I forgot to do a TWTWTW last week, which was silly as I had some cool shots from our weekend shopping trip to Portland.
It turned out to be a sunshine and showers, great food and great coffee, groovy shops and pink petals sort of a weekend.
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We had a wonderful time There’s a blog post on shopping in Portland in your near future.
I was so incredibly moved by this art installation that I came across recently.
There’s something about the beauty of the flowers in such a bleak space, and the hope they represent in a place that must have seemed devoid of hope for so many people. Art can sometimes be so incredibly powerful.
In 2003 Anna Schuleit was asked to create a commemorative art installation to mark the closure of the Massachusetts Mental Health Center. She noted that psychiatric patients are rarely brought flowers, so she used old hospital records to calculate how many people had passed through the facility and decided to commemorate each one with flowers.
The 28,000 potted plants and green turf were spread throughout the building which was opened up to the public, including former patients and staff, for four days. Then the plants were distributed to patients in care homes throughout the region (which is why Schuleit insisted on using potted plants instead of cut flowers).
Read more about it here. {Images by Anna Schuleit}
While in New York I had a great time at the Ace Hotel. It was fascinating to stay there since we’d enjoyed ourselves so much at the Ace in Palm Springs and I was intrigued to see how their aesthetic would translate to a New York setting.
And what they’ve done is very clever. The free-wheeling hippie chick of Palm Springs has smartened herself up for New York and become a little more glam and a little more polished, while still being a bit rough and ready around the edges and retaining her creative rocker vibe.
The refurbishment of the 1904 midtown Hotel Breslin is not exactly to my taste, but it’s hugely clever and hugely comfortable, and, as you would expect, full of thoughtful and quirky touches which add greatly to the pleasure of the stay.
Our room featured tattoo art (and super comfortable beds) a guitar (of course, every hotel room should have a guitar) and a full-sized fridge, a working record-player and water bottles in the shape of gin bottles (I loved those).
Downstairs in the lobby everything was dark and a little seedy, with glamorous filmstar lights, polished vintage woods and antique ceiling lights, while the funky graffiti wallpaper echoed the tattoo art in the bedroom.
Using vintage artifacts and furniture everywhere, while retaining the worn mosaic floors and chipped plaster ceilings made everything seem a little louche and decadent, while being respectful of the building and its history.
And someone had had huge fun with the graphic design (and having the address written so prominently on the keycard was super useful when grabbing a cab late at night).
The food was good, the coffee was great, the bar was jumping and staff couldn’t have been more pleasant, helpful and friendly.
All in all a fun, comfortable and reasonably-priced place to stay in New York. I will be back.
This has been an Instagram week of colourful shopping, tall buildings, funky hotels and yellow cabs. With just a bit of blogging inspiration thrown in.
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On the 1st January I started posting daily photos to Instagram. I’m @mirrormirroxx. Come and be my friend.
I’ve had the most wonderful weekend. My head is full to bursting with ideas and inspiration, as is my cardholder with friends old and new. Unfortunately my email inbox and laundry basket are also in danger of exploding and my fridge is very, VERY empty.
I’ve got tons of ideas and thoughts and photos to share with you all but need to get myself straight today. New and improved blogging service begins tomorrow.
Apparently it takes a village to make a pumpkin pie. Not a literal village you understand – who’s got one of those nowadays? – but an online village.
Having never made a pumpkin pie before; indeed having spent the vast majority of my life thinking that putting pumpkin in a PIE, instead of say, soup or ravioli, was a vaguely barbaric act; I put out pleas on here, on Facebook and on Twitter for pie-making advice.
TOP TIP #1 – USE CANNED PUMPKIN
This was not entirely helpful. As I mentioned, I mostly wanted to make a pumpkin pie because the Minx and I had managed to grow two little pumpkins in our vegetable garden this summer. However, convinced by the many, many comments I received, I did buy an emergency can of pumpkin just in case.
Which was fortunate, as when we halved, deseeded and roasted the homegrown pumpkins, we found them to be extremely anaemic and tasteless. One up for the online village.
TOP TIP #2- USE THE MACRINA COOKBOOK’S MAPLE PECAN PUMPKIN PIE RECIPE
I received a lot of recipe suggestions but one that struck home was to use the one from the Macrina bakery cookbook. This sounded good because a) I actually have the book b) the recipes I’ve cooked from it before have been excellent and c) it included maple syrup in the pumpkin custard and a topping of pecans and maple syrup. Since I don’t actually much like pumpkin pie, these sounded like good additions to me. Here’s a link to a pdf of the recipe.
TOP TIP #3- BLEND THE PUMPKIN VICIOUSLY
The Macrina recipe uses canned pumpkin and roasted fresh butternut squash (which we always have in the freezer to make risotto) which are both comparatively smooth. Nevertheless a few minutes attacking them with the immersion blender made them even smoother and creamier. Definitely a good thing to do whatever type of pumpkin or squash you’re using.
