Our Florida Project- Part 1

When we visited the Keys last week, we flew in & out through Miami and our resort stay was a day short of our flight day so we stopped in to see my family who lives near Miami on our way home so we could make out early morning flight.  My Aunt Linda lives there & my three older cousins (Tracy, Adam & Chris) are spread throughout Florida- one on the Gulf (Chris- near my in-laws' home!) one near Orlando (Tracy) and the other cousin (Adam) right near my Aunt Linda.  Adam recently purchased an 8-acre property that he'll be building his dream home on & I'm helping him do it.  I came into the project once Adam & the architect had decided on this:

The house is pretty massive, but the most important parts of it to Adam (who owns a large residential & commercial landscape design firm in Southern Florida) are the outdoor spaces.  These 3-D drawings don't show any of the insanely beautiful landscaping that's already in place & that will be there once we're finished.  In the image above Adam built a huge rock wall with waterfalls flowing down it instead of the one-level ending of the pond you see here.

Here's the front view:

My cousin took us for a nighttime tour of the property in the golf cart on steroids:

(It's not the best picture because Adam's girlfriend, Nicki, who's sitting next to me, is completely hidden, but it's all I've got.  Adam's in the driver seat holding Christian, who drove.  Don't worry, the baby didn't come along, he posed for the pic ;)

Before we get onto the house, I need to describe my cousin, Adam, to you...  His mom (my Aunt Linda) is my dad's sister and although his last name isn't Maestranzi, (he's got his dad's last name not his mom's maiden name)  he's very "Maestranzi"--- energetic, tireless, creative, hard-working, fun-loving, business-minded, generous and crazy.  He's so good to his nieces & nephews and loves kids (and they love him) in general. Adam's also all over the place and thinks and talks a mile a minute.  If you hang out with him for more than 15 minutes, you will have been on some sort of adventure.  (And I'm not kidding here...  Adam is the type that just swoops people away and takes them somewhere or shows them something crazy...  Some of my adventures with him included a random roadtrip up a mountain in Costa Rica which ended with a blown tire from his insane driving, timing a couple mile long jog he took in the middle of the night because his best friend bet he couldn't run that far & ended with a police officer stopping us asking what as going on...  Trips to the Florida Everglades getting dangerously close to alligators and so much more.)  He started his current business when he was 12 years old and he used to mow his neighbors' lawns.  When he went to college for business, he kept the business open and it's now a huge company with both residential & commercial clients and he has kept his ten original clients.  He dreams big and lives bigger (and faster.)  I'm hoping that when we're finished with the house, he might settle & slow down a little but I really doubt it because he wouldn't be him if he did.

Anyway, back to the house...

The pool area is already Heaven:

There are tiki huts and a slide & it's like a kids' fun land. 

 It feels like this a jungle...

...So the whole house is focused on this backyard playland.  But, as you might remember, I'm a fiend for sunlight...  Natural light is the single most important element to me in houses.  It's the reason I fell in love with both my new house and my old house.  So... this house plan scares me. (It's actually keeping my from sleeping well to be honest.)  I'm also a big fan of simplicity.  My cousin is not (yet ;) ;)

We've been talking a lot about how I'm worried about how dark the house will be & how it needs to be simplified & cleaned up a little.  I want all of the "bravado" to be removed from the house plans if that makes any sense.  (BTW, I'm being this frank with you about this project because the client is my cousin & I think I can get away with it ;)

The architect will be making a few changes to lighten it up slightly.   (  :/  )

In the drawing below, you can see that there's a ten foot overhang along the entire back of the house...  In front of the family room , the living room, upstairs bedrooms including the master, and most of the kitchen.  (It makes me sick writing that haha.)  Adam spends most of his time outside and entertains all the time for friends.  He's setting this house up as the ultimate bachelor pad that will hopefully one day also work for a family.  

At my nudging, the columns will now be square, stucco and clean instead of round & decorative.  The arches will be gentler and we're removing some of the columns so that the arches will now be more "eyebrow" shaped instead of semi-circle.  Removing some of the columns will lighten it up a little so I'm glad for that, but still worried.  The bay window glass (toward the left side) will now be extended completely to the corners (this is in the kitchen) to maximize the sunlight in the single uncovered window in the entire back of the house.  

