Blogs: A Great Design Resource!

 I have started to get announcements from vendors about their blogs, the latest being Schumacher. 

Schumacher

I hadn't really thought about exploring vendor blogs until recently--since I started my own blog (smile).  They are a fantastic design resource!  
Since I began surfing blogs,  I now see websites  as a formal and fairly static internet resource, and blogs as an outlet for current news, thoughts and observations.  Vendor blogs are great because they are talking about their passion (like every blogger) ----which is their product!   What's really nice is that they also link and discuss other design sites and products that you might not find out about otherwise.

Maison 21's favorite Schumacher fabrics

For instance, Schumacher's blog recently had a post about Traditional Home magazine's new interactive weblink.  You know how you look at a photo spread in a magazine and wonder where the products you like can be purchased?  Well, you can now go to Traditional Home's website; they have linked the items in the issue's room photo to the vendors!  It works great--they even have paint colors linked!  As a fabric and furniture manufacturer, Schumacher is interested in  this because it can be a link back to their product--a win-win situation for both customer and manufacturer!

Traditional Home

Another blog I like is Circa Lighting's.  First of all, I love their lighting products! 

Circa Lighting

Which makes me want to know more information:  how does a particular light look in a room, what about sizing lighting correctly? What other inspiration and ideas do they have around lighting?  What new products do they have and what designers do they like?  It's all here!

Finally, a shout out to my sister's company's blog for Dominion Electric Supply - "Enlightening"!  A great resource for what's up and coming in lighting, presented in an easy, conversational form.  It is very different from their website which is more technical in nature.

Get out there and blog!

Is Less...More?

It seems so, looking at this video!  Twenty-four rooms in 330 square feet?!  Truly amazing when you see the video, but could you really live in it?  Or more specifically, could an American, used to larger spaces in general, live in such a small space?

Interestingly enough, House Beautiful magazine's theme this month is "Is Small the New Big?" and features designer David Kaihoi's NYC one bedroom apartment that is 390 square feet.  He lives there with this wife and daughter.  It sounds amazing until you read that their daughter shares their only bedroom!  How long can that last?! 


The rich colors of this New York apartment made me feel like I was inside a Godiva chocolate, so warm and rich!  Very different from the mirrored, stainless steel apartment in Hong Kong.   Two such different approaches to small spaces!   Do you think you could live in either of these spaces?  Alone or with your family?!


Reading the Washington Post today, is an article of a family of five who lived on a small sailing ship for seven--yes SEVEN years!  24/7 with each other in a space the size of a standard hotel room.  The father said as soon as they left their port in Maryland all sibling rivalry stopped...Hard to imagine!


Perhaps our larger spaces are leaving us more isolated....something to think about...