Decor Porn

Since things have been rather food-centric around here, I thought I'd shake it up with some decor porn to close out the week. These hand-polished acrylic tables by Decorati are absolutely driving me insane--they're the perfect intersection between Moorish shape and modern design. I've never been one to hide my complete obsession with Moroccan- and Middle Eastern-inspired design, and this is exactly the kind of product that speaks to those passions. These can tie together a room, merging the ethnic with the contemporary and creating something that's ultimately very chic. Let's face it, it's love at first sight.


Tangier Tables and more available here, price on request.

Design Porn: Alphabet Drawers

Earlier today, a friend left some love on the blog that she herself said was no budget find. What it turned out to be was perfect decor porn, worthy of being shared with all of you. Not only does this beautiful handmade chest of drawers feature my fervent love of typography, but it's inspired by the very printing blocks that I've blogged about (and gushed over) on eatmywords. I question its ergonomic function, but I have no doubt that this would be the perfect centerpiece for an uber-organized home office. Let's just not look at the price tag.


Alphabet Drawers by Kent and London, available for purchase (for the lucky and wealthy) right over here.

PS. Thanks for sharing, Alison!

Design Porn -- Handpainted Coral Dishes

It's been a long week for Red, so apologies for the late posting! To balance out all the food content this week, I thought I'd close out with a little design porn. These dishes by Modern Goods are simply irresistible, drawing on one of my favorite color palettes and beachy (read: summery!) illustrations. They're all hand painted, and unfortunately that translates to "very expensive," but that doesn't mean I can't stare in awe until I feel confident enough to reproduce the patterns on my own at the local pottery painting studio! (Shhh... I would never advocate such a thing!)



Other patterns are available right here--they're all pretty exquisite. Enjoy, and have a great weekend!

Design Porn: Domino Shopping Spree

I had so many ideas for today's porn section, but they were all upstaged by a rather last-minute announcement made by former domino editors, Dara Caponigro and Tom Delevan. According to this article and this article, the pair decided that, after amassing over 1,500 square feet of swagged home goods from the magazine's glory days, it might be a good idea to clear some space--and make a much needed buck in the process. Designer goods previously featured in the dearly deparated shelter title will be on sale for a fraction of their price--of the quoted items, it seems that even larger home accessories will be falling in the $40 range--with a selection of clothing items on the side as well. The whole sale promises to be, at worst, a great chance to meet former domino staffers (can we point out for once and for all that the title was never capitalized? Just sayin') and maybe pick up a fun gift along the way.

Saturday, May 9, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., at 13 West Ninth Street (Fifth Avenue), garden apartment; cash only. [photo via NYTimes]

Design Porn: Treeprints by Bryan Nash

I'm absolutely head over heels in crazy love with these prints by artist Bryan Nash. With a huge respect for printmaking cultivated by years in the shop, I'm fascinated by Nash's ability to preserve a dead tree through art--and such striking art at that. The connection between the rings of the tree and fingerprints and printmaking--never two of the same, all intricate lines--are absolutely fascinating to me and are exactly the kinds of traits that I think make pieces most special. It's a steep price ($4,000) for one of 12 prints (a very limited edition indeed!) but if I had the money to throw around, I'd do it in a heartbeat. After all, every single ring of the tree needs to be imprinted by hand--and getting a print this complicated to look this clean is no small feat.


On that note, enjoy the beautifully springy weekend! I sure will!

Budget Finds: Inflatable Art

Since last fall, I've been really craving some artwork to go on my one white wall. I'll clarify--I don't actually want artwork. I want frames. I want empty, beautiful frames. But in an effort to conserve funds, I decided to buy some brown mural paper that I could draw on, cut out, and put up in interesting arrangements. A constant fan of paper art (shock? I think not.), it seemed like the ideal route. Here's another idea from Fred Flare, though. This inflatable frame/masterpiece screams silly summer chic, and at just $4.99, I'm totally digging it.

Design Porn: Post #200

Earlier this week, I found these beautiful images of Matthew Williamson's new rug collection, being sold through London-based The Rug Company. The patterns remind me of Moroccan and Persian rugs, but modernized and with a brighter, splashier color palette. I'm crazy about this one:


but these are pretty fantastic, too:


Check out the collection here, or click here for more of Williamson's work.

Have a great week, and if you go out, have a toast for eatmyword's 200th post :)

DIY Project -- Fanciful Modern Chandelier

I'm surprised that I somehow managed to miss this in last week's issue of Time Out New York, but I'm almost glad I did (this week's letters to the editors had some crucial clarification on the project!).


