A pre-weekend treat, the stylings of Jamo Associates

Yay for the weekend! And yay for the first weekend where it'll be up in the 80's here in NY. Hopefully these images will prep you and help you get through the last few hours of you day. Have a great weekend!



















great composition!

This bedroom I am just in love with - my favorite I've seen in a long time!



via Jamo Associates

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Beautiful Bright Eye Candy

I was looking for some particular images today but I couldn't find them...grrr. But not all is lost - I found some really bright and sunny laid back interiors while searching. And we can't have too much prettiness now can we?

I love the light here

the tree branch is such a nice surprise in place of flowers...

check out the bathroom storage!

What I wouldn't give to walk through my door to such serenity

...in my humble opinion, your work surface can never be too large...


so cheerful!




via House Beautiful

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A new life style I'm into: Wabi Sabi

So I'm thinking maybe I've been living under a rock, but it was only a few weeks ago that I found out about Wabi Sabi. While perusing through Maven Momma's blog I stumbled across a post describing Wabi Sabi and how it is such a joyful part of her could-be chaotic life.

I was hooked when I read this:

"It is truly a gift to live so closely with a child. I am remembering again what living in only the present is all about. The delightful child-sized messes around the house, the joy of beautiful food prepared according to baby time (which seems to stretch into infinity), the imperfection that can't be helped is all priceless..."

"First, I de-cluttered. Then I de-cluttered again. If 'it' isn't truly important or necessary, it gets recycled, donated or trashed. Then I started eating simply, and consciously, remembering this old Zen teaching: When alone, eat as though you are entertaining guests, When entertaining guests, eat as though you are alone. I began to better understand that all of our battered belongings are beautiful with evidence of their years of usefulness, and I began to feel that way about myself, too."

via Maven Mama


...so wonderfully wabi sabi...

These are two of the images she chose to represent Wabi Sabi, which she sums up as "Its roots in Zen Buddhism, wabi sabi is about the perfection of impermanence and imperfection. " I think this is such a wonderful philosophy! I can relate because I often find the most comfort not in new things, but in a coat that has fit me and warmed me from day one....and while worn through the years, still continues to do so wonderfully. There's just a contentment and satisfaction in that you have to know to understand.
via Maven Mama

I still have a lot of reading to do before I feel like I really grasp wabi sabi, and I'm sure that it ends up being something different for everyone, but below are some images that to me, atleast, I could see the wabi sabi...

...maybe it's furniture and tools that have been with you for years, and thought they might not all "match," the fact that they've served you so well makes them beautiful.


Uncluttered spaces are very wabi sabi!

live plants are something very important to me
via Apartment Therapy




via The Inspired Room


I love the "table" beside the tub.

via The Poetic Home

Here's a nice article I found on iVillage which tries to break it down a bit, or atleast help you get started:

