socal

This is a photo of a woman that I took in HB. You can't tell from this photo but she was perhaps the coolest person I have ever seen. She was taking photographs of surfers the day before the US Open of Surfing started. Perfect jeans, striped shirt and hat. I really wanted to know who she was but chickened out when my chance came to chat her up. I kept wondering if she had ever made an appearance on The Sartorialist blog.

I am back tracking a little today. I am finally publishing a post about a trip to SOCAL that we took at the beginning of the summer. Richard had some work to do down in Huntington Beach and we both had people we wanted to visit in Palm Springs and LA so we took about 5 days and headed out.

dessert before Palm Springs

cabazon dinosaur

My friend Kelsey was in Palm Springs for the weekend so we drove down for the night to join him. We decided to drive through the dessert. I ended up getting caught in a CHP speed trap and now have to pay a $332. fine. The scenary was gorgeous though. I am trying to remember how beautiful it was and not how irritated I was at getting the ticket.

The photos above are from the lobby at our friend Roger's office. We went to see him once we got into LA. I just love how the spirit of old Hollywood glamour pops up in the most unexpected places.

Chicken Boy

While in LA we had dinner in Highland Park. I was a little scared by the landmark over the restaurant but learned later that Chicken Boy is a benevolent landmark. You can read all about it here.

I have quite a few photos of our trip that I uploaded to flickr that you can view if you want more but for now I close with some of the gorgeous flowers that fill up most of Los Angeles in the summer. Anything will grow there and the weather keeps everything thriving.

Thanks for looking!

stephanie's garden wall phase 2

Today we started really digging into the Stephanie wall project. I pulled out my bag of pigments and opened the cans of simulated milk paint that we bought from Olde Century Simulated Milk Paint and we started mixing plaster and paint colors.

The first step was to lay down two distinct layers of plaster. One in a pale gold tone and the other, a dark earth color. Then we outlined a few prominent areas where trees would go.

Richard painted in a light mountain range across the wall and I painted in a nice beeswax color to give the wall some warmth.

We then washed over the bottom brown layer with a darker brown color and started painting in the first layer of trees and bushes.


Towards the end of the day we went back over a few of the darker painted areas with plaster that we will then paint over with lighter bushes and reeds. Above is the last picture of the day. We won't be picking it up again for at least a week as I am off to NYC in the morning.

I hope to be mobile blogging about my trip while I'm away. I am really looking forward to seeing the High Line and spending some time in Hudson. More soon!

Thanks for looking!

sfgirlbybay

I was checking in with one of my favorite bloggers and was surprised and flattered to see a few photos from my flickr account in one of her posts today. Victoria just started a great flickr group called sfgirlbybay that consists of mainly photos of home interiors. I am always inspired by photos and stories I see and read on her blog and was thrilled to join her group.Thank you for including me in your story about the group Victoria! You ROCK!

I'm sure everyone knows about how fabulous her blog is but just in case you don't here's a link to sfgirlbybay.

stephanie garden apartment project day 1

the end of day one

2 weeks ago I blogged about starting a project for my friend Stephanie. She has this great apartment that looks out onto a gorgeous ivy and jasmine covered fence. It really feels like a garden in there. Anyway, today was the day I actually started the project and I am really happy with the completion of phase one. Tomorrow is phase 2 and I am really hoping to get it all done.

Phase one included playing with pigment in the plaster and patching rough areas on the wall. Tomorrow I will go over the entire wall with pigment tinted plaster and then Richard and I will paint in the landscape scene on top of the almost dry plaster. SO FUN!!!!

I will be plastering the wall and then painting a mural on top of it, inspired by the one shown in the inspiration page above.

This is the apartment right before Stephanie moved in.

This is one of the pieces we picked up at a flea market. We will install it once the vision for the place comes together a little bit more. Not sure if we are going to paint it yet.

I found this little gem at the Alameda flea market. The plan is to buy an actual slices of a log for the top of it. I think it was a bird bath but will be a fabulous end table when we get finished with it.

I love a good interior project. I just can't wait to see what we end up with tomorrow.

Thanks for looking!

stephanie and the garden apartment

This is a before photo of the room we will be working on

About a year ago my friend Stephanie moved into her apartment. The view from the main room looks out to vines and trees and really feels like a garden. Just recently we discussed truly embracing the garden theme and painting a fresco on one of her walls. This is something I've done in the past and really enjoyed. Richard agreed to give me a hand and now we are just putting all of the pieces of the puzzle together. We should start working on it next week. I am still working out the details but I thought I would share some of the photos that are inspiring the project. I am not totally sure which magazines hey all came from but they are most certainly Nest and World of Interiors. My hands down favorites.

I can't wait to get started!!! I will be posting progress photos as we go.

beach chair recovery project

Last summer I bought two great vintage beach chairs at a flea market for $5.00. The fabric was cracking with age so they couldn't really be used. I decided to put them into storage until the time was right to recover them. Last weekend I was cleaning up my storage locker and I found them again. I decided it was time and I went out looking for fabric. I went to a few places to try to find a fresh beach stripe, like the original but I find it is a lot more difficult to find classic anything especially stripes. I decided to go in a new direction and headed out to IKEA.

I ended up finding two really great designs. They aren't exactly classic beach chair fabrics but I really like the look of the two together.

I took off one of the covers from the chairs and cut my new fabric to match. I then sewed and stapled my new covers onto the freshly cleaned and waxed beach chair frames and I swear they look brand new! I can't wait to take them to the beach!




Thanks for looking!

needlepoint

I have been an admirer of needlepoint for many years but never really thought of it seriously for me. Since the Brigid Berlin Show in NY back in October and of course the Johnathan Adler pillows I had thought about dabbling in it. It wasn't until our last trip to Cape Cod that the idea really took hold. Richards mom has done a lot of needlepoint over the years and there are these great well worn pillows all over the house of the family dog or initials of her children. There was something really comforting about it and when we got back to California I decided to give it a shot.

I bought two really great needlepoint books from around the mid 70's (thank you ebay) I love the covers.

I also found a great screen of a deer that will be perfect for my friend Brody's birthday. I found a great place here in SF called Elaine Magnin. The woman there helped me choose thread and offered some great advice. Now I just have to get started. I have a short time to get it all done but I tend to be a little bit obsessive so off I go!

This one even comes with a sample screen and sample thread.

I should have a good chunk done by next week. I will post an update when I have a respectable portion done.

Thanks for looking!