Beige is so blah... Or is it?

I am a long time subscriber and lover of Elle Decoration UK Edition.  I literally squeal when I see the plastic wrapped glossy in the mailbox every month.  Straight from England to my doorstep, I read it cover to cover.  The February issue arrived today and I randomly flipped to a section about Beige.  The article is titled, 'Beautiful beige.'   The little blurb under the title reads, "We predict a revival for this classic hue, with sophisticated combinations of shades and textures that are a world away from drab."

Beige?!??!  Really?  I can't think how or why beige would be in.  Was it ever in?  Is it going to be in?  Why is it even an acceptable color palette for interiors except maybe for the leather interior of a car and even then, beige is so... well, to put it lightly, it's blah...  Just my opinion.

But because I believe that Elle Decoration features the most fabulous in everything to date, I needed to understand why they had featured beige as the new it 'Style Steal.'
So I stared really hard at the pictures in the spread.
And I stared some more...

Okay.  The pictures are quite nice.  It wasn't all THAT bad.  I wouldn't personally choose beige as a color scheme for MY home.  (I covet COLOR!)  But I generally got the idea.  There is a calming quality to beige.  (Which is why it's still kind of blah to me, but I am now more accepting of this color palette)  The sumptuous or sometimes contradicting smooth textures paired with the beiges are interesting and quite inviting.  With my new found acceptance, I HAD to do more research.  What's out there that is so Beautifully beige?

I actually found some lovely Beige interiors!

Take a look.

Nordic, Whimsical Holiday Beige

 Exotic Locale Beige (Check out the cool light fixture)

 Kind of Ethnic Materials and Beige

 Downtown Beige

 Modern Bathroom Beige

 Tasteful Platform Bed and Alcove Beige

 Metallics and Beige

 Wallpaper Extravaganza Beige

 Minimalist Beige (Gotta love the cowhide rug)

 Bold, graphic rug and Beige

 Boring Sectional but fancy cut-out rug Beige

 Striped Beige

 Kid-friendly Beige

 Red and Beige (Cute Pairing of colors)

 Traditional Japanese tatami room Beige

 LOVE the glass partition Beige

 Don't know why but I like this kitchen, but I do Beige

 Wall Mural Beige

 Drawing Room Beige

Gold Bling Tile and Beige

What are your thoughts on Beige???

All photos are from Interior Design And Decoration

A picture is worth a 1000 words

I grew up in Southern California pretty much my entire life, but I was raised by my mother who spoke broken English...  Therefore, I know a lot of Japanese 'adages' and 'proverbs,' but when it comes to American sayings, I get them wrong sometimes.  I love them though.  Every culture seems to have old wives tales, folk wisdom, and wise sayings that always make me nod my head and say, "uh-huh,  I agree!"  The American adage I misused most recently: A picture is worth a thousand words.  I kept saying, "a picture is a thousand words..."  Usually, whomever is standing closest to me, corrects me.  This time, it just so happened to be my husband.  "It's A picture is WORTH a thousand words.  Not a picture IS a thousand words."  Somehow, I find myself being more gracious when it is a stranger or a friend who corrects me.  When it's Mark, it just sounds condescending.  "Gees!  Okay, okay.  Sorry!"  You get the point.

Wikipedia says, "A picture is worth a thousand words" refers to the idea that a complex idea can be conveyed with just a single still image. It also aptly characterizes one of the main goals of visualization, namely making it possible to absorb large amounts of data quickly.


In any case, we just got professional photos sent to us of a house we built in Palos Verdes Estates.  Mark was the GC, and I did the exterior/interior material selections.  (Architecture by: Studio 9one2)  I think the pictures of the place are WORTH a thousand words.  Enjoy!

