Who couldn’t use a little more Zen in their lives? Buddha is here to help, thanks to factories and print shops all around the world churning them out like crazy. You may not be able to find Zen in the short term, but Buddha? No problemo, samanen.
Beautiful silk Buddha pillows from Zen & Bhakti and ARTE ETRA
DIY Buddha busts from Pudel Design
Designer Bjørn Jørund Blikstad’s unusual bookshelves, known as Imeüble, fool the eye and bend the mind. At least from far away. As optical illusions go, at least these colorful and weird bookshelves serve as storage, as well as acting as art. Blikstad’s creation appears to be 2D from far off – and even in the pictures, my brain is trying to tell me two things at once – but Imeüble exists squarely in the 3D realm.
But it’s all smoke and shadows – every nook is capable of holding books and plants and whatever else needs storing.
Every square is a shelf!
And yet my brain says Q*Bert
This project is apparently Blikstad’s attempt to understand the concept of storage by “looking at it, not as a practical issue involving the storage of known objects, but in sync with our memory; comparing the mental storage capacity with the actual.”
I don’t know if I get all that from it, but still. Very cool, no?
I am so loving these amazing dinosaur planters from Plaid Pigeon… they’re made of repurposed dinosaur toys, hand painted and sealed (complete with drainage holes), and the succulents inside are hardy enough to survive life with everyone from the green thumb set to the black thumb set.
If these came to live at my house...
both the cats and my darling daughter...
would go absolutely out of their minds!
No sewing machine required!
True story: I can sew. I can even sew big stuff on my sewing machine that was absolutely not designed to make anything bigger than a dress or wee baby blanket. BUT I’d rather not sew big stuff because it is a big pain in the rear. That’s why I was so jazzed to find THIS, a simple no-sew fabric blinds tutorial by Regina Morrison, owner of Acute Designs. Check it out, give it a try, and if you do, share it! Also, while you’re still here, tell me:
Can you sew the big stuff? Do you like to?
When can I move in?
Want to give your backyard birdies some upscale digs? Try these sweet birdhouses from Anthropologie. Modeled after iconic homes in Philadelphia, each birdhouse designed by Austin + Mergold is meant to inspire ruminations on the ways in which we share our space with urban birds and how their habitats are strikingly similar to our own. As you might imagine, they’re not exactly inexpensive as birdhouses go and they may not bring you as much enjoyment as this modern birdhouse, but they certainly do look sharp!
If there’s one person out there designing furniture using all of my favorite things, it’s British textile designer Zoe Murphy. Her repurposed mid-century modern furniture pieces and printed vintage textiles are just a treat for the eye! She applies prints she draws of her home town and gorgeous patterns, along with happy colors, in unexpected ways. At least I find her furniture designs unexpected!
Zoe Murphy is my new favorite person
Get a load of those colors...
She even makes art, suqeeee!
Did I mention she makes art for walls, too? Murphy keeps a blog if you want to see what she’s up to these days!
A built-in book nook to die for!
When I’m reading, where I actually am has never been the important thing. I love reading on packed trains, in turbulent planes, and yes, I’m even one of those nasty people who will happily read in the bathroom.* If I’m truly immersed in a book, the rest of the world just disappears. But I understand that for many people, the enjoyment of reading is heightened by by doing the deed in relative comfort, and perhaps even in beauty. Do I need a built-in book nook to be a happy reader? No. Nor does anyone else. But I am nonetheless in true lust with this particular built-in book nook, surrounded as it is with built-in shelves and filled with its many throw pillows. And the drawers and the wallpaper! I think I could even happily sleep in it, as long as I didn’t have to share.
Do you have a special reading spot that enhances your reading experience?
*In my defense, with a toddler demanding my attention it’s one of the few places I can read for a few minutes without any interruption!
Sometimes I think I really want my entire living space to look something like this:
Mmmmodern classic
Then I wake up the very next day and find myself longing for something like this:
Cute and colorful
It’s just one of those things – unless you have two homes or a really big house that allows for for multiple decorative zones, you have to make some exclusionary decisions when you’re planning our your decor scheme. Maybe one day you lust after a modern look and the next you’re suddenly feeling the country thing… or even that you can’t reconcile your love of studio apartments with your desire not to be living above and below other people. I think living style can be even harder to narrow down. House in the suburbs? A few acres in the country? Bustling city flat? How can you ever really choose?
Where do you find you’re of two minds when it comes to decor?
How much space is necessary to raise a child? I would never claim to be an expert, even with a child of my own. Some days, I feel like we could happily roam the country in an RV. Other days, my little Cape Cod house feels almost too small to contain the twister that is a tantruming toddler. If you’ve ever wondered how someone could possible cope with raising a child in a small home, it may surprise you to learn that I’ve known a few people who’ve shared studio apartments with partners and toddlers. And successfully, too. Could I do it? Sure, Do I want to? Nope! With a baby, maybe, but not with a toddler. Sometimes – very occasionally, promise – it’s that cheap hollow door between her and me that keeps La Paloma on this earth.
IF I was going to move into a studio loft apartment with my family, I think I would at least need something, anything to differentiate my space from kid space. Maybe that space would be a corner for a grownup bedroom or a built in reading nook or even a biggish closet with the doors taken off that’s just big enough to hold a desk. But whatever it was, there would be curtain room dividers. Nice heavy, drapey ones that you couldn’t see through. DIY drop cloth curtains, perhaps. If you think hospital curtains when you think curtain room dividers, don’t! Curtain room dividers for the studio apartment family, even the single gal or guy, can look pretty darn good!
Super small spaces can benefit from a couple of curtains
Even if all that's blocked off is the bed...
You could SO DIY this one
What else is great about curtain room dividers in small spaces? In addition to looking good, they provide you with another degree of flexibility when it comes to how you utilize the available space. And they’re a lot less expensive than bookshelves and standing room dividers. Installation can be super easy, too, and there’s the fact that there are a bunch of different ways to hang a curtain in a rented space that won’t make it so you lose your deposit.
While a curtain room divider may not be as good as a wall when it comes to putting yourself in time out so you don’t FedEx your kids to Dubai, they’re still better than nothing!
