Manolo for the Home

When it comes to plain ceilings (i.e., not tin, decorative plaster, or good-looking wood), you have a limited number of options. You can paint them ivory or cream or eggshell, or whatever incarnation of white looks best with your chosen paint color scheme. You can add embellishments like vinyl wall stickers, though that sort of thing can look a bit juvenile and typically works best in kids’ rooms. Or you can go against the grain and paint your ceilings a color other than white.

People are generally afraid to do this. They’re used to painting walls, so when they think of adding color to a room, their thoughts turn to vertical surfaces. It’s also more difficult to coordinate furnishings with accessories with floor colors with wall colors with ceiling colors, omg, but really, it’s not impossible. It’s even easier when you start with a nice neutral for your walls. One option involves painting all your walls the same color, then varying the color of your ceilings by room. Or you can go all-out and have coordinating wall and ceiling colors that differ entirely from room to room.

The best way to approaching painting ceilings is to look for inspiration (some of which I have thoughtfully provided below) then play with color combos using Paint or Photoshop or The Gimp until you find something that works. You can even paint a small test area on one wall and an adjoining bit of ceiling just like you should do with the wall only so you see how the colors influence each other and the room in different sorts of light. To begin, check these out. And if you’ve painted your ceilings a color other than white, tell us about it!

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Anyone who has ever been afraid of using color should take a good look at this amazingly colorful villa designed by Giorgio Saporiti for Il Loft to see just how awesome color can be.

Beautiful!

This room reminds me strongly of one of my first apartments. I wouldn’t say that flat was a put together as this one — in fact, it was rather cluttered due to a wackadoodle roommate — but it had the same shabby chic feel. Of course, for many people shabby chic is just not something that exists. In their minds pits, dings, scratches, and paint less than uniformly applied are defects rather than features. Old things that haven’t been perfectly preserved are fit only for junking, and charming little cottages crammed with threadbare settees and chipped teacups simply don’t exist in real life.

I suppose I fall into the pro camp when it comes to shabby chic, and I can easily imagine a younger version of me settling comfortably into an apartment that includes this room (styled by Emma Thomas). The peeling walls might drive me a bit batty after a while, but who knows how long it would take considering that my own kitchen is currently sporting a rough area where I steamed off an ugly wallpaper border along with a great deal of paint and then just stopped. What do you think, dear reader? Is shabby chic a valid decor style or simply a way to excuse imperfection?

Manolo for the Home is one of the younger blogs in the Manolosphere — did I just write that? — so I don’t get nearly as many reader e-mails with leads on cool stuff to feature as I do over at Manolo for the Brides. A recent communiqué from Sterlingspider brought this to mind, so before I tell you what she wrote me about I wanted to remind you that I want your tips! Bring ‘em on!

So what was the lovely Sterlingspider so excited about? Sternocera aequisignata. That’s right, a beetle. But not just any beetle! This beetle, eaten in Thailand, happens to have a exquisite wing case that is as durable as it is beautiful and has attracted the notice of artists and craftspeople, particularly contemporary Belgian artist Jan Fabre. In 2003, Fabre used the used the glowing beetle carapaces to create an awe inspiring mosaic that covers the vault ceiling and chandelier of the Hall of Mirrors in the Royal Palace in Brussels.

Called Heaven of Delight, a nod to Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights, the ethereal green ceiling was made from 1.6 million beetle shells, glued by hand to the vault, niches, and formerly gold chandelier. As you might imagine, Fabre didn’t work alone, but instead employed 30 assistants who worked with him full-time for four months to complete. One glance at the detail tells you why…

I can’t imagine that I’d guess what the ceiling and chandelier are made from; most likely I’d wager it was something like green opal. But Fabre knew what he was doing when he chose his unusual medium. As he told the New York Times:

He is convinced that this skin will last far longer than paint: ”The wing cases of the jewel beetles are made of chitin, one of the hardest, most imperishable materials we know. They consist of wafer-thin platelets that capture, reflect and transform light. Oil paint fades; the carapace will keep its original colors.”

As an aside, Fabre is no stranger to using materials sourced from animals. In the course of his work, he has covered columns in marbled ham, as well as bones and other sorts of beetles before settling on the sternocera aequisignata for this very large work.

Curious about sternocera aequisignata? Here’s the little edible jewel up close.

I’ll take one of these:

And four of these:

And while you’re at it, I may as well have you send me one of these:

Love,
Never teh Bride (who is redoing her kitchen)

Ah, blue and brown. It’s a color combo I got to know while dealing with weddings, from teal and mocha to ice blue and chocolate. I’ll admit that at first I hated it because it always came off as so babyish. Then I realized that it wasn’t the combination that felt immature, but rather the specific blues and browns that are so often seen in wedding color schemes and on bridesmaid totes and shower invitations. Change the hues, and you’ve peaked my interest.

Of course, some would rightly say that this color pairing has been done to death and back again, so let’s leave it where it belongs, i.e., in history’s pages. I say that if you like it, feel free to surround yourself in it, and screw the haters. It all depends on whether you’re a slave to the latest trends — and there is nothing wrong with that! — or looking to create a living space you could see yourself occupying for at least a few years before you change it up.

If you are a fan of brown and blue, the good news is that it’s still available on everything from bedding sets to shower curtains to lighting accessories to to dog collars. And, of course, in all sorts of other places as well.

My favorite brown and blue interiors are those that are wickedly unbalanced, with either scads more blue (like this one) or an overload of brown. Yay, accent pieces and showstopping furniture!

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When I last wrote about organizing bookshelves, a bunch of you weighed in after voting in the poll (which is still open). Some people organize by size, others by color, others by topic or genre or author, while the rest of us just kind of stash books wherever they fit, whether that means on bookshelves or not.

