Swoon Interiors

interiors that make your heart skip a beat.

Complete Randomness

So sorry for the lack of posts this week. Now that school and fall are both in full swing, it has been a busy week of school activities and new client projects. So please excuse the complete randomness of this post but I thought I’d just share a few things a came across this week that made me swoon.

Grand Wingback Chair
giant typewriter keys.

Taken with my iphone:
Calvin Klein rug
A pretty new collection at Serena and Lily …

table linens
Love the simplicity of this line drawing. Feels like something you’d find at a great flea market or estate sale …
Jockeys
Oooh … how about the color scheme and wallpaper on the cover of House Beautiful that came in my mailbox …
Spotted this on Pinterest …
At this time of year, we all tend to take on too much … I often need to remind myself that sometimes it’s all right to keep things simple.
Hope everyone has a wonderful (and simple!) weekend!

My quest for romance with a kitchen rug …

Up until two nights ago, we did not have a rug under our kitchen table. I’ve gone back and forth on it for a long time.  Of course, I thought it would look better with a rug, but since I spend inordinate amounts of time on my hands and knees wiping up what seems like half a meal after each breakfast/lunch/dinner, I have been afraid to put a rug down in fear of what it might look like after just a few meals.

Then I thought that perhaps if I found one that wasn’t too expensive, I wouldn’t feel so bad about it if it didn’t hold up for very long. Several fine candidates crossed my path.

First there was Mr. Nate Berkus Rug. It was love at first sight when I saw it on the set of his daytime talk show when it first aired. (Swoon.)

At the time, I didn’t even know that he was selling it on HSN.com. Sadly, by the time I figured it out, they were all sold out in the size I needed. 

Now they are no longer available at all. (I go on periodically to check, but no such luck.)

With that in my head, I was attracted to other bold stripes. I love how Nate himself used a boldly patterned rug in his own Chicago pad.
So then along came Mr. Wisteria Rug. I loved the soft green color and the thin dhurrie-style. My heart fluttered when I saw it in the catalog. The price was right, but the size wasn’t. A 9 x 12. (I needed a 6 x 9.)

It’s been a while and I have searched around but nothing else made me swoon. Sure there where some handsome ones, but they may have been too fancy for my kitchen.  I needed one that wasn’t afraid to get a little dirty. I found more stripes but not in the soft colors I was looking for.
Then maybe just a month ago I opened the latest Ballard catalog and … 

Perfection.  Suzane Kasler’s Wide Stripe Jute Rug.  I loved the durability and texture of the jute.  And, he had stripes to boot!  The paprika-orange would tie in nicely with the rug and some of the pillows I have in my adjoining family room. And, there was even a 6×9. (Which, I discovered, are somewhat hard to come by.) 
Ok, so with the start of summer, the weeks began to fly by.  Finally, one day I had a free moment, sat down at my computer and pulled up the rug online with my credit card in hand.  Choose color. Choose size. But wait … there in parenthesis next to 6×9 were the dreaded words I hate to see. NO LONGER AVAILABLE.
Ugh!
Surely this couldn’t be so! He was my perfect match!  Right away I called Ballard just to make sure. Nope they were all gone. Sold out quickly. Won’t be making any more. 
Really?  Are you sure they won’t be making any more? I mean, if it was so popular, couldn’t they … pretty please … make some more?
Sorry. No more information.
Where to turn? Now that I had been thinking about that rug for several weeks, I couldn’t get it out of my mind. And while I had been unsure about getting a rug at all before, I was now determined that my little breakfast area was definitely in need of a rug.
Hmmm.  Okay … so none of those other rugs were meant to be. Usually things happen for a reason. Maybe I just wasn’t supposed to get stripes.  But jute … one of the things I loved about the Ballard rug was the natural jute.  Maybe I should just look for a plain jute rug.
So I started looking again. But I was a little like Goldilocks … a 5×8 is too small. An 8×10 is too big. A 6×9 would be just right. But no one seemed to carry a 6×9. 
When I run out of places to look, I often check on Overstock.com.  It is hit or miss, but they have such a large inventory of, well, everything at such great prices so I figured it was worth a look.
And that’s where I found him. A beautiful 6×9 jute rug for under $200!
  It was meant to be.
I didn’t want fringe (too hard to get crumbs out of) and I didn’t want binding. So it was perfect. The reviews were great too. Done.
So the rug arrived last Friday and sat all rolled up through the weekend since we were out of town.  I was excited to get back and lay it down (after a thorough cleaning of the floor below the table) … but of course, as often happens … I was still feeling a little nervous that I had made the right decision.  After all, it is not easy to send a rug back. 
Back home, I was reading some of my favorite blogs and came across this one by Emily A. Clark all about finding the perfect rug for her family room.  What did she decide on? Jute!
And in her post she mentioned how another of my favorite bloggers, Lauren Liess of Pure Style Home had influenced her decision with her post comparing all of the different kinds of natural rugs.
I clicked on over to Pure Style Home and was so pleased as I read Lauren’s words …
“1) MAINTENANCE: laughable. I took the WORST care ever of our jute rugs & they looked fine. They kind of eat your dirt. You can just vacuum them. I’ve had ours in the kitchen & even spilled salsa (I know, gross!) in ours and just wiped it with a rag & then blotted it with a wet rag to get the stain out.