Nesting

My husband and I found a bird's nest while doing some gardening over the weekend.  It made me think about our homes (as humans) and what it means to create a comfortable, nest-like abode.  What makes a home?  Is it what it is made of?  Or is it the stuff that's in it?  Birds use twigs, leaves, and other organic materials to create the perfect home for their eggs.  There is nothing much to a nest.  The simplicity is strikingly beautiful and natural.  There was nothing in it but what it was made of.  Nests are designed and built for raising offspring within its bowl shape until they are big and strong enough to build nests of their own.  Now abandoned, the nest we found was empty of life, but somehow, it told a story.  The little chicks looks out into the world from their nest and examined the skies which they would travel to find food.  They felt the wind and maybe the rain for nests don't have walls or a roof.  We as humans build our homes solidly out of concrete, steel, glass and timbers and then fill them with stuff.  The building materials which construct the structure of our homes no matter what the style when complete are pretty much the same.  It's what we fill our homes with that define how we feel when we live in them.  Furniture, lights, fixtures, and knick-knacks define spaces in our homes and tell the story of who we are.  The stuff we surround ourselves with define our tastes and what we feel is important to set us apart as individuals.  But how much stuff do we really need?  The sparseness of the bird's nest we found prompted me to ponder just that question.  I suddenly wanted to pare down everything in our home.  I had an itch to have a garage sale or put together boxes of our unused stuff for donation and get rid of everything that wasn't "necessary."  What more do we need than the essentials?  Isn't it enough to have just the nest itself and a few twigs and leaves to feel safe and secure?  I decided to start in our bedroom.  I looked around and started evaluating what we had.  The bed.  Okay, we need that.  The dresser.  That keeps our unmentionables organized.  Picture frames.  That's our wall of memories filled with faces and places we love.  The TV.  Too much of a hassle to take off the swivel wall mount and besides, my husband would most definitely kill me if I gave that away.  Everything in our bedroom was in it's purposeful place.  Organized and designed to fit our needs just-so.  I paced around with an empty file box for about 10 minutes and realized that I couldn't get rid of any of our "stuff."  Maybe the living room?  Same outcome with me standing with an empty box on my hip.  Each item had a reason, a story.  Each pillow and vase had a place and made the "look" complete.  Maybe that's what makes our homes what they are?  My stuff paired with his stuff and the culmination of it all is our home.  Our nest.  I walked back to the garage and broke down the box.  I couldn't fill it with anything.  At least, not yet.  Unlike the bird's nest with it's stark simplicity of construction and lack of obvious flare, our home is a work in progress.  One year the cabinets were finished wood, the next year they were red.  I looked closely at the nest and realized that towards the bottom on the outside, there was a piece of pink yarn expertly threaded through some of the twigs.  I examined further and lo-and-behold, a tiny piece of green plastic, a thread of yellow string, a taupe carpet strand... "I stand corrected, this nest did have flare!"  There was evidence that the builder of the nest chose stuff to make it as unique and like no other.  I placed the found nest on a shelf to help me remember that individuality is essential and stuff one loves is not bad.  It all just adds up to make the perfect nest.

Paint a wall mural

A dear friend of mine called me up for a little room make-over.  After moving into their new house, her daughter's bedroom needed something special.  The challenge was that her little princess was adamant about having pink walls.  "I'm not the biggest fan of gender specific paint colors." she said, "I've seen one too many kids rooms that just look tacky."  I couldn't agree more.  The shade of color chosen could either make or break any room, never mind if the wrong color just happens to be pink!  But for a little girl who loves butterflies and princesses, how could I say no?  So I went to work trying to figure out what I could do to girly up the space on a tight budget.  Basically for the price of paint.  My solution?  Paint a wall mural.

The feature wall was a boring, standard issue cream before.  Thank goodness for handy husbands!  My friend's hubby did all the prep work for me and painted the walls the pink color I chose.  (Benjamin Moore - Ballerina Pink)

I decided to paint a tree and some birds.  I could use one color (Benjamin Moore - Townsend Harbor Brown) to match the existing furniture, and it was a design that took up a lot of wall space.  I also figured it wouldn't go out of style too quickly until my pint-sized client decided that pink was so-last-year and wanted her walls to be purple...  The tree branches also allowed me to frame out where the bed would be located when all the furniture was moved back in place.

A little kids coat rack by the door for storage and a birdie above the door.

Painting leaves...  Lots and lots of leaves

Finished wall with the bed underneath the big branch.

This was a super easy, one day project to add interest to a kids room without spending a lot of money.  Happy mural-ing.