 It's not everything I wanted (I was really gunning for a removal of the overhang at least in front of the kitchen/ family room but of course that kind of changes EVERYTHING including the roof line & the pleasing look on the exterior and we're trying to get the plans approved asap...  I should've been brought in sooner!! argg)

Letting that one go, let's move on to the interiors.  I've gotten every Corinthian column inside to be turned into simple square columns.  The house will be Mediterranean in feeling and I'm opening up Adam to the idea of "less is more."  (Which is sort of a foreign concept to my cousin...  Somehow he has THE BEST taste & ideas in landscaping & outdoor spaces but inside, I swear he's got Kirkland's on his speed dial.)  He normally loves anything "Tuscan" which I've dubbed in our offices as "Fauxscan" and he's also drawn to very dark, formal, opulent spaces- burgundies & golds and TASSLES and curls & swirls. (sooooo not me.)

 (We don't live in Tuscany!! Putting up palm tree prints or street scene artwork with really terrible painted metallic frames is NEVER going to change that!!  Neither will lots of scrolly iron & dark wood furniture.  I can say this because at one time, I too, was into Fauxscan...  and it was bad.)

BUT-  Adam is really open to the idea of simplifying the house and going for more of a "rough luxe" feel...  In all honesty, even though he's been loving Fauxscan for so long, my cousin is turning into one of my most receptive clients ever.  He will initially say "No, I hate that," when I propose something outside of his comfort zone, but then he listens to why I think something should be and he usually comes around.

He really wants to bring stone and/or brickwork into the kitchen & I love this idea...  I think he was originally envisioning it as more of a dark Tudor-esque kitchen, but he's coming around to lightening things up a bit.  I love this type of stonework- seen in an Italian villa (below)& am envisioning it on the two main kitchen walls- as backsplash & above the cabinets...

Here's more beautiful stonework in a kitchen as I envision it:

Although I love it, the look above is too modern & primitive for Adam but the floors are similar to the limestone ones we're going with and the walls are spot on. 

While in Florida, I met with the kitchen cabinet maker & the designer/artist they work with to create the preliminary hand-drawn rendering of how the kitchen will look.  He is an insanely talented artist and can draw beautiful things in two seconds.  What I'm asking for, however, is very different from the normal kitchens they do which tend to be more formal and more decorative, so it's been a challenging process.  I worked on the kitchen plan before we met together and knew almost exactly what we wanted,  but because we're so different, aesthetically, I think they're having a bit of a tough time giving us what I've asked for.  (And I know how it feels to have to create a design that goes against what you believe in and it's not easy to do so I can only imagine what I PAIN I am to them.  haha)

So, I'll share with you the very first rendering of the kitchen:

I was honestly shocked when I saw a Medieval coat of arms on the island and at all of the twisted iron detailing, the drawbridge shelving and the castle doors on the fridge.  I guess someone had said "Medieval" at the meeting and so this happened.  The artist/designer is very accommodating, however, and has been amazing with giving me lots of revisions and the drawing you see below is almost exactly what I'd originally specified, except we will be going with 1 type of stone everywhere (behind the shelves too) and also where you see brickwork so that the hood doesn't jump out so much:

I'm not sure that this is the final plan for the kitchen but it is where I'd intended to start from in the first place.    Adam loves the stone fireplace exhaust above the range and it was his main stipulation.  I'm intrigued but don't know how I feel about it yet.  It's good to have this drawing to mull over.  The cabinets you see here will be in a washed cream and a second island (not shown here) will be in a darker stained pecky cypress.  To give you an idea of scale, the ceilings are twelve (!!) feet high.  It's a little bigger than I find comfortable to be honest but I know it will help with the sunlight situation because the sliders are also very tall.  

I'm envisioning it all in a lighter crumbly stone like this one:

I think the drawing still feels a bit over the top to me but that in reality with all one stone, the hood will blend a bit more and might not feel so overpowering.  (Overpowering is what my cousin wants BTW.)

