bedroom in blue

this design has been a work in progress... and remains one. but, now it's to the point where i consider it a designed room. spaces in my own home tend to fall toward the bottom of my list of places that receive my full design attention. i hope other designers feel the same way at some point. i'm fairly certain i'm not the only one.

for our bedroom, we decided to go dark! my rule of thumb - don't be afraid of the dark! although it's the largest bedroom in the house, the room wasn't offering any new experience in contrast to the rest of the house, which was all wrong. the decision of dark blue was one of the bolder color choices of my life, but i love the masculinity of color and furniture selections alongside the playful, feminine pieces such as the purple satin ruffled pillow, candle wall sconces (custom painted white to stand out from the walls), and jewelry boxes, one of which i designed, lasercut, and assembled myself for michelle. this is a room that receives a tremendous amount of western light, giving the room an array of blue hues throughout the day.

the large white mirror was a fortunate find - we only paid for the cost of paint and wall hangers. i love the thick bordering and the chunky scale of that mirror, and our room now feels much, much larger because of it's presence. our little claire loves looking at herself in that mirror.

we're blown away at the difference some blue and white paint and some bold, masculine furniture pieces have made. without removing any walls we achieved sophistocated relaxation in a previously bored room. the family we bought the home from wouldn't recognize it at all.



designing for the Trumps

No lie - I have designed an office for the Trumps! My friends Matt + Alicia invited me to come see their home office and get a sense of how they needed that room in their home to function on a higher level for them. I measured and photographed the room and drafted the space in 2D and 3D to begin the process of forming a concept that would allow the room to operate and appeal completely different from its state at the time, without requiring much construction or labor.
I settled on proposing an "industrial chic" concept for their office, especially since Matt is an extraordinary welder. This included a design for a custom-welded shadowbox desk (which Matt constructed after reviewing my shop drawings), a custom-welded sewing desk/station with built-in shelves for storage, tall floor lamps to flank their west-facing window for ambiance and tertiary lighting on this focal wall, and a very different color scheme from the rest of the spaces in their home. I wanted this design to suggest a comfortable working space, while being highly efficient in terms of storage, while remaining under budget. The paint scheme included painting the trim a brighter white and laying a light warm grey as a base coat on all the walls, accented with 3" wide stripes of a slightly darker shade of warm grey in a scattered pattern that accentuates both the height of their 9' ceiling and allows the room to appear larger and more spacious.

...more photos of the final, finished room to come!

girl's bedroom design

(top image: slightly asymmetrical floor plan, giving the room three zones of activity.)
(image below: symmetrical floor plan anchored by the east-facing window, giving the room two zones of activity.)

I designed a little girl's room for a friend who's expecting another baby at the end of the year. She and her husband needed a simple design that focused more on re-arranging than re-doing everything. My solution was to keep the wall color, and rather paint a few new and existing furniture pieces the same color, tying the furniture together into one "language" for the room. I leaned on a few of my favorite local shops for some awesome vintage kid accessories to bring the room down to their daughter's level (the room is currently a spare bedroom more fit for an adult).
My friend plans to make a quilt for her daughter's room, from which I pulled colors for the furniture and accessories. The only piece of furniture they plan to purchase is a dresser, which we will repurpose into the color scheme. All in all, the room makeover cost was less than $200, and will look completely different with a few simple, coordinated gestures!

floating.

in Chicago's early days, the city was rapidly expanding. new growth and construction were everywhere, and businesses found themselves in need of more space than was geographically available. instead of continuing to build out (as we've been doing in Utah), they built up! now, the city is an eclectic collection of timeless styles in vertical array that set the precedence for hundreds of subsequent cities.

in relation to our homes, we don't all have space to keep expanding. square footage and floor space are commodities that homes don't always afford. so, my tip for expressing your identity and style when you can't build out? build up! my favorite remedy for letting your style flow throughout a space are these floating shelves. these are very inexpensive, but they make such a bold statement in such a minimal gesture. there are a wide variety of styles out there. i tend to prefer these straightforward rectalinear shapes because they let the items placed upon them hold your focus more so than the shelf itself.

don't forget - i always compliment every space i design with photography prints to bring your space to life with images of you and your family, to tie the whole design back to you!

louvered light fixture

i've been doing a lot of drawings trying to design our little girl's room. some of those drawings have been new light fixtures, because i hate the square frosted glass light covers that hang above our heads in our house. it's a long story, but when i was young, one of those same light covers came loose and fell straight down on my head and luckily i walked away with 7 stitches. it could've been a lot worse. ever since i've been skeptical of those lights.

our little girl's room had one such light cover, and i have been thinking of designs to replace the glass with something else - less dangerous, and a lot more fun to look at. this is my first physical iteration - a 1/8" mdf lasercut light cover with louvers that somewhat hide the lightbulbs they conceal with a whimsical, child-like twist.

** note: remember to use flourescent bulbs (seen in the rendering above)! they last months longer than iridescent bulbs, and are much more cost-effective!

"green" swing

 
the wooden swing hanging from the walnut tree in our front yard must be twenty years old, and until now i've been adding coats of white paint to help it look fresh and clean. but, the split in the seat kept getting bigger, and it's been an accident waiting to happen.

in response, i utilized some scrap pieces of 3-Form material as a new seat. this material is very green - made from 40% pre-consumer recycled resin material that is melted down into new resin sheets. the entire sheet can be ground down and re-used by 3-Form, eliminating any waste material. plus, the aesthetics are incredible!

for more information on 3-Form, visit www.3-form.com.

basement re-design

this basement re-design was inspired by my desire to make a bold new gesture to my own monotone basement for under $30. re-painting the entire basement would've easily cost over $100, and would have taken me all day. instead, i decided to hit the ground running, and re-design the existing color palette of "sell-this-house-neutral-tan" and white baseboards.

...then, playing on the concept of "budget design", came the idea to create a barcode on the walls! using the leftover paint we bought to darken an accent wall in our living room, a roll of 2" painters tape ($9), a paint roller ($4), and a measuring tape, i spent an hour taping off my lines and about twenty minutes tops actually painting.

then, as a finishing touch, I designed my own custom light fixture using a bamboo utensil holder ($5) paired with a touch LED camping light ($5) situated and concealed inside. Reach in... touch the light on... instant drama. It makes for a perfect night light for taking my dog out when I don't want to turn on the much brighter ceiling lights!

remember - (1) you don't have to use bright colors for a room to "pop", and (2) truly designing a space only requires that you let go of fearing the outcome.