Cultivate Your Wabi-Sabi Sensibility in 10 Easy Steps

1. Quiet your home. Most of us contend with a daily onslaught of motors and machines ‑- not to mention the human noise generated by the Loud Family next door. You can bring nourishing quiet into your home through structural changes such as better windows and cork floors or with smaller fixes such as heavy window draperies and rubber mats for your kitchen appliances. Even better, leave the dishwasher turned off and wash the dishes by hand. This quiet task can be a meditation in itself.
2. Give yourself sacred space. Don't deny yourself the luxury of a dedicated meditation room or space. If you don't have an extra room for this, find a special rug that you can unroll in a corner to designate the space.
3. Clear the clutter. Start slowly, uncluttering your house one drawer or closet at a time. Keep clutter from overwhelming you by spending 15 minutes at the end of the day clearing away all that's accumulated. Get rid of one item for everything you bring in. And create plenty of storage ‑- built-in storage is ideal ‑- to keep it all contained.
4. Appreciate imperfection. Don't throw out that much-loved but chipped vase, the old wooden coffee table that bears the scars of toddlers and adults alike, or that old tarnished goblet. Begin your wabi-sabi journey by letting the paint on an old chair crumble or by hanging antique doors. Be wary of counterfeits: True wabi-sabi eschews mass-produced distress for real antiques and flea market finds. Also be wary of taking the "wabi-slobby" approach and entering into überdistress ‑- wabi-sabi is never messy or slovenly. Worn things take on their magic only in settings where it's clear they don't harbor bugs or grime.
5. Take inspiration from nature's color palette. Borrow colors from the autumnal landscape ‑- hues ranging from soft slate gray to matte gold, with occasional spots of rust breaking the subtle spectrum ‑- for a serene, wabi-sabi look. Take a long walk in March or November, and let nature inspire you.
6. Make it yourself. Nothing compares to the satisfaction of curling up with an afghan you made yourself. But perhaps more importantly, there's the calming, centering act of setting stitch upon stitch, slowly building something that no machine could make better. You say you're just not crafty? Anyone can make collages (using magazine and newspaper clippings, flowers and leaves, wrapping paper), dry flowers (just hang them upside down in a closet) or create an indoor rock garden (it only takes a few).
7. Bring nature indoors ‑- no matter what the season. Open yourself up to a whole new world of flower-arranging prospects. Pick a few stems of the chicory growing between the sidewalk cracks and let them settle into an old bottle or a rusty can. In winter, gather a basket full of dried grasses and seedpods. Wabi-sabi flower arrangements follow no rules or regulations ‑- except for one. They should honor the current season.
8. Bring in pieces of soul. What gives a home soul? A sepia-tone photograph of your grandmother as a young bride. Linens your mother embroidered. Your five-year-old's artwork. Getting the picture?
9. Study the masters. William Morris, Frank Lloyd Wright and Charles and Ray Eames all came under the wabi-sabi influence ‑- whether they knew it or not.
10. Try the candle trick. So, you come home at the end of a long day and the dog's been on the sofa again and the breakfast bowls are still full of dried oatmeal, and the entry hall still needs a coat of paint. Turn out the lights and light some candles. Nothing looks quite so bad when the atmosphere is dim and flickering.

What do you think? Does anyone have any advice for me in getting started or things that have worked for you/I should keep in mind?

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Check out my guest post over at the City Sage about retro decor!

Ashley from Decorology here! I think I love retro and vintage so much because it enables me to create an environment reminiscent of times when people couldn't talk on the phone while shopping for groceries, didn't eat dinner in front of the TV, and put a little more effort in personal presentation (i.e. - a time where Uggs would not be considered acceptable in the workplace - or in public for that matter) Not that I'm not guilty of weary sneakers to work from time to time....I think part of it is that we are so rushed the idea of living this way seems completely out of one's grasp. Maybe - with a little effort - if you decorate for a life where one can stop to smell the roses, one day you can!

I love this mix of modern an vintage - the classic white and black palette holds it all together (via Country Living).

Retro or vintage can be so many things - glamorous luxury, cozy and artsy, or clean and refined (via House Beautiful).


For those of us who don't have the budget - retro and "vintage" reproductions are pretty easy to find...(via Ideal Home).

country-style vintage...(via Poetic Home).

(via CasaSugar).


See the post and more at The City Sage

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The unimaginable but true mansion - Grey Gardens

I've seen the posters up in the subway for HBO's movie "Grey Gardens," but I hadn't paid much attention until this morning. I was cyber-flipping through the New York Times Home & Garden section when a black and white thumbnail image of a dilapidated mansion captioned "Inside Grey Gardens" caught my attention. I clicked, and thus began my morning-long search on the back story and photos of this intriguing house.

From the New York Times:

A 1975 documentary captured the eccentric lives of Edith Bouvier Beale, known as Big Edie, and her daughter, Little Edie, in Grey Gardens, the filthy, dilapidated mansion they occupied in East Hampton.

Two years after Big Edie died in 1977, Little Edie sold the house to Sally Quinn and Benjamin C. Bradlee, who undertook a massive renovation. These photographs, which have never been seen by the public before, were taken by a photographer hired by Ms. Quinn at the time she and her husband purchased the house, in order to capture the extent of the decay.


When Ms. Quinn touched a key on this piano in the living room, the whole thing collapsed and fell through the floor.


Ms. Quinn recalled that after Little Edie put the house on the market for $220,000, she turned down several potential buyers, fearing they would tear it down and build something new. "I walked in and said 'this is the most beautiful house I've ever seen,' And she said, 'it's yours,'" Ms. Quinn said. "Then she did this little pirouette in the hall of the house, put her hands up in the air and said 'All it needs is a coat of paint!'"