As it turns out, those are by no means the only ways of organizing a bookshelf. In a recent Guardian article, Sarah Crown and John Crace put forth the idea that rearranging one’s bookshelves alphabetically is a bad mistake because alphabetization is, according to them, the most banal approach to bookshelving. They go on to suggest these alternative ways of arranging a home library.

• The literary snob

Old Penguins, heavily creased to denote re-reading, are lined up in rows of orange, black and grey. These can be bought by the yard at most secondhand bookshops, and are a very easy way of acquiring instant intellectual credibility.

• The David Cameron

Books by important members of the new Tory World Order are prominently displayed where they can be seen by everyone. Acolytes can ascertain how close to power they are by the position of their own books.

• The Jeffrey Archer

Shelf after shelf of your own book in every imaginable translation and edition – frequently in multiples of 10. Come to think of it, this applies to almost ever author I know.

• The ‘I’m desperate for a shag’, male version

Must include prominent copies of The Golden Notebook and The Second Sex and any dreary rubbish by Ian McEwan lying around to show you are in touch with your sensitive side. Best to hide any well-thumbed copies of Belle du Jour and La Vie Sexuelle by Catherine M under the bed.

• The “I’m desperate for a shag’, female version

Doesn’t really require books – it’s the last thing a man will notice. But on the off-chance you bring someone home who can read, it might be an idea temporarily to lose anything too intimidating by Andrea Dworkin. Unless you’re a lesbian, in which case you might like to put it on the coffee table.

• The kleptomaniac

Easy. You just arrange your books in accordance with the numbering system of the library from which you nicked them.

Personally, I like the sound of The Jeffrey Archer!

Yellow by itself can be striking or calming, depending on the shade. In some cultures, yellow was the animating color for life, and it suggests joy, gaiety, and merriment. In decor, yellow is often one of the first colors people notice because it has a tendency to catch the eye. And yet, yellow can soothe, as is evident here:

Then there is teal. This color can have an old-fashioned 50s and 60s retro feel, but with an unexpected sophistication and richness. Teal can signify trustworthiness, devotion, and healing. I cannot argue with the vintage feel of teal. Observe:

When combined, yellow and teal are striking, especially if one color or the other is used as an accent color:

From Canadian House and Home: “In this new ode to a Grecian urn—as well as busts, vases and goblets—Palladian principles of scale and symmetry mix with fun colours, while decorative laurels, pearls and rosettes add authenticity. Black chairs and lampshades offer striking contrast to the yellow wall.”

Purple is associated with (among other things) royalty, imperialism, nobility, Easter, Mardi Gras, the upper class, poison, friendship, hope, and sympathy — in other words, it evokes feelings that are both light and dark, positive and negative. Perhaps these dichotomies exist because purple can be both intense and gentle. Think byzantium versus wisteria.

I long to see the rest of this building. In case you can’t see it clearly, the window itself matches the shutters. Don’t be afraid to combine purples to see what you come up with. If you need to ease into it, grab some paint chips and play.

A little purple can go a long way, though as La BellaDonna frequently reminds me, more is indeed more. If you can handle a deep, saturated purple, go for it!

Then again, this soft purple makes for a great background for blues and neutrals. It looks like the ceiling, rather than being white or cream, is a very, very light purple. I’m afraid to say all my ceilings are white, but I am fascinated with the thought of colorizing them.

White kitchen? Forget it. If buying all new cabinetry doesn’t fit into your current home improvement budget, you can always paint kitchen cabinets to give your kitchen a makeover. (via)

Finally, purple is potent, which means even a few dashes of it here and there can really jazz up a room. You don’t *have* to commit to purple if you don’t want to!

It seems that today, being Memorial Day, is an appropriate day to post about how wartime homes can positively influence the evolution of small and/or affordable housing, at least in terms of interior space utilization. You see, once upon a time in the post-WWII era, the family home tended to be smaller, forcing the people who lived therein to make the most of all available space.

“In the same way that the proud new householders of wartime homes made numerous accommodations and undertook several modifications as a means of coping with the small size of their residences, so too can designers of contemporary affordable housing devise methods of living comfortably in a space no larger than 1,000 square feet,” state [Avi Friedman and Maria Pantalopoulos's in "The Wartime Home as a Paradigm for Today's Affordable Housing Design" (1996)]

I have a personal interest in this sort of thing, because my own home (which measures in at 1,100 square foot) was built just after WWII. While it’s not quite affordable housing, it is on the smallish side, so The Beard and I do what we can to keep our little cottage tidy and clutter free. We do a good job, too, though I can’t say we are quite so thorough as the homeowner in this wartime home case study:

One Affordable Housing Research Project drew the following conclusions from Friedman and Pantelopoulos’ article:

SPACE
There are numerous ways a space can be designed so that it feels more comfortable and inviting. The relationship of rooms whether they are adjacent or removed can interrupt or guide the circulation patterns in a home. The amount of natural light that enters a room is also important. Usually, a space will feel larger when there is a plentiful source of natural light entering the room. Floor space is extremely valuable in today’s compact houses. Built in furniture is an excellent way to maintain maximum floor space, especially in bedrooms where built in furniture eliminates the need for dressers and desks.

STORAGE
Abundant storage is necessary in the design of today’s compact houses. Storage is a key selling point, because families accumulate more and more belongings the longer they live in one home. Therefore, the designer must be receptive to the demands for ample storage when designing a small, compact house (Friedman and Pantelopoulos, 1996, 191). There are many ways unused spaces should be used for storage, such as in the corners of rooms, and areas near the ceiling. Attics and basements are also ideal areas for adequate storage space.

Yes, yes, and yes. Then again, is it just me, or does this all seem like common sense?