Conversation Pits

It seems to me that conversation pits are begging for re-invention. When I was a kid, my grandfather had them in both his New York city living room and the house he rented during the summers. They were very much a product of their time -- heavily carpeted and populated by large couches and very little else. Back then, and still now, they were generally found in contemporary structures and were designed with a modern aesthetic. Today, houses have expanded in size and so have conversation pits -- which kind of defeats the purpose. My ideal sunken living room would reside in a small mountain lodge. Its focal point would be a simple stone fireplace. A tweed couch and a couple of leather club chairs would surround it and a vintage trunk between them would be filled with board games. All the makings of smores would be stored year-round in an antique jelly cupboard nearby. The space would be perfect for enjoying good company or for curling up alone with a wool blanket and a great read.

Me in the summer house conversation pit.

Images: Ouno Design, Redfin, The Room Vote, The Insane Domain, She Moves the Furniture.

Shop: Izzi & Popo

Australia is on my short list of countries to visit (along with Argentina and Norway) and European vintage emporium Izzi & Popo is at the top of the grouping of shops I'd have to visit. This place features some of my favorite varieties of vintage -- leather club chairs, suitcases, hat molds and shoe forms, farmhouse furniture, old hardware and enamelware. When it comes to unique vintage finds, I've been known to search far and wide -- even if it means traveling to the other side of the globe.

Store Counter

Cupboard

Perpetual Calendar

Monastery Table

Coat Hangers

Journals

Enamelware

Images: Izzi & Popo.

Tartan

When I was planning the shop opening a year ago, six large frames of tartan book plates came up for auction and I knew I had to have them. I'm usually able to walk away from something if the price climbs higher than the number I assign to it, but occasionally something like these book plates comes along that I'm willing to be flexible about because I know it's that unique. I don't think I have any Scottish in me, but I've always been drawn to tartans and plaids. With her love of the pattern, Vivienne Westwood can do no wrong in my eyes. And when winter is approaching, a tartan blanket or accent wall of fabric shows that there's beauty in being stuck indoors. Tartan often goes hand-in-hand with one of my favorite styles -- gentleman's club (see previous post) -- in a variety of forms from wallpaper to covered boxes. It casts such a spell that it makes me nostalgic about things that have never featured prominently in my life -- fox hunts and hot toddies and chilly castles on the moors.

Images: RevivalSmith. Lonny magazine, Feb/March 2010 issue. Three Pixie Lane. Hoscote. Elle Decor. Wasabi Peas. Apartment Therapy. Room Rx. 

Gentlemen's Club

When I opened the most recent issue of Inside Out magazine, I fell instantly in love with the NYC apartment of sisters Hollister and Porter Hovey (names like that belong in a Wes Anderson script). Their style (evident in the first two pics) gives me a chance to tout the glories of the "gentlemen's club" aesthetic -- a style I have long admired for its unapologetic masculinity and for the fact that it reminds me of England. To be clear, we're not talking about strip club decor. The gentlemen's clubs in question were first established in the West End of London in the eighteenth century. They were members-only clubs for upper-class men to socialize, play parlor games, dine, and sometimes retreat for the night. Dark walls, shelves full of books, lit fireplaces, leather club chairs, ancestral art and animal skins and antlers are all welcome in this environment. These are rooms for retreating from a rainy day or an unrelenting winter. They are spaces to sink into with a favored book and a hot cup of Earl Grey while noshing on shortbread.

Images: Inside Out magazine, July-August 2011 issue. Living etc magazine, September 2011 issue. Simply Seleta. Decoratualma.