Happy New Year!

photo by Karl Lagerfeld via This Is Glamorous

This is a bit of wow for new years eve, beautiful.

So 2009 has been an interesting year - few ups, few downs but overall not too bad! What will 2010 bring? Only time will tell.............

Wishing you all a very happy new year, bringing lots of beautiful things your way.

S xx

All moved in!

So I'm all moved into my first little place, one week tomorrow. Word of advice - if you work in retail, don't move house the week before Christmas!

So I broke a key rule that I learnt at design school, do your scaled drawings. When I placed all my furniture into the living space, it became very clear my furniture was too small and clearly I don't have enough seating. I'm so used to my old place that was so tiny, my furniture is now not in scale with the size of the room.

These are my temporary curtains in the background, such an interior statement - not so much. Undecided on what to put there though - curtains that are nice and soft or a nice clean simple rollerblind???

This table is clearly too small, it needs to be longer. But I love my piece of coral (Chrissy present my parents). This little tablescape is a work in progress.

Celebrity Home - Sarah Jessica Parker

images unknown

Whether any of us admit it or not, I think everyone is fascinated with how celebrities live and love to take a peak insode their homes. I have a huge collection of pics of celeb homes (yes, I know!!) and I will share with you over my blog. Any requests, let me know.

This is Sarah Jessica Parkers home in the Hamptons. I think it is so cute and so cozy. So different to the inner city New York style. I could definitely holiday in the hamptons here!

My Bedroom Inspiration

images via Canadian House & Home, Pink Wallpaper,
Domino, Metropolitan Home, Design Inc

These are some of the images that have inspired my new bedroom. I guess I feel more confident in my scheme as my new bed was delivered yesterday which I went to see today and thank god it looks great. I was a bit nervous because the walls are grey and so is the bed, but they look good together. I can't wait to put it all together now.

Monday is official moving in day - finally. I'll post some more pics of the place when I have some things in there!!

Beautiful Home - Bree Oliver

all images via Home Beautiful

This is my current inspiration. This is the beautiful home of Interior Designer and Stylist Bree Oliver of Oliver Interiors. I love it so much. Even though I have gone for different colours, I am so inspired by her overall style. Beautiful.......

On my house, carpets are down today and floorboards tomorrow - yippee :)

My own little Bob The Builder

This is my little nephew Charlie, my own Bob the Builder. I had to post this pic beacuse we said to him we were going to my new house. As he has seen his Pa working there, he had to get his "noggles" (yes goggles!) and his saw. I think he decided he didn't need his hard hat!! How a 2 year old can figure this out I will never know.

Too cute.....

Bathroom Tiled

Finally the bathroom and toilet tiling has been done, just needs the grout. I'm really happy with it and loving my subway like tiles. I got all the tapware today and the vanity which is not exactly what I wanted but I'm happy with anyway.

The painting has also been finished so it's just flooring going down this week so hopefully move in day is either Sunday or Monday!

Book Of The Week - Thom Filicia

I have been watching alot of Dress My Nest on the Style Network lately so I only thought it was fitting to pull out my Thom Filicia "Inspired Ideas for Creating Rooms You'll Love" from my book shelf. I really love his style although it is different from mine. He uses colour and texture in a really great way. Usually those reality shows of making up people's houses are not so good and cheap but not this one, he executes some great rooms with beautiful choice of furniture.

Just for the Laundry

I've just come home from a lovely breakfast at Spendelove at Ferry Road Markets and while I was there of course had to pop into Wheel & Barrow. I couldn't help but buy this tub. It is really meant for drinks and things but I'm going to use it in my new laundry. I just love the crisp whiteness of it and the silver trim.

My new Ceilings!!

So who would of thought new ceilings would be so exciting!! Me, I was so excited to see my new ceilings installed downstairs. Reason being is the previous ceiling was that horrible textured ceiling. You know when someone thought slapping rough textured plaster on the ceiling would be a great design statement? Well I can't stand them, it just looks...not so nice! So new ceilings were a must. However I could only do downstairs so when I'm lying in bed, I will be looking up at a terrible a ceiling. I hope I will cope!!

I also had installed the beautiful 3 step cornice. Was this a cost I needed? Well no, but I wanted a little bit of detail and this is a simple way of doing it. So happy I did.

Book Of The Week - Kelly Wearstler

image via amazon

Ok, so I might be a little Kelly focussed at the moment and whilst I love her new work and her new book Hue, I still can't go past one of my all time favourite books in my collection "Modern Glamour". If you haven't read it, you must!

Choosing the paint colours

It's been a crazy week at work but I now have time to finalise the paint colours. This, I thought wouldn't be too hard.....wrong!

The upstairs is fine. The main bedroom will be a beautiful pale grey, Resene - Double Concrete and the second bedroom will be a beautiful pale blue Dulux - Pre School Half. Both rooms will have beautiful crisp white trims.

The challenge has been the white for downstairs and all other spots of the house. So these are my choices Dulux whites - Whisper White or Lexicon Quarter or Antique White USA. I thought Whisper White as that is the colour we used to paint the store at work and it looks lovely. Lexicon Quarter because I saw an image that Greg Natale did and it look amazing. Antique White USA because it is so well known and widely used, however part of me feels it's a safe white! I'm edgeing towards Lexicon Quarter because I want the crisp, fresh white that will look fantastic with my yellow accent colour.

My inspiration for the living area has come from the great Ivy Bar in Sydney and from The Viceroy Hotel in Palm Springs, designed by the amazing Kelly Wearstler.

The Ivy

image above and below via The Viceroy Hotel

Book Of The Week - Kelly Hoppen

I am a huge fan of beautiful big coffee table books, anything to do with interiors, fashion, photography, art...........love it. This is the most recent addition to my ever growing collection, "Home From Concept to Reality" Kelly Hoppen. Her UK style is great, she uses great shapes and fabrics. This book takes you through her complete design process. I highly recommend this book.

Bathroom Inspiration

Kelly Wearstler

Sarah Richardson

House Beautiful

Canadian House & Home

Black & Spiro

Seeming I've been disillusioned with my bathroom quote today, I'm posting some of my favourite bathrooms to keep me inspired and motivated.

Keep Calm and Carry On!

So I guess I'm facing the same issue that anyone who has taken on a renovation has faced.......budget.....money running out......! Paid for the new flooring - done. Got a quote for the bathroom (very tiny bathroom) and it was huge and that didn't even include the tiles!!
So what do I do now?? A new plan maybe on it's way! This image is my mantra at the moment!

Rip it up and out!

Dining area and laundry space

Living area

Excuse the photo quality......This is what the downstairs looks like at the moment. As soon as we got the keys, all floors were taken up as they were revolting, and we have taken down the cornices. The ceiling downstairs is that terrible textured look which I just cannot live with. So a new ceiling will be going up hopefully on Friday. Electrician and plumber came in yesterday to do all their bits.

As you can see from the bath and old vanity sitting in the middle of the living room floor!! the bathroom has also been gutted.

Love, love, love Mr Jacobs

For my first official post, I wanted to share these are pictures of Marc's old apartment in Paris. He now lives in an another amazing apartment but I can't help but still love these shots. I live for the day I can have those beautiful big French windows.

My First Little Post.....

Hi everyone

Welcome to the first post on my new blog. As many of my friends live far and away, I wanted to create this blog to keep in touch and if you're interested, on the updates of my first place.

I've just come back from 2 months in beautiful Perth and the construction of my place is underway.
I'll post pics soon.

Thanks for joining me........

Sx