Built It And You’ll Never Want To Leave

I now officially have the home renovation bug – bad.  I know I promised the other day that I would share images of the built-ins we just installed in my sons’ room and didn’t deliver.  I will, eventually, I swear.  But I am in love with my built-ins.  In fact, I am in love with built-ins in general.  As a kid there were a built-in closet and dresser in my bedroom and we cursed them nearly every day.  The placed serious constraints on how I could arrange my room, and seemed a highly inefficient and unattractive use of space.  And as an adult homeowner I have noticed that built-ins seem to have generally fallen out of favor for some time now.  But I think that’s a big mistake.  When done well, the storage — and therefore space, organization and dimension – and character that they can add to a room is truly phenomenal.

I received perhaps my favorite complement of all time the other day when my son and his friends did some baking for a school fundraiser in my renovated kitchen and one of the boys commented that it was the best kitchen he had ever seen (or something to that effect, but we’ll just assume that was the gist).  I loved not only the complement itself certainly, but the fact that it was made after and in response to spending the day working in my kitchen.  Because certainly whether it is the nicest looking kitchen around is highly debatable.  The really beauty of the kitchen is in how efficiently and effectively the space is used, so that it honestly makes me happy every single time I cook or bake in it.  All of which feels fairly arrogant to say, since I designed the kitchen, but I think the actual point is that built-ins work best when they are designed by (or in conjunction with) the owner and take into account the user’s specific needs.  While pruning the photographs in the iPhoto library which threatens to take over — and then take down — my computer I came across pictures of the kitchen pre-renovation.  Organizing the room around efficient storage was nothing short of transformative. Read the rest of this entry »

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When Art Meets Art (Meets Art)

It feels like a collaboration from another century — modern art greats coming together to create a production that pushes the limits in every way.  Great designer meets great architect meets great score meets great conductor.  The LA Philharmonic’s production of Don Giovanni on May 26 features costumes by Rodarte and stage sets by Frank Gehry.  The Mulleavy sisters brought their hair and make-up stylists from the runway to complete the look of the show.  Given how hauntingly beautiful their costumes for Black Swan were, the bar has been set pretty high for Kate and Laura Mulleavy when it comes to costume design.  From the looks of it, they will not disappoint this time either.  You go girls!  The sets and costumes are chilling and beautiful on their own.  Imagine Mozart playing, and this is one show that shouldn’t be missed.  Admittedly, for completely unknown reasons I’ve been feeling rather weepy of late, so that might have something to do with it, but the stills alone are giving me shivers.  Since I’m not likely to make it to Los Angeles this weekend, here’s hoping they reconsider the decision not to film this one time production.  Let’s start a movement now … maybe we can win them over by Saturday.

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Why Didn’t British Women Adore Adele

The fashion industry generally ascribes a direct correlation to the influence and celebrity of the woman who graces a magazine’s cover and the sales figures for that particular issue.  In this light, it seems that everyone can’t stop talking about the fact that BritishVogue featuring Adele on the cover was one of the worst selling issues in the magazine’s history.

And I would have to agree, that if number of sales reflects anything about popular response specifically to the magazine’s cover model (more than, for example, the stories highlighted on the cover), that is a surprising and I dare say disappointing fact.  What does it mean?  That BritishVogue readers may love Adele’s voice but don’t see her as a physical ideal to which they aspire?  My god, the woman is gorgeous. According to racked.com, British Vogue editor Alexandra Shulman said that “there has to be a relationship with the person on the cover that goes beyond how they look.”  So is it a failure of readers to connect with Adele.  That seems to me to make significantly less sense.  Are we really so superficial?

When asked who she was dying to get on the cover, Shulman replied that her choice would be Kate Middleton.  While I can’t understand, let alone articulate, what went wrong with the Adele cover, somehow Kate Middleton doesn’t seem to me like much better of a choice.  But who knows, maybe this is why I’m not the editor of British Vogue.

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Sometimes Life Really Shouldn’t Imitate Art

Clearly I am all for life imitating art, art imitating life, art in life, and style driven in equal parts by beauty, enthusiasm and a good sense of humor.  Still, the two are not entirely interchangeable and it seems lately like some people could use a little reminding about where the line is, however faint it may be.

On Tuesday, for the London premiere of Snow White and the Huntsmen, the stars showed up decked out in full Gothic glory.  I have been waiting not so patiently for the movie to come out.  I love that kind of dark Gothic drama.  On film.  And I admire actors like Christian Bale, or even Sascha Baron Cohen, who stay in character when appearing in public while promoting a film.  But Kristen Stewart and Charlize Theron’s dresses weren’t in character, they were simply misguided.  Somehow when Rooney Mara tries this type of thing, the whole look is so completely of a piece, and so genuine to her style, that for me it works.  But Stewart and Theron have their own looks which work for them, and this is not it.

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San Miguel de Allende

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