Love Affair

I am having a love affair with John and Carolyn Malone's new old homestead featured in the current issue of Garden & Gun, which has become one of my favorite magazines. When I was in high school my family moved to the small community where my father was raised, Goodes Georgia, and lately I've been in a mode of re-discovering all that I loved about living in a rural, small Southern town. These images speak to the beauty that one finds in the slower paced life living among a time forgotten home where lush green life abounds. Enjoy!

Our creative selves

Designing and decorating one's home is an essential part of being human. This is not a superficial, "keeping up with the Jones" sort thing. Home. Nest. Shelter. These words conjure up a variety of memories like the sent of home baked cookies that greets one upon entering the front door when coming home from school or work, or perhaps yours is a memory of cuddling up under a quilt with a parent or sibling, or just knowing that upon stepping one's foot upon home base you feel safe, comfortable and at last can be fully oneself. Whatever it means to you, I hope that you can discover a creative part of yourself through the designing of a room.  Most importantly make it functional and personal, filling it with the things you love. "The personal" is of utmost importance in selecting a designer. A home owner must forge an intimate relationship with one's designer. When you enter a person's home not as a family member or friend but instead as a professional it is a delicate dance to learn about, embrace and respect the person, the family and the home for which you are designing. Hopefully, if I've done my job correctly, a new lasting friendship ensues.

I encourage my clients to use their homes as a way to express themselves. As very young children we are almost immediately pulled away from our creative selves. For finding a creative path, we must go to a messy place, a place of mistakes. Luckily, one does not have to have the skill set of an artist to be creative at home. One may simply surround oneself with things she loves. Although, even this, can become a strange quest raising questions like "What do I truly love?," " What can I live without?" "Why am I so attached to...?" This is where hiring a professional can help.

Believe it or not, floor coverings can be wonderful way to be creative in you home. A custom area rug can be made to mimic your child's art work or a family portrait or just a burst of one's favorite color. Hard surfaces, though more permanent, can also be lovely exhibits of self-expression. Perhaps, these images below can be of some inspiration to you...

The patterns above are hand tufted custom area rugs available through Moore Floor Coverings via DCI. 

I love the textile art of Arlene Blackburn. Love this black bird on wire piece.

I have a great custom rug program that I can easily switch out the colors in standard patterns, creating an easier approach for making a custom carpet. This last one is suppose to be for a boys room... A City Planning idea...?

Our Design Predictions for 2012

Dali's Melting Clock

Predictions are is a  It's time for the ubiquitous design trends or forecasts for the New Year. As much as I hate clichés, I do find trends fascinating. Perhaps trends are not merely driven and forced upon us by the design industries, but, instead, I like to think, arise out of our collective unconscious of the great timeless desire for beautiful ascetics and more useful technologies. Either way, these trends do determine how we shop, buy, wear and live the material world. Even if you are, like myself, a constant forager of that which has been tossed aside by one in order for another to make new again. Here's what folks are saying for the new Now:

Moore says:
Whooo doesn't love Owls. They are everywhere these days. For one thing, it's difficult to miss the huge gold owl on top of the TBS building overlooking I-85 here in the capital of The South. It took me a second to figure out why the owl? Then I remembered the Conan O'Brien ads showing the host of  newish TBS late night show with a white owl on his shoulder. So, anyone want an custom owl rug, maybe for a child's room?

TBS ad for the Conan O'Brien Show

Artist Leah Duncan

Hand hooked area rug by Claire Murray

Love this signage pulled from Vogue & Friends blog

If our latest carpet samples are any indication of what's to come in home fashions, I can tell ya right now that a washed pallet will be around for a while. Very Neutral but with punches of richer colors like, plum, matte blacks, golds, orange reds. Also, for carpet expect super soft, high luster nylons. Although I'm a natural fibers sort of gal, I do have to say that these latest man made fibers feel just like silk but are as tough as steel.
The lovely Darden Straus snapped a pic of the newest Rosecore Samples while in our showroom the other day. These feel and look like silk, but are a man made fiber... not (quite ; ) as expensive.

By now we've all know about Pantone's 2012 color Tangerine, but I feel blues will be here for a bit longer, I believe but are showing up more in Navy tones.Also, read my previous post on Who's Blue?  Also, I love a soft plum.

Handmade in Nepal, this dark navy area reg is available in standard sizes.

 

 

 

 

Not sure how I feel about all the elements in this room, but the colors!

I love a pale blue with purples. Here the blue area rug sets off those chairs perfectly. Photo taken from Patricia Gray.

I really like many of the designers' comments in a recent Elle Decor article on the trend subject.

From Elle Decor-
 “I adore books and cannot imagine life, or my home, without them,” says Ronda Carman, of All the Best Blog. But for her, books as props have a short shelf life. “Rose Tarlow put it best: ‘An object added for effect instead of affection will always look like an affectation.’”
• Antiques dealer Richard Shapiro has modernism malaise, calling out the “monotony of one midcentury room after another, all with predictable, gratuitous, gimmicky accessories.” He lobbies for collecting objects from different periods and styles that all have a bit of soul.
• It’s time to retire brightly lacquered Hollywood Regency furniture, says decorator Mary McDonald: “I think we all have seen enough garage-sale junk sprayed in high-gloss Skittles colors to last through the next century.”
• Designer Mario Buatta singles out “dysfunctional decoration,” his term for interiors that don’t relate to people. “Everything is done for styling, and nothing has to do with living— there’s no place to have a conversation or set down a drink,” he says. “The best time to look at a room is the day after you’ve had a party because you see the way people used the space.”
• The DIY craze has run its course, says decorator Sheila Bridges, who has seen her share of “earthy, handmade concoctions. Just because it can be reclaimed doesn’t mean it should be.”

~ Sloane