TOP TIP #4- USE COCONUT MILK IN THE CUSTARD
Another person to send me her recipe was Seattle pie queen Kate McDermott. Her recipe is for a more traditional pumpkin pie, though it had one intriguing ingredient – lite coconut milk instead of cream or condensed milk. I used it instead of the buttermilk in the Macrina recipe and Kate is right, the texture and flavour are exceptional, I did of course also use Kate’s superlative pie crust recipe.
TOP TIP #5 – USE GINGER SYRUP INSTEAD OF FRESH OR GROUND GINGER
This top tip was invented by me! And I think it’s a good one. Stem ginger, or preserved ginger in syrup, is a very traditional British preserve, which I managed to get on Amazon. The ginger pieces are preserved in a tangy ginger syrup and instead of freshly, grated ginger I added a little ginger syrup to the pumpkin custard and the maple pecan topping. I’ve since seen that in the US you can also buy a delicious-looking ginger syrup here (with great packaging) which might also work.
This pie turned out incredibly well, and was wolfed down by pumpkin pie traditionalists AND pumpkin pie disparagers alike. Thanks to everyone in my lovely online community who contributed the tips that made it possible.
I see that November has been and gone, and I’ve got nowhere close to posting every day. Oh well. Might try for December, though posting over Christmas could be a little light (and possibly drunken)..
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For my recent escape to San Francisco, I was looking for a hotel that was not TOO pricey, centrally-located and yet still a luxurious treat. Through various Seattle foodie events, I’ve had the great good luck to get to know the wonderful Sheri Doyle of Pacific Northwest Journeys, who specialises in travel-planning throughout the Pacific Northwest. What she doesn’t know about travel throughout the region and booking hotels in San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, Vancouver and Victoria really isn’t worth knowing.
So I followed her advice and booked the Hotel Monaco (a sister hotel to the Hotel Triton, where we’d enjoyed staying before). Sheri made the arrangements, got me a great rate, asked if I wanted a goldfish in my room (!), and passed on a secret password which would get me a ‘nice treat’.
The treat proved to be an upgrade to a Junior Suite, the goldfish was delivered to the door of my room with a note telling me his name was Speedy, and I spend the next 24 hours just WALLOWING in the hotel. The staff were all delightful – friendliness and helpfulness personified – which is great if you’re travelling on your own.
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I have to admit upfront that the décor – like the lovechild of a louche gentlemen’s club on acid and a fantasy French chateau – wasn’t really my thing and seemed a little dated, but it was bright and supremely comfortable and had that touch of crazy fantasy that characterizes all the best hotels. You may not want to try this at home, but goodness it’s fun to visit.
My room was very, very, very stripy. No other adjective seems appropriate somehow.
As for Speedy the goldfish? Well, he’s about the weirdest gimmick I’ve ever encountered at a hotel and I only said I wanted one so I could blog about it, but there was actually something strangely companionable about having a fish in the room. And he did have the most excellent manners – no snoring, no farting, very quiet. I was sad to leave him behind.
If ever you’re thinking of travelling around the Pacific Northwest, don’t hesitate to get in touch with Sheri. You’ll end up with a detailed itinerary, the best recommendations out there for accommodation, eating out and things to see and do, and the savings that she’ll get you on room rates will probably more than pay for her services. Oh and she is incredibly organised, friendly and helpful and a pleasure to do business with.
We wanted to go to Southern California this year to a) escape the miserable Seattle ‘spring’ (I use this term loosely) b) visit my elderly aunt in Dana Point, an hour or so’s drive south of LA and c) take the Minx to Disneyland.
I was told by friends on Twitter and Facebook that Del Mar was fun and it was suggested that we try the newly-refurbished L’Auberge Del Mar. When we discovered that my very favourite discounted fancy hotels travel site www.luxurylink.com was offering a deal, our fate was sealed.
And we had the most wonderful time.
L’Auberge Del Mar is a historic hotel overlooking the Pacific Ocean and right on Del Mar’s attractive main street.
The hotel was completely refurbished in 2008 by interior designer Barclay Butera who has done a great job bringing a historic building bang up to date.
We were lucky enough to have a room overlooking the main courtyard of the hotel, which was been designed as a series of little ‘rooms’, cabanas, terraces and courtyards centered around the small but luxurious pool and jacuzzi area. There’s the kicking Bleu Bar, a scenic terrace for breakfast and informal suppers, cosy hidden cabanas and even space for weddings, all with an ocean view.
The themes of the décor are soft and muted sage-y greens, brown and white stripes and the most breathtakingly lush white planting – white roses everywhere you turn, undulating seas of fragrant jasmine, and hedges of rosemary and box.
To be perfectly honest we hardly left the hotel all week. The place comes into its own at night, when the surfers come in from the beach and le tout Del Mar comes out to party. We dined one evening in the hotel’s top notch restaurant Kitchen 1540, where the cured meats, golden beet salad and frozen key lime pie will live on in my memory. We drank superlative cocktails at the Bleu Bar every night. The hotel is beautifully lit with fires and burners everywhere to take the chill off the evening air as the sun sets over the ocean.
