There are very few things I remember about visits to my grandparents on my father’s side of the family’s house, among them: the smell of stale cigars, the sight of an impossibly tall Christmas tree that seemed to stick around all year, and this incredibly loud, incessant banging noise that can only be made when a child’s hands discover the drum that was my grandparents brass tray coffee table. Granted the banging noises I remember were probably from my own fists, but somehow I’m not delighted by the sound 20-something years later.

So do you know what noise resounded in my mind (wrapped in the tinge of that yucky stale smoke smell) the entire time I flipped through this month’s Elle Decor? Yep, you got it

Our cover girl, Ellen Pompeo has no idea what she’s in for raising a child near that nightmarishly loud baby toy.

Perhaps she could take advice from the young couple on page 147 of the EXACT SAME ISSUE

Diego and April Uchitel have small children and they have this table which leads me to believe that they are not home much and they have a nanny. Or (cover your eyes margaret!) (I still love you!) Elle Decor hired the same stylist for both shoots.

Also, it means that this vintage table, having appeared twice in a single issue of Elle Decor, is hot hot hot.

PS Erin has one and I really hope she doesn’t read this post today so she can learn first hand how fun it is when Ike takes his first lap around it.

We are experiencing a major drought here in Texas.  My once lush green lawn is now on life support and with the city’s water restrictions the prognosis isn’t good.  Everyone in the lone star state has their hands clasped together in prayer for some serious serious sky water.  So, I’m not sure if I just have rain on the brain or if there really is a lightning bolt trend happening out there in the rest of the irrigated world.

This glorious wallpaper has been in my office wall inspiration folder for some time now.  I’ve written about the magic of Minakani wallpaper before and my love for them has only grown stronger since releasing this design.  Since my office renovation is scheduled to start next week (I’m doing it myself and just took a couple days off) I’ve had this design on my mind.

Then, low and behold, I spotted this genius art piece on one of my favorite blogs Me Melodia:

If ever I had the need to have a urinal in my home, it would most certainly be this Duchamp knockoff with lightning bolts by Hellovon.

Bombarded by TWO badass lightning bolt images, I decided to super sleuth the possible trend to see what else I could find.  Here’s what I dug up:

Admittedly, much of what I found was clothing – but doesn’t fashion usually preempt home decor?  There were gazillions of lightning bolt earrings, so, assuming that you’ve probably already seen them, I excluded them and only picked the best of the best.  This Miss Miln Lightning Dress from Asos certainly takes the cake.  If I had my way I would buy it and time warp back to 199X so I could wear it to the prom, then maybe I would have had a good time.  Note to self:  find a new date, too.

This lightning bolt skirt is feeding my craving for all things bright yellow.  And short.  At only $30 from Karma Loop, I think it just may become mine.  How rad would I look in my new lightning bolt office with this skirt?  It’s totally work appropriate, right?

Don’t worry dudes, I did find a few lightning items that will dress up your den, not your booty.  Like this watercolor from Etsy user HellsSewingCircle

Or this stamp set from another etsy artist, WhimsyByJess.  Get a load of that green background, pretty rad, Aye?

This laptop cover by another etsy user MichelleChristina will trendify your mac lighning quick

And finally, one last fashion image.  Sorry, but I thought it was too cute to pass up.  Etsy user Aeon’s lightning tee

Real quick like I want to say Thanks so much to Waxyhearts for her awesome guest post yesterday and Jen for her yellow, black and white roundup on Friday!  Stay tuned this week for lots of fun and excitement:  Tomorrow Even Cleveland will be ripping your heart out with some to-die-for-designs.  I’ll pose a design question for the ages on Thursday and Friday you really really won’t want to miss:  our own Mrs. Erin will be dropping by to give you all an update on la bambino and to finally make a public reveal of his little name.  Sadly, it’s not Berin.

Kisses!

Last Wednesday’s post about sweet little taxidermied feather puppies lead me down a rabbit hole of all things peacock.  It’s a really lovely tunnel to get stuck in, don’t get me wrong:  The saturated colors of the flightless birdie alone are enough to design an entire house around.  But, well, how long could you live in that house?  How many Kenley-inspired headbands do we have to see before we bid this trend adieu?  There is most definitely a peacock trend happening, but I can’t tell if it’s just getting started or if we’ve already seen enough.  What do you think?