Either way, this funky chandelier made entirely out of splitters is a great project that likely costs peanuts (I mean, really, peanuts can even be kind of expensive these days. Is it an apt metaphor?). I'm going to go the extra mile to say that this project costs ramen. How about that? And it looks damn cool too. I'm envisioning it over a Eames chair in a comfy corner devoted to late-night reading, or the breakfast nook in my dream kitchen with tons of white and colorful accents. I think I've told you about it before?


Here's the finished product, and for the steps, click here. That letter to the editor asked about the light bulbs you'd want to use, and the important answer is eight-watters. They create that signature hazy glow. Love it!

Budget Finds -- Skeleton Key Key Holder

There are lots of decor-centric websites out there that I love to look at with a "look-but-don't-touch" kind of mindset. Three Potato Four is sometimes one of those, but sometimes it ventures into my price range with the most dainty and beautiful pieces, often in the "I-look-super-old-but-still-super-stylish" kind of vein. I majorly covet these old typewriters (an instance of look-but-don't-touch, at something like $500 a piece), but while drooling over them this week I found something smaller both in size and price.



These skeleton key key holders are dainty and chic in that really effortless "it's just an old key" kind of way. (I've got to stop it with the little catch phrases today.) Part of the charm here probably has to do with my fixation on the vintage keys sold all over Moroccan souks, which, counter-intuitively, were somewhat expensive by local standards. Anyhow, it's only $16 right here, and I'm seriously tempted...


But like usual, I'll live vicariously through the beauty of these pictures, pinching my pennies (and maybe saving up for one of those typewriters!)

Perpetual Kid

Yes, yes. It's nice when things are nice and pretty and wrapped with a bow. And it's also nice when things coordinate just so and come together to form the most perfect, most put-together look. But sometimes it's nice to break out and have a little fun. Any room without its humorous, quirky touches is a room without personality--or simply a room with too boring or too fancy a personality for my taste.

That's why I'm loving this site I recently discovered, called Perpetual Kid. It's filled with all sorts of cheeky (sometimes plain silly) accessories for the kitchen and home--and most of them are quite budget-friendly, too.



This cheese board, for instance, is one of my favorites. I like to host regular wine and cheese parties, and though the wine is usually enough to get us all laughing, I think this would really start the party on a pretty entertaining note. At $18, it's not too pricey either.


Doing dishes wouldn't be as much of a chore if I had one of these--blowing bubbles is one of life's most underrated pleasures and I'd be happy to bring more bubbles into my everyday routine. Not so sure how my floors would feel after a week of this, but hey! It's a fun a thought.



Since I generally like to leave you with three items of choice, I'll round out my list of fun finds with these super cute S+P shakers. There's a big kitsch and nostalgia factor here, which I think makes them more than worth the $8.49. I'm constructing an entire breakfast nook in my head around these little guys--bright walls, mod chairs, and a bunch of cool prints in frames on a single, perfectly cluttered wall. Love it.

Anyway, find all these cute things and more over at Perpetual Kid by clicking this little link. Enjoy!

Design Porn -- Mad Hatter Tea Set

I do wayyy too much internet strolling to ever remember how I find the things that I find, which is particularly sad in the case of these "mad hatters." If the lead led to other equally adorable trinkets... well, I suppose it could have been damaging. Perhaps this is for the best.


Anyhow, these so-called "mad hatters" are a really precious take on the much-loved Alice in Wonderland tea party. If there's one scene in one movie that would spark a food lover's imagination, it could just be that one. It was with that in mind that Jorine Oosterhoff made these teacups, each with their own protective lid. Why the lid? Perhaps to keep your tea from getting cold. Or perhaps to protect candies from being found by the wrong eaters. But really, I think they're just for cuteness. Expensive cuteness, at that--this set of three is on sale for a rather exorbitant $595.00 right here.

Design Porn: Blue Potato Parchment Bowls

These. Are. The. Coolest. Things. I. Have. Ever. Seen.


I have a feeling most of you wouldn't believe me if I said the gorgeous bowl pictured above was made out of potatoes. But it's not made of ordinary potatoes, you see--it's made of really gorgeous (and completely edible) purple potatoes. Artist Margaret Dorfman has taken the pretty chip an extra step though, by curing, pressing, and aging potato slivers and artfully layering them one by one to form these exquisite looking bowls. And it's not just potatoes she works with--Margaret is making bowls out of all kinds of vegetables, one more beautiful that the next. Other than the purple potato, I'm particularly digging the thai papaya, beet, and white raddish versions pictured below.


Something tells me this isn't your traditional DIY project, but surprisingly the bowls are fairly affordable, ranging from $28 to $54 for the purple potato, available here, and just $34 for the other varieties that can be found on her site right here. And please, whatever you do, don't try eating them.