2)PETS: Great for pets. Like I said, these things eat your dirt so they just sort of suck up the hair & you can vacuum it off.
3) SOFTNESS FACTOR: There are a lot of jute-chenille blends that are actually very soft but full jute isn’t as soft. Jute is thicker than sisal & seagrass and also softer, but still not super-soft unless it’s a blend. Ours is full jute and it is more like a foot-massager (which I love to walk on) but I wouldn’t recommend it for a kids’ play area or somewhere that you want to hang out on the floor.

4) STYLE FACTOR: I LOVE the look of jute. It’s so chunky & warm-looking and adds so much texture to a room. “

A foot massager that eats dirt?  Who could ask for anything more? I think these two ladies were sending me a sign.
So we rolled him out and yes ….
… he makes me swoon.

And two breakfasts, two lunches and one dinner later, he still looks good.

He might actually save my sanity because I can no longer see (i.e. obsess) over every little crumb that falls. Yes, I know they are still there, and I will still vacuum … just maybe not after every meal.

Designer Finds: Overstock

Don’t you love when a high-end designer creates an “affordable” line of products? Target is great at snagging big names to develop fun clothing and home decor for their stores. 

Apparently, Overstock is in on the game too. Thom Filicia has a great collection of rugs on Overstock right now at unbelievable prices and they are selling out fast.  Below are some of my favorites. Each come in a variety of sizes and colorways.



Handmade Tioga Ink Blue Rug

Handmade Chatam Lawn Green Rug

Handmade Danforth Indoor/ Outdoor Indian Red Rug



Handmade Ackerman Indoor/ Outdoor Sunflower Rug 

Although some of them are considered indoor/outdoor, I think they would still be great in a more casual space … especially with little ones underfoot.  A breakfast room, entry hall, playroom, sun porch … just the right punch of color, texture or pattern to transform a room. What do you think?

Lovely for Less: Jonathan Adler rug

I love the look of these blue chevron rugs.

1
via Houzz

via Decorpad

Recently I saw that the Johnathan Adler website has a really cool feature where you can design your own rug. Pick the size, pattern, background color, fabric, the whole shebang. I came up with this …

The cost? $1050 for a 5×7. Hmmm.

Just so happens that Urban Outfitters sells this ….

The cost? $69.00 for a 5×7.

While I’ve finally come to the realization that I may be too old to shop for clothes at Urban Outfitters much longer (if it all?), they have a surprisingly swoon worthy collection of rugs and home decor items that certainly fall under the category Lovely for Less. Here’s just a few I spied at first glance …

CoCo Cabana Chair $189
Slipper chair $329
Industrial Vintage Rolling Side Table $169
 

Lovely for Less: Home Decorators

Do you get Home Decorators catalog in the mail?  If you look really closely, you’ll see that they have quite a few … shall we say … replicas (sounds nicer than knockoffs)… of some pretty high end pieces you may have seen elsewhere. And some of them are pretty spectacular.  See for yourself …

Sundance 1934 Dining Chair $245

Home Decorators Garden Chair $89

Layla Grace’s Somerset Bay Essex Chest $3,461  
Home Decorator’s Left Bank Chest $259 
Circa Lighting Stacked Ball Glass Table Lamp $1,190

Home Decorators Lafayette Table Lamp $249

Madeline Weinrib’s Mandala Rug Beige and Blue (many, many thousands of dollars) 
Home Decorator’s Rosa Area Rug Ivory and Navy $279 for a 5’x8″ 
Neiman Marcus Arched Mirror $750
Home Decorators Amiel Arched Mirror $239
Restoration Hardware’s Brickmaker’s Coffee Table $1,360  
Home Decorator’s Holbrook Coffee Table $329  
Circa Lighting Desmond Table Lamp $483
Home Decorators Adonis Table Lamp $129
Aidan Gray Cushion Le Jardin from Layla Grace $225
Home Decorators Louvre Square Cushion $24

Aiden Gray French Pillow from Layla Grace $105

Home Decorators Belle Jardiniere Pillow $34

 See …  In some cases, I think I even like the Home Decorators version better.  It’s a great lesson in decorating and something I think we all do in fashion as well.  We see an $800 dollar lamp or a $2000 dress that we love in a magazine. No, of course we’re not going to buy it … but we can be inspired by it to look for something with similar lines, colors, patterns, etc. that is a little more friendly to the pocketbook. 

What are some of your favorite “Lovely for Less” pieces?