Clockwise from top left:

Peacock Dinner Plate from Anthropologie

The Pugs that started it all, originally posted on our blog here

Green Feather Print Lampshade (that is seriously what they are calling this – not, um, peacock lampshade, do you think the word peacock is copywritten or something.  how lame) Anyway, you can buy it from the crazy brits here

Rise and Fall Peacock Pillow from Urban Outfitters

Also from Urban Outfitters (and only $14!!!!!) 30″ Peacock Printed Rug

Peacock throw pillow (decidedly more expensive than the rug – recession tip:  buy 2 rugs, sew them together & make a giant pillow) available here

Peacock tights, available all over the damn place, like here, here and here

Claw Money Customized Nike Vandal Hi, buy them here

The world’s most impractical place-mat set for real available here

Electric Peacock tee (I love that it’s nice and long) available from modcloth

Peacock don’t-use-plastic-save-the-earth bottle here

No matter what happens with the peacock trend, I’m pretty sure I’ll never get sick of this wallpaper from ferm living

Hanging Peacocks Here

World’s Best Peacock Necklace (my name) available from Bona Drag

So, what say you, are you going to order every single thing I posted today, or have you had your fill?

I am completely obsessed with following trends.  It’s an odd characteristic considering that my wardrobe is about as dull as it gets (hello jeans and a black t-shirt) and I would have had the same hairstyle since I was 20 if my hairdresser didn’t force her scissors and color upon me.  But, nonetheless, I love me some trend-spotting.

I treat the act of predicting next season’s color as though it were a sport and I’m always on the lookout for the animal du jour (you know the hipsters always have an animal, they’re just now getting over bears, fyi).  What I find most fascinating about trends is their evolution:  from the ‘04 hipster adoration of sweet little deer to the ‘06 demand for taxidermy; the leap from skulls etched on everything, to the less predictable pirate craze.  Most recently I’ve noticed a trend that has risen from the ashes of another well on it’s way out:  bullets and shells have evolved from the gun trend that has been set on, ahem, overkill, for a while.

Long-time friend Alex Reh, sorry, Alexander, left all of us Austinites for Industrial Design School in the Big Apple several years ago.  Apparently all those tuition fees were good for something because our native Texan walked out the doors of Pratt with this quaint shotgun shell chair in his portfolio.

Each Chair is made from 388 once-fired shotgun shells (I’m pretty sure he does this himself when he comes home to his ranch in Texas).  The Steel frame is gun-blued by hand, honestly, this finish almost rivals gold in my book, almost.

The buyer may choose from any of the bullet options above to work seamlessly with their decor.  All this customization can’t be cheap and Alex promises me that I can’t afford one.  And I thought we were friends.

I’ve been in love with his chair for a while and have been trying to coordinate an interview but apparently he’s working on new things and wanted to wait until they were done.  I was Patient-Pam for a few months but then I started seeing bullets and gun shells pop up everywhere and I knew I needed to do this post before the trend passed me by.

Sorry, Alex, I promise a follow up on your new goods whenever you’re ready.  

So, last week I was at a party during SXSW and caught the cute lady on the left wearing a bullet bolo tie, she was kind enough to let me snap a picture and mentioned that she found it on Etsy.  I managed to track down the artist, awelldressedbullet

At THE VERY SAME PARTY, I also spotted another gal with a bullet necklace, I forgot to snap her picture but I did grab her card.  Turns out, she’s the artist behind Unearthen, a lovely jewelry site with lots and LOTS of bullets.

I knew that the bullet thing was about to go all trend crazy and I had to move forward without Alex’s blessing.  I scoured the internet and found all of these bullet goodies:

Bullet Bracelet by Astali.  Man I love things in clusters.

Left: 22 Shell Necklace by etsy user oliveselkie; Right: Bullet, Padlock & Pearl Necklace by Etsy user sebastianjaramillo

Etsy continued to turn up the bullet charm with these finds as well:

Clockwise from top Left: Brass Bullet Belt Buckle by badassbeltbuckles; Mini Shotgun Shell belt buckle, also by badassbeltbuckles; Bottom Row: Shotgun Wedding Lights by awelldressedbullet

And, finally, rounding up the fashion portion of our program are these 2 t-shirts:

Lipstick Bullet, Left and Safety in Numbers, Right

Before you get all scared that this has become a fashion blog (remember I opened with a chair!) let me show you the few home goods I managed to dig up:

Clockwise from Top Left: Bullet Cocktail Shaker available at Amazon; Shotgun Canister at (wait for it) GREAT BIG STUFF (I’m so sifting through everything on this site after I write this post); Bullet Ice Cube Tray and the Bullets it produces along the bottom row.