Space-Expanding Wall Art

I got a recent tip from TWB about wall decals from a particular website called Infectious, but when I looked at the site I knew there had to be something better out there. At once intrigued by the world of wall art and curious to see the scope of what was out there, I set out to find a few pieces I wouldn't mind putting on my own walls.

These decals, mimicking the silhouettes of antique furniture, would add character and depth to small spaces. I was particularly inspired by this fireplace, which would be so charming and yet so mod in a small living room. Better yet, the site lets you color-customize each decal according to your existing wall colors--clever!

Here are some of my favorites...

Find yours here!

Budget Finds: Remnants from the First Depression

In light of my uber-budget mindset this week, I've found an uber-special budget find. One of my favorite magazines (with a not-so-budget subscription rate) asked a number of contemporary artists to re-envision poster designs and slogans from the great depression era. The results, for the most part, are really cool, and I wouldn't mind having some of these framed in my home. Good thing, because they're free to print right here. Try a little bit of super-cheap lamination at your local Fed-Ex Kinko's and you'll be all set with some uber-budget (and uber-chic) decor!




See all the designs (and print them free!) right here. Enjoy!

Treehouse Restaurant -- Restaurant Design Gone Wild!

If I were to pick one niche category that I'm obsessed with, it's definitely the intersection between food and design. We're talking restaurant design, table settings, food plating and styling, and the different sensory experiences that can be effected through these intersections. No wonder I was totally blown away by this amazing restaurant in New Zealand called The Yellow Treehouse Restaurant. It's just what it sounds like--a restaurant that's actually a treehouse 10 metres high in a forest of redwood trees.


The pop up restaurant opened officially over the weekend, and will be seating guests for lunch and dinner for one month, until Feb. 9th. Curious to see how the menu would interact with the setting, I downloaded the PDF version to find that, as I suspected, you can't cook a whole lot of stuff in a treehouse. But I'm happy to report there are no birds on the menu--how awkward would that be? Worse than boiling a calf in her mother's milk might just be eating a bird in its own nest. Anyhow, the fare seems local, largely vegetarian, and mostly out of convenience for the lack of appliances one can safely use in a redwood forest.


Overall, a very cool design concept, but the food? I've yet to be convinced. If you happen to be travelling to NZ anytime soon, though... let me know!

Totally Chic or Totally Geek?

I was flipping through a rather unremarkable magazine when I saw an image that caught my attention--it was a piece of fabric, but illuminated with all the colors of the rainbow. It was flat and flexible, but an obvious source of light that glowed in gorgeously vibrant hues. Immediately, I googled LED-embedded fabric and sought something similar to share with you.


What I found was monochromatic, but perhaps more practical than a piece of fabric that is every color all at once. The all-white light is more elegant and chic, just like white-colored Christmas lights in comparison to the tacky multicolored ones. Would I want this in my house though? I'm not sure. And would I want an LED-embedded headboard, like the one you can see through the LED-embedded curtains below? No thanks.


I'd love to see how designers incorporate this into a room--next season of Top Design, anyone? Check here for more images and info.

Eames Elephant Chairs -- so perfect!

Not long ago, I stumbled upon these adorable chairs by Charles and Ray Eames. It doesn't fail to fascinate me how these two created designs a half a century ago that still look so strikingly modern today. And though there are many Eames designs that have stayed popular through the decades, I'd never seen these before. How could I have ever missed them? Elephants are my favorites.





And who is to say that they wouldn't make cute endtables, too?

Link of the Day

I'm about to head out of the office but I just stumbled upon this awesome tidbit by Luis Luna that combines both food and decor, my two biggest loves. It reminds me a bit of a design Nathan came up with on Top Design this season, a paper plate chandelier that was too cool for words. But really, I might even like the utensils one even better! Might have to try a DIY version...



More info over here...

Design Porn

As if yesterday's H&M madness weren't enough, here's a little more design porn to round out the week. This isn't quite so budget friendly, but oh! the novelty! The asian-meets-modern-meets-ultra-chic of it! And I can't help thinking it looks like a chihuahua. Even still, I may be in love.



Plus, I've always wanted a nice glass teapot to show off my gorgeous tea flowers...

But perhaps $250 is a bit much to spend on a teapot, no? Alas, it goes in the dream pile.

Link of the Day

This site may not be in a language I speak, but the message is quite clear: H&M is scheduled to introduce a line of home goods early 2009! It looks like there will be four separate design themes in the collection, and some who have been able to translate the site claim that H&M home will hit e-stores this February! Hard to believe that February 2009 is only two months away...