The internal décor is luxurious too – all sage greens, soft browns, seashells and comfy seating. I loved the ridiculously rococo shell-encrusted side tables, the beautiful mother-of-pearl smothered lamps, the green toile cushions and the enormous shell planters full of orchids.
There were little touches of wit and humour everywhere – the wait staff had foodie quotations printed on their tee-shirts and Sofie, Kristy the Marketing Coordinator’s pretty little dog, had a sign at the front desk telling us when she was ‘working’ and available for cuddles.
Finally, and most importantly for us, L’Auberge trod that extremely fine line between being super relaxed and kid-friendly (with unbelievably kind staff and a great kids’ menu) and sophisticated and happening enough for grown-ups – thanks to a fabulous bar, gorgeous spa and secluded lap pool. The Minx adored it and the Husband and I are longing to return.
Truly I can’t recommend this one highly enough.
Elle Decor recently created its first showhouse in a San Francisco suburb – working with ten different Bay Area interior designers to ‘turn a classic 1920s Mediterranean-style home into a showcase for contemporary style’.
That’s some beautiful house isn’t it? Unfortunately these designers seemingly run the gamut of decorating styles from boringly humdrum, via fussy and old fashioned through to suicidally depressing, and managed to transform the house into something not only monstrously ugly, but, to my eye at least, not remotely representative of San Francisco style.
I’m really interested to here what Bay Area peeps in particular think of this.
The living room was created by Gary Spain, and all the heavy, gloomy clutter, weird artifacts and strange cross-cultural references makes it look like a junk room at the British Museum. And those dark wing-backed chairs would make even the Dowager Duchess of Downton uncomfortable. In fact the whole thing looks about as relaxing as a dentist’s waiting room. Like the black fireplace though.
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The TV watching area of Erin Martin’s media room below at least has some wow factor – I like the screen and that curved chair - but all the darkness is making me want to switch on my lightbox. Does all the black really say San Francisco to you?
The other end of the room with its huge spider (is that what it’s supposed to be?) light fitting and hideously uncomfortable seating area and mirrored fireplace is, however, the stuff of nightmares.
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If the unremitting terror and gloom is getting too much then you can always escape to Will Wick’s library. Except that is probably the most scarily gloomy and depressing room of all. AND it has a zebra-stripe rug. Seriously didn’t that decorating ship sail a very long time ago? But no matter, it also features a helpful saw thingy in an alcove, making it super easy to kill yourself, or at the very least add authenticity to games of Cluedo.
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Steven Volpe’s dining room is another unremittingly cheerful place – you can just hear the stylist yelling for ‘oranges’, ‘maple leaves’ ‘ANYTHING’ to relieve the gloom. But at least you know that extra light bulbs would make a thoughtful hostess gift.
The house’s vampires should avoid the breakfast nook decorated by Palmer Weiss, as here at least the sun is visible and the chairs are lovely. But the birdcage light, ferns on columns and busy curtains make this look contemporary to 1911 rather than this century. Or is Downton Abbey spearheading an Edwardian revival?
And I’m so relieved to see a little bit of colour in this home office designed by Kendall Wilkinson, that I’ll forgive it its totally impractical and uncomfortable seating.
I suppose Jay Jeffers master bedroom is not too bad in a personality-free luxury hotel sort of way. I do like the artwork above the bed and the interesting bedside lamps. Note that the turquoise bench at the foot of the bed provides a little pop of colour, but mysteriously disappears in the image below.
While the Dowager Duchess would be right at home in this guest bedroom by Suzanne Tucker. Contemporary style, really? Really?
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The decorating cliches are back in force in this room for a teenage girl, with more zebras, and a brightly coloured Moroccan pouf. And I’m sorry, but covering up a stunning De Gournay wallpaper with framed pictures of RPatz has to rank as one of the worst possible decorating crimes against humanity.
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So what say you? Does this house showcase the best contemporary design in San Francisco and the US? Or is it just fugly?
Pictures from Elle Decor, Casa Sugar and Merida
Phew! I think I’ve just about got the Oscars out of my system. I was on the brink of comparing Nicole Kidman to an armadillo, but stopped myself just in time.
In other news, Liberty London Girl just tweeted about the fabulous wallpaper in the bathrooms at the Soho Grand Hotel in NYC.
It’s called Aviary by F Schumacher, and the pattern was designed by Saul Steinberg, who was a cartoonist for The New Yorker in the 1950s.
Here is is in situ at the Soho Grand. I may have to stay here next time I’m in NYC, just so I can sit in the bathroom.
This wallpaper needs to be in my life somehow as a matter of urgency. Time to work on the downstairs bathroom? It’s also available at Decorator’s Best.
{Found via Liberty London Girl’s Tumblr. Additional pictures via Remodelista and Tea For Joy}