This Bullet Vase by Robert Langhorn was easily the prettiest home decor item that I found, consider it the Y2K9 version of the gun vase

If you’re looking for something slightly less charming to cover your house with, might I suggest this:

Bullet Tape!  Who doesn’t want Bullet Tape?  It’s just so practical.

Speaking of practical:

Bullet ipod touch skin available here.  Does anyone even own the ipod touch?

And finally, if you hated todays post and want to send me a nasty letter, don’t send an email, do it the old fashioned way, using these:

Bullet Pens

Letters of praise are accepted as well, however, we encourage you to use the comments section for anything of a positive nature for speedy response.

Down here in Texas, I’ve been craving what you northerners have been taking for granted for months:  some snow days.  Last week, the hubs, Matt, my brother, Davis, his friend, Tom and I finally got our fix:  5 days in snowy Vail Colorado.  I got to walk in honest-to-god snow and see my breath when I dared to step outside, it totally ruled.  My trip also inspired this post of all white goodness.  I’ll bore you with some vacay pics first, then we’ll move along to view the stuff you’re here for:  decor porn

Tom, Davis & me about to make our first run of the day.  Note my big mug of chai, which I am rarely seen without.

Me, Matt, and Davis in our exceptionally fancy goggles

I monitor as Matt and Davis scrape 10 inches of overnight snowfall off my aunt’s car

K-dawg in front of the stable where aunt Darlene’s horse lives.  Please keep in mind that I’m wearing, like, 45 pounds worth of snowboarding gear, which hides my teeny tiny 13 inch (approx) waist line.

Ok, no one likes to look at other people’s pictures so I’ll quit the tomfoolery and move on to the meat of the post.

Several Months ago I posted this Nathan Ables print available from Tiny Showcase.  As fate would have it, Mr. Ables contacted the DC headquarters just days after my trip updating us on his newest work:

Nathan’s almost all white print, Two Roofs, merged seamlessly with my plans for an all white post.  Hooray, we’re all winners.  You may buy the limited edition print here

Clockwise from top left:

Bianco Pelle Quadatissimo (aka awesome ottoman) at myfab.com (It killed me not to post the gold version)

Snow Globe available here

DC fave: The Carlos Night Light, available here

Banana Bowl (also available in gold, hooray!) here

Cloud Umbrella from Joons Design

Design House, Muuto is stealing my heart six ways to Sunday with their plethora of oddly shaped white objects

Because I was feeling extra daring, I allowed myself to cruise over to the house of all things overpriced and unattainable, 1stdibs, just to glimpse at their white selection:

I could give you individual links to these items, but really, which of you readers is ready to shell out 25 large for a pair of hand chairs.  If you’ve got that kinda cash here are the options I am willing to present:  1. call your decorator and tell her to get her ass on the case, or the better choice, 2. contact me directly at hollaback@design-crisis.com, I will gladly take some of that extra green off your, um, hands.

If I were ever honestly willing to pay 1st dibs style prices, the only thing I could imagine shelling out serious dough for would be my favorite light ever from innermost.  There is no price mentioned on the site (surprise!) so I’m guessing it exceeds my $100 / light limit.  Yes, I know, I know, I could make it.  But who has time?  Plus, I don’t want it to end up looking like this.

Until now, my white obsession has mostly revolved around lamps, here are a few choice chairs to even things out:

clockwise from top:

Crochet Chair from whack-a-holic, Marcel Wanders

Chair that I can’t find the name of from Mathieu Lehanneur

Tropicalia Chair from Moroso (it’s really best in it’s multi-colored version)

Bouquet Chair also from Moroso (not sure about that stand, though)

Hechima 4 chair via atelier 29

If you’re looking for something lovely and white that is absolutely amazing but has no function what-so-ever, might I suggest this sculpture:

Kim Simonsson has a plethora of to-die-for pieces in her gallery, most of them make me swoon with their mixture of white and gold, but I wanted to stay on task like a good little blogger.

As I can’t afford a single item in my post today, but love clusters of white oddities, I’ve taken to buying toys from the thrift store and spray painting them white.  Here are 2 pieces from my, very slowly growing, collection.  Total cost: $3.75

Well, well, well, what will they think of next?  Certainly not butterflies, Mrs. Russell.  Sometimes it seems like just about anything could be a new trend, think of something you haven’t seen in awhile:  telephone books for example, when was the last time you saw them?  An item needs to be absent before it can be reborn with to a new perspective and adored.  Let’s explore this phonebook thing for a while, I’ll apply my scientifically formulated trend-worthy questions: Are they hovering on the verge of being nostalgic? check.  Easily recognized with bold colors?  check.  Firmly planted in the depths of the universal subconscious?  And Check.  hmmm, in my babbling I think I may be on to something:  phone books will be next season’s new black.  For now, I’m feeling something equally arbitrary:  cross sections and topography.  Totally random, right?  But still, somehow, it’s everywhere.