Architect vs. Contractor - Good Cop/Bad Cop

I have a Bachelors degree in Architecture.  Post graduation, I worked in several smaller architecture firms in LA, taking on responsibilities from designer, project manager, CAD Monkey, model builder, to coffee brewer, binder organizer, and phone answerer.  But no matter what I was doing, I didn't mind because whenever someone asked me what I did for a living, I could say, "I work in an architect's office."  And egotistically, I thought that was kinda cool.  I was on the team that created, drew and delivered in built form, people's dreams.
When my husband decided to start his own construction company a few years back, (Libiano Construction, Inc.) I was really excited for him.  He has a Bachelor of Science in Construction Management and had worked so hard to build his career and it was time to venture out on his own.  At the time, there was a lull in the firm I was working for, so I started reevaluating my own career.  I thought it would be a good experience for me as a future architect-to-be, to learn the ropes about how buildings are actually built.  I thought it would make me a more "well-rounded" designer.  So, I temporarily jumped ship from the architecture side and went to work for the construction side.  Today, I work with and for my husband's company...
Despite the fact that we are really slow these days because the economy blows, I find myself doubting if I made the right decision.  Not because of the husband/wife dynamic.  We work well together for the most part, it's more the architect vs. contractor dynamic that makes me feel... well, weird.  For starters, I feel like I am personally losing my design inspiration and oddly worrying too much about how materials and labor are way too expensive.  This is not what I imagined when I signed up to learn about construction.  I simply wanted to walk around job sites with a tool belt on (like Tim the Tool Man's assistant) and learn how to use a recipro saw.  Not about budgeting nightmares and how clients want everything done yesterday because on HGTV, a house can be built in the time span of one episode.
This is a really pathetic analogy, but lately, now that I have seen and understand both sides of the coin; architects and contractors are kind of like the oil and vinegar in a salad dressing and the client is the salad that brings them together.  You need the ingredients (architects and contractors) to make the dressing (project), but they don't really bend well together.  And a salad just isn't a salad without the dressing.
My biggest issue is that I am a designer at heart.  I love the over-designed details, the expensive materials and the budget disregarding creativity of architecture.  But now that I have a good handle on what goes into getting a building built, I feel for the contractor too.  The architect is often times the "Good Cop" who breathes life into a project, and the contractor is by default the "Bad Cop" who wants to deliver the goods, but has to handle a lot of crap along the way.  I know that there are perfect clients that love both parties, but I have only experienced this scenario play out twice at the most. *  The architect designs the cedar lined closets and the lighting for the house that costs 200K, then the contractor comes in and tells the client how much it all costs.  The client then spirals into a deep depression and the architect has to go back and "re-design", making cuts that are just inconceivable in order to build the perfect house, but necessary because the client only has "X" amount of dollars to sink into his/her dream palace.  Why does this have to happen?
I am a big proponent of Design/Build projects.  Having the contractor on the design team from the very beginning is brilliant so that the budget can be monitored before the design runs too far off the mark.  Furthermore, Design/Build teams by definition, are a group of professionals that get along and respect each other's profession and their ultimate goal as a team is to get the job done right the first time for the benefit of all.  My goal is to get my license ASAP so maybe my husband and I be a Design/Build team.  Why I STILL don't have my license already is another story all together, but I think I am weary of the two sides being like disparate ingredients in dressing.  I want to design again, and build responsibly within the budget.  I want a good balance between the wonderful side of architecture as problem solving and the wonderful side of construction, where everything goes just as planned.  The city approves the plans without any corrections, the inspections are passed on the first go, materials are delivered on time, and the plumber and electrician get along as they run their lines side by side...**

* Note: When the client has oodles of money, it doesn't really matter how much things cost, but there still is the architect/contractor dynamic that has to be addressed.
** Thankfully, we at Libiano Construction, Inc. have had nothing but great experiences with the architects we have worked with so far.  Knock on wood...  This does not mean that we have not had "issues" with our projects, for if there is one thing that I have learned from both architects and contractors; there is no such thing as a "perfect build."  Much like unicorns and pots of gold at the ends of rainbows, it simply does not exist.

Mega Millions

I don't play the Lotto.  I do occasionally glance at the electronic sign whenever I drive by the local liquor store.  I do fantasize about my life without any financial worries.  Debts paid off, a house that doesn't leak or isn't compromised structurally by termites, a car without squeaky brakes, a museum-like collection of purses, an around the world trip, private school for my future children...  Then I remind myself of the odds of winning. One in like, a kajillion, and so I never stop to buy a ticket.  "Imagine what a buck could do?" my ass I tell myself reluctantly.  Times are tough.  I need that buck.  The holidays didn't help because I always feel obligated.  Yes, we promised to only buy one present for our "secret santa" family member (capped at $50) but inevitably, I just had to buy a little something for this person, that person and their kids...  That's why I'm the one that always gets in trouble every month when the credit card bills need to be paid.
So, what would I do with a windfall of 330 Million dollars?  (That's what it's up to today.  I checked on my way home from grabbing my overpriced coffee.)  I don't know.  I would probably die of shock.  I get excited when I have a $100 bill in my wallet let alone the bank account of a millionaire.  I asked my husband what he would you do if he won the MEGA?  His answer was kind of expected because he's practical, but still, it was so unromantic that I felt a little disappointed that he didn't want to participate in my frivolous game.  "I'll tell you what I'd do... I'd pay f-ing taxes on it.  Then I'd invest it in stocks, bonds, REITS, precious metals and real estate.  Then we'd live off the interest that the bonds would generate."
Right.  That's exactly what I was thinking too!  NOT.  I love to bits, my financially responsible husband.  We don't have much, but he makes it so we are smart about what we have.
It's 2011!  It's gonna be a good year, I know it, I can feel it.  I didn't make a list of new year's resolutions this time around...  I never stick to them anyway.  Eat less crap and go to the gym more is really ridiculous with my stubbornness and lack of self control.  If I want to eat something, I don't think twice, I eat it.  If I don't want to feel the burn, I stay at home and vegetate.  But with this unwavering feeling of beginning-of-the-year good fortune, I think I'm going to play the lotto later today.  I'm gonna change things up a bit.  Become a gambler for the day.  If we win, and I know we will, my husband can grudgingly pay taxes on our winnings bringing it all down to a measly 170 million and invest the rest in bonds and REITS and whatever else he wants.  And maybe with some of the interest that our bonds have generated, I will buy a purse or two for my collection, that is, if I don't die first from the shock.