit is open to the public tomorrow, Thursday June 24, from 12-5p, at Felissimo Design House, 10 West 56^th Street, NYC.

Check out a few highlights and some of my favorite finds after the jump.

sculptures by Verodalla

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Ethereal Angkor

By Jenny Bradley

I have to share with you a new book that is on my list of new favorite things. It’s John Mcdermott’s, Elegy: Reflections of Angkor (McDermott Gallery, hardcover, $75).

If you’ve been to Cambodia, it’s a must-have. If you haven’t, it will persuade you to get there. And soon. I’ve tried for years to describe to people what it is about Angkor that puts it smack dab at the top of my favorite places list. McDermott’s book communicates visually what I have not been able to communicate verbally.

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eye on the tiger – behind the scenes at Shaw

By Amy Bleier Long

I’m kind of a geek, so I was very into the heavy-on-the-science tour of the Shaw headquarters. It was cool to see the process from start to finish, and it really illustrated the advantages of Tigressá SoftStyle carpet.

We started where most things do: inspiration. We briefly discussed the colors, research, home and fashion trends, and qualities (strength, beauty, protection) that influenced the Shaw designers. Regional inspiration boards and displays showing national and regional sales of existing products by color were interesting to study.

The group was paired off to create our own inspiration boards. The Shaw team wanted to see what we were inspired by and what we were seeing in the market. I worked with the fabulous Carmen Natschke from The Decorating Diva. Here’s our board (including some pieces you may already recognize from past TH issues):

If you want to hear me discuss our board, here’s a video. More of what I’ve been seeing in the market will be in our pages soon!

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Rough and Refined

By Doris Athineos

Strength in Numbers

By Doris Athineos

For decorative arts devotees, nothing is better than finding lots of fine furnishings and art all under one roof. Better if the roof covers all periods and styles as well as (clearly marked) reproductions and contemporary craft.  Look no further than midtown Manhattan where you’ll find Center44 (222 East 44th Street), a few blocks west of the United Nations.

Proprietors Paul Plumadore and Jim Tindell are the kind of people who make the business of buying and selling antiques pure pleasure. They’ve invited 75 dealers to display furnishings in room-like settings and the results create sparks of brilliance. Mod, see-through lucite chairs rub up against a 300-year-old walnut chest-of-drawers. Fornasetti plates (by Rosenthal) rest on a metal table fashioned from discarded oil drums. The decorative mix, from old Ethiopian crosses to Italian modern (Gio Ponti chairs) reflect the way we live now.

Paul, a former dancer with the Paul Taylor Dance Company, designed the look of the Center while Jim handles sales southern style–friendly and gracious (chalk it up to Alabama where he was born).  Shoppers include a-list designers Bunny Williams, Kelly Wearsler, Amy Lau and Albert Hadley to name (drop!) a few regulars.  The atmosphere invites meandering (and so does the shop layout). Introduce yourself to Paul and Jim before you begin. They can help, but you’re free to browse. Most of the individual dealers leave it up to Paul and Jim to handle sales. Don’t be surprised if a few hours pass before you come up for air. And prices? Affordable. Visit and tell us what you find. Center44 earns four acanthus leaves * * * *  (And the super-groovy hanging lights throughout the block-long showroom are among the best we’ve seen anywhere in NYC.)

eye on the tiger – Tigressá SoftStyle

By Amy Bleier Long

 
In the market for new carpet? I just got back from a slightly whirlwind trip to Dalton, GA, for a press event hosted by Shaw, the world’s largest carpet manufacturer, and CCA Global Partners, where I toured Shaw’s corporate headquarters and had an exclusive preview of their brand new line coming out this weekend.
 

Tigressá SoftStyle is an innovative line of nylon carpet, but it’s also the culmination of a lengthy development process, one I learned a great deal about over two days. Shaw let us (9 bloggers, 3 trade editors, and me!) see the evolution of Tigressá by literally opening their doors so we could examine each step in the production cycle. Read more

Prickly Heat

By Sabine Rothman

I’m not a huge fan of the desert landscape. Actually, it’s the heat—no matter how dry—that makes me break out in hives. But, I’m loving the prickly presence of cactus motifs cropping up around town. Here are a few that got under my skin—in a good way!

We stopped in our tracks for these Prickly Pair chairs at ICFF. Their young designer,Valentina Gonzales Wohlers, was born in the late 1970s in Mexico City, but now lives in London.

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