Viva Los Libros!

It has been hard getting back on the blogging horse, but we thought we would start out talking about a favorite to all designers, design books. I don’t know a designer out there who doesn’t love (or obsess about) design books. We thought we would take the next few posts to talk about some of our favorites and talk about some new discoveries.

David Hicks: Designer / Ashley Hicks 2003
I received this book as a Christmas gift last year and fell in love with David Hicks, and his aesthetic all over again.
The book has a forward by Tom Ford which gives some insight into Hicks’ influence.
Hicks was the master when it came to the marriage of traditional and modern English style. His interiors from the 60’s and 70’s convey what I have always thought about Interior Design, that there are no rules as long as rooms are done with taste and style. The rooms in the book look as fresh today as when they were done some decades ago.
A new generation of designers has become interested in David Hicks after seeing his daughter India (pictured in the book as a young girl) acting as the host of the Bravo TV network show Top Design.
This book is a must for anyone interested in the melding of traditional and contemporary design.

David Hansen

The book cover

One of the great interiors featured in the book

Blogging is Tough!

As I look at the date of our last post it seems impossible that so much time has passed (nearly three months).
Whenever I read other design blogs (which one does inevitably when starting your own) it all seems so effortless.
It is so easy to get caught up in the day to day of client meetings, paperwork and working to have a life outside of work that finding time to document inspiration seems challenging at best.
I’m not sure that I have a good answer, but they say that acceptance is the key to change. We hope to be back on the blogging horse and riding in no time.
Stay tuned.

CRAZY FOR IKAT: PART 1

Ikat is something you hear a lot about on Design Blogs. I think most designers have a fascination with them, as they are exotic and vary widely. Barbara and I love using Ikat textiles in our designs, as it provides a chance to infuse alternate colors into a palette, while also giving interiors a “travelled” look.

We will be referring back to Ikat again and again, so this is the first post in the beginning of many honoring the celebrated textile in all its glory.

I thought it made sense to begin talking about Ikat by giving the proper definition. This is taken from http://dictionary.reference.com/ :

i-kat - [ee-kaht]

1. A method of printing woven fabric by tie-dyeing the warp yarns (warp ikat), the weft yarns (weft ikat), or both (double ikat) before weaving.

2. A fabric made by this method.

When I was in London recently I went to an exhibit at the Victoria and Albert Museum, specifically to view their exhibit on Ikat. The V&A is known globally for their extensive collection of textiles and fashion. Below are some of the photos I took at the exhibit. I found most of the pieces were from 1850 or thereabouts and most all were from Kazakhstan. The thing I find amazing about these pieces in particular is how contemporary the colors feel. The color combinations offer up much inspiration for design of any kind.

Until we talk about Ikat next….

David Hansen

And the winner is...

We say if you can’t toot your own horn on your blog…where can you?

We recently were honored with an award for our work. On May 15, the ASID (American Society of Interior Designers) California Peninsula Chapter held their annual Design Award celebration in Los Gatos. We won a Gold award (the highest honor) in the Bath category.

We were thrilled to be recognized for our work among our peers, and were inspired to see all the amazing work that the other honorees exhibited. We want to take this opportunity to congratulate all the other designers and firms that were awarded honors.

Although we are proud of our work, we thought it would help to show you the full transition, and show you the before photos as well as the after (this is what the judges saw). These photos appear below. The original bath was actually two rooms and the wall between was removed to create a more luxurious space.

We worked on this particular project with the gentleman that does our professional photography, Nathanael Bennett. Since the work was being done at his own home he fully documented the process with his camera at every stage, which is where we get such great before shots of the space.

If you want to find out more about Natanael Bennett and his work check out his website at www.nbphoto.com





BEFORE AFTER



BEFORE AFTER

BEFORE AFTER

Welcome

Welcome to our first post! Being on the other side of the blog is a new and unfamiliar feeling for us. There are so many blogs about design that we love to keep up with that offer an enormous amount of diversity in their perspectives on design.

What makes design interesting is experiencing an alternate point of view. I hear my peers in the industry say they are tired of seeing the same thing over and over. This is what drives the motivation for a lot of our design work. We feel if we can offer our clients something different we have doubled the value of our services.

We want to use this blog to not only talk about our design work and projects, but explore what we find interesting and talk about people, places and imagery that gives us inspiration.

We thought it only fitting to start off with a piece of our work. This is a photo of an entry way phone desk for an apartment on Nob Hill.