I caught my first glimpse of some trend-worthy cross sections when I purchased this Josh Keyes print from Tiny Showcase (ps, if you happen to know where the hell I put it, I will totally give you a dollar).  I instantly fell in love with the small sections of land Keyes meticulously slices off for his animals to live on.  His work speaks to the ever-growing human population and their encroachment upon natures little creatures, so it’s a bit sad, but man if it isn’t pretty.  Let’s see more:

I’ve been drooling over Keyes’s work for ages and skipping the starbucks in hopes to one day save enough dough for a real painting, not just a print.  I had never seen anything like it.  So imagine my surprise when I saw this ad campaign for a Ukrainian Travel Agency:

So similar to Keyes’s work, just without all that we’re stealing the sweet cute baby animal land stuff.  I have to admit, while these works are lovely,  Keyes is still my fave.  

If I wanted a real-honest-to-god cross section hanging around my house, I’d most certainly hunt down the work of Rainbow Monkey:

let’s play archeologist and get a closer look at this bit of earth we’ve discovered

I have blue rocks in my backyard, too, what a coincidence!  

With 3 confirmed artists creating cross section art, I started to keep my eyes peeled.  I began to notice cross sections popping up everywhere, from realistic shots of actual earth, to meticulous topographical paper carvings: 

Silver Lake Operations #1, Lake Lefroy, Western Australia, 2008 3/10

Isn’t it funny that, after looking at several fake cross sections, this real one seems like a bit of a bummer?  If you pull Edward Burtynsky’s Australian Minescape out of the context of this post, however the photographs become epic, and even mirror the work of Keyes:  documenting human destruction of the land.  Ok, on to something less depressing:  Birthday Cards, yay! 

Etsy Artist, Crafterall carves topographic wading pools and ravines into her notecards, combining enough color and texture to make the blank cards speak for themselves.  This is perfect for me because I never really know what to write in those anyway.  Thank you for the gift……you’re awesome?  (But don’t worry, I’m from the south and therefore have manners and, yes, I always send thank you notes, just not very interesting ones)

Noriko Ambe takes the whole paper-carving thing to a whole new level, carving entire landscapes into her works

Crazy-insane?  Right?  But so amazingly beautiful

Incase you designophiles were worried that I was missing the decor section of today’s post:  fear not!  I managed to find two home goods companies that are buckled in tight on the cross section-trend-bandwagon:

Forsberg has created a line of silver topographic plates.  I, of course, am waiting for them to come out in gold.  

And Gore Design Co. has a line of STUNNING concrete topographical sinks:

I usually lean towards the very simple when it comes to things like basins and tubs, shying away from anything as outrageous as, say, a pedestal sink but these topographic sinks really get my heart racing.  I strongly urge you to stop by their site to check out more of their lovely works.

So, next time you’re cruising along a ravine and see a big piece of exposed earth, remember who told you about it first.

Peace Out Homies!

I know I’m supposed to be bombarding you with the best review of Top Design this side of the Mason Dixon line BUT I had an art opening to go to last night (for the lovely miss Hope Perkins) and had to DVR the decorating bloodbath.  I’ll be watching it post haste and will immediately run back to my computer to give you the play-by-play of your dreams.  In the mean time, I’m hoping to hold you over while strangling the last bit of life out of this animal trend:

So, let’s talk about ibride.  The first time I saw their trays I was 100% smitten, then I saw them 67 more times and was a little over the phenomenon, now I’ve seen them 432 times and thought I never wanted to see them again until they released their new line last week at the  MAISON & Objet exhibition in Paris.  So, what do we think now:

Do we like them more or less than the trays I got at the thrift store this week? (try not to let my professional photos and the $1.99 neon green price tag sway you):

Discuss

Sorry to interrupt the long weekend but this is mjr.  heads on walls are running rampant throughout the east coast, which means we’ll be seeing them here in Austin in about a year and Wal-mart will have head wall covering kits in about 3 years:

no, this is not a mexican wrestling mask shop or the dumping ground for a failed hollywood cliched comedy, it is a mask covered wall in Philly restaurant Distrito by Creme Design.  See more:

I have to say, when it comes to walls covered in heads, I’m loving the skulls over at Goldbar so much more.  This place is pretty cute when taken in context, though. I do think those tables in pic 3 are pretty presh.

Ok, that’s it, resume long weekend.