Maybe it’s just that with a toddler, I already spend so much time sitting on the floor so it’s a bit of a luxury to actually get up onto the couch. Especially when I get to sit solo, instead of with a small human being on my lap demanding stories. More and more stories! But when I read something over at Apartment Therapy recently that asserted that you absolutely need to double up those floor pillows for comfort, I had to admit my ignorance.

Floor pillows? Like the grownup version of the beanbag chair? Seated on a floor cushion, floor pillow, whatever, your feet fall asleep and there’s nowhere to lean and you consequently have to maintain perfect posture or become a hunchback.

Am I getting any of this right? Or I am simply not hip to the floor pillows charms? Or perhaps it’s just floor fatigue…

Found on The Purl Bee

Admittedly, I do like the look. It’s very casual, like we all lounge wherever we want around here. Chairs? We don’t need no stinking chairs. We have floor cushions! Cushions ON THE FLOOR! Don’t try to badger us into adopting your bourgeois couch-and-chair lifestyle, because we’re not having it. It’s a floor pillow revolution! Furniture you can fit in the back of your hybrid!

(Well, okay. I like that last part. Furniture is too dang bulky. Tell me: Do you have any of these pillows on steroids in your living room?)

OMG I am SO close to my 1,000th post! Wonder if anything special will go down to mark the event!?

A piano is a useful item all on its own, but the size of the instrument almost necessitates it becoming another piece of furniture. At least, I’ve never seen a piano in someone’s home that wasn’t sporting something on top – from stacks of books to framed pictures to lamps and vases and so on. And it’s difficult to decorate around a piano, especially when it’s a large piano in a small space. Often, a piano becomes the centerpiece of a room, but if you do the right things, it can become the STAR of a room. Here are some piano decorating ideas that are making me want to go out and buy one right this second:

Make your piano a focal point of the room by keeping it bare and decorating around it

A boring piano becomes exciting with a simple coat of paint

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There are numerous wooden clocks out there – this one and this one come to mind as particularly interesting examples, not so much this one – but none tickles my fancy so much as this one that caught my eye as I was browsing Etsy the other day.

Could you, WOOD you, love it?

Created by Cameron MacLean, craftsman and owner of Offcutstudio, this maple wood clock has taken the traditional classic alarm clock and pared it down to its basic elements. The blank face and unexpected material turn this basic clock into something much more interesting and engaging. I don’t know about you, but I’d be tempted to pick this wooden clock up just to see if it was heavy or light, smooth or rough.

What say you: Too simple? Or just right? Would it fit into your decor and personal style?

Tea, hot and beautiful.

Lovely, no? The emblematic art deco tea pots used at Mariage Frères tea salons since the early days are a beautiful example of how form and function can collide perfectly in an utterly simple household object. Each tea pot is wrapped in a removable shell of highly polished steel, which works to retail heat keeping your tea at the perfect drinkable temperature for an hour. Visit MariageFrese.com to purchase one of their gorgeous tea pots or some of the best – and possibly also most expensive – tea you’ll ever drink. Feel free to double your order and send your excess to moi!

P.S. – Did you know that Manolo for the Home is on Facebook? We’d love your likes and your uploads – it’s a great place to share your decor ideas, pics, and inspiration with the rest of us!

Upon first glance, white ceramic greyhound statues seem like something you’d find in a new Long Island residence with Italinate features, lots of pink pastels inside, and a huge fountain set in an inappropriately small lawn outside. What can I say? I grew up on Long Island and saw a lot of places like that, and the older I became, the less I liked them.

While I haven’t changed my mind about the giant lawn fountains or the raging palette of pastels, I think I’m changing my mind about the white porcelain greyhound sculptures. I’m not saying a greyhound statue is something that would find a forever home in my little house, but I could see one serving as a foil for other types of decor for a while. And white is still white hot, as is shiny white ceramics. Even ceramic animals!

So enter the greyhound statue!

Greyhound in repose

Greyhounds upright

Or a greyhound in a collar?

I say that while I like ceramic greyhound sculptures, I’ll add that they’re not for every person or every decor. In my own little house, I think they’d come off as kind of ironic, and a nod to a weird past. What say you: Regal, or ridiculous?

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

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