Among the debris Ms. Quinn and Mr. Bradlee found in their house were the corpses of cats and skulls of raccoons. Here, scattered seashells and piles of books occupy one of the ten bedrooms.

Ms. Quinn said she fell in love with the house as soon as she entered it. "There's something magical about this house. You couldn't walk into it without putting a handkerchief over your nose, but I thought it was just beautiful," she said. "It just absolutely gripped me. I looked at it and I saw what the house could be like, saw what the garden could be." Above, the main staircase as seen from the second floor.

"I wasn't sure I wanted to buy the house," Mr. Bradlee said. "There were 52 dead cats in it, and funeral arrangements had to be made for each one." Above, the master bedroom, which had been used by Big Edie.

Just before closing on the house, Ms. Quinn was sitting in the sun room with her mother when Lois Wright, a longtime friend of Big Edie, unexpectedly entered the room. "She said, 'I just appeared to bring you a message from Big Edie. She wanted you to have this house and wants you to know that you were meant to have it and that she's watching over you and that everything will go absolutely perfectly,'" Ms. Quinn recalls. Above, Big Edie's glass menagerie fills a cabinet in one of the bedrooms. Ms. Quinn had both the cabinet and the figurines restored.

Quinn Bradlee, the couple's adult son, says he and his mother sometimes joke that they will end up like Big Edie and Little Edie. "My mom and I, we do argue a lot. But I think the way [the Beales] argued was due more to their craziness than love. The way my mom and I argue, it's because we care about each other so much and love each other so much,” Mr. Bradlee said. Above, the bedroom used by Little Edie after her mother died. A single light bulb hangs in a bird cage above the bed.

Nora Ephron, a friend of the Bradlees, says Grey Gardens is a sight to behold. "It's quite a fabulous restoration because they didn't tear the house down, they rebuilt it," she said. "All the original bones are there. All the grace of the original house is exactly as it was." Above, a small bedroom with a porch that has views of the ocean. Ms. Quinn had all of the furniture seen here restored, and it is still in use.

A detail from the master bedroom used by Big Edie. Today, the home is a summer residence for Ms. Quinn and Mr. Bradlee and has become a destination that guests routinely describe as "magical." Lauren Bacall, a friend of the Bradlees, says she has many fond memories. "It is a happy house," Ms. Bacall said. "There is life there."



the garden in 1900

Thirty-four years after a documentary film introduced the world to Grey Gardens and its eccentric occupants, a new movie on HBO is again casting light on the legend of this East Hampton property. In 1979, when this photo was taken, Sally Quinn, the writer and Washington hostess, and her husband Benjamin Bradlee, former editor of The Washington Post, purchased the property, which had fallen into complete disarray, and set out to restore it to its earlier splendor.

Prior to restoring the house and hiring Victoria Fensterer to reinvent the gardens, Ms. Quinn arranged for photographs to be taken. This never-before-seen shot shows a sunroom with doors leading outside, where years of neglect had hidden the low grey cement walls that gave Grey Gardens its name.

As various components of the property were cleared, friends and neighbors, like Nora Ephron, were amazed at what Ms. Quinn and Mr. Bradlee uncovered. "Ben began cutting through the thicket and found the wall that once surrounded the walled garden," Ms. Ephron said. The extent of neglect was "truly unimaginable, even if you had seen the movie."



The beautiful gardens now

Ms. Quinn envisioned a garden that preserved the spirit of the Beales' Grey Gardens. "I wanted it to be wild. I wanted it to be just on the verge of being over the top," she said. "I wanted it to look like it happened by itself. I didn't want it to be manicured in any way, because the house isn't that way."


All images above via The New York Times

via Life


via Life
All of those cans are empty cat food cans. I simply cannot comprehend putting on stockings and heels every morning and then teetering around about the squalor...

via Life

via Life
Like her mother, Edith Beale considers herself an artist and a performer, she explains in the 1975 film "Grey Gardens." Allowing their Easthampton, Long Island mansion to decay into decrepitude is apparently part of the free-spirited, independent lifestyle that distinguishes the Beales from high society types like their relative, Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis.


This is the resorted home today.
via La Dolce Vita







via Grey Gardens News
The 5 above images are production designer Kalina Ivanov's creations for the HBO film. The bedroom images depict Big Edie's bedroom at it's glamorous state, followed by the set house, before disrepair and during.

What are your thoughts/reactions to the Beales' life?

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