The designer/artist also sent me this drawing last night, which is his own interpretation on Adam's stone fireplace exhaust, which I'm also very intrigued by:

It seems softened a bit and I like that.  I think I'd like to see the vertical portion of the chimney be widened a bit so Adam is getting a tadm ore of what he wants, but this feels a little humbler to me somehow, and I'm excited about that.  What do you think?  I haven't shown any of these new revisions to Adam yet (and he doesn't read my blog ;) but when I get down to my final choice, I'll be showing him.  

I have to run for the day, so I'll share more about the project another day but would love your thoughts on the range hood as we;re finalizing today!!  And also- if you have any other thought of how to maximize light with exterior changes... would love to know.  Anyone know of anything like a glass roof that you could walk on safely that we could maybe put over the family room overhang without frying the people under it?  

If you'd like help creating a home you absolutely love, contact me about our design services.

Where I've Been...

I'm one of those people who never wants to come home from vacation.  For someone who loves being home so much, I still have trouble fathoming wanting to come home from any vacation that's under at least a month.  (And we never get away for a whole month so maybe if we did, I'd still want more.)  

{I'm proud of my little guys for carrying all of their own things through the airport and everywhere- Christian (5) and Justin (3)...  Justin got slower at the end but we got no complaints!}

We spent the past week in the Keys (Islamorada) and just had the most relaxing time. My goal (and Dave's too!) on this trip was to try to "get bored."  It didn't happen though.  I've realized I just don't think I'm capable of boredom any more.  When I was a little girl, my grandmother never let me say the word "bored."  She believed (and I now agree) there's always something that could be done and that there's no excuse for being bored.  She'd say, "Don't say that word!"

{We stayed here- The Cheeca Lodge and I've never loved a hotel/resort so much!!}

I flipped over the shower... (below)   Do you see that the back wall is a sliding glass door?  You could open it up to the private balcony for showers.

Heaven.

And on the private balcony was this tub:

The water for the tub came from the ceiling in a really strong (hose-like) stream (not ike a shower head but a totally solid stream of water)... It was insane & so beautiful.  I  loved looking out at the tropical foliage.  The curtains could zip close if you needed privacy.  We used the tub when Justin got stung by a man-of-war and the poor guy had to soak in scalding water to release the poison.  I felt bad that he had to endure the hot water so I did it too and I kept saying, "We're going to to this together. Mommy's here." and he finally said "Mama, why do you keep saying that??"

There was lots of quality family time, which we so needed... Our house and life are so full all of the time, so it was really important for us to be able to just focus on spending time with each other.

We lazed around the beach and the boys really bonded...

We basically just wandered around with each other, ate a TON, read, swam and relaxed:

I loved the tea stand Cheeca set out every morning....

We had some windy days and I loved being in sweats on the beach with my tea & my man:

The baby (Luke, also known as "Louie" or "Lulu") pretty much stuffed his face with crackers the entire trip:

{His favorite toy is a wooden chicken drumstick...  I don't get it}

I loved getting to be with my family 24/7 for a full week.

 We felt like were alone most of the time which was what we wanted more than anything...  We had a spot on the beach or lagoon to ourselves on most days because the resort is so spread out.

We explored the tiki torch-lit nature trails at night & I loved how they made these palm trees grow:

We enjoyed drinks & dinner under the tiki bar & I loved the lanterns:

Something for everyone:

I'm home feeling ready to rock and get moving on a bunch of exciting projects.  (And I CANNOT WAIT to go back one day!!)

I'll be back later this week to tell you about an amazing project we're working on in Florida!!  I'm so excited!!

If you'd like help creating a home you absolutely love, contact me about our design services.

Let's Talk about my white sofa

I've received a bajillion emails and messages with questions about my new white sofa so I thought I'd share some details & info on it.

{My tiny guy & my new white sofa}

It's from Restoration Hardware and it's the Belgian track arm sofa.  It was a bit of an impulse purchase... one we thought long & hard about (is it weird to talk about the purchase of a sofa for hours over the course of a couple of weeks??) but an impulse purchase nonetheless because I didn't really think it through the way I should have.

With my clients, I keep them safe...  In my own house, I take the hits.  We're the guinea pigs.  We try things I would never be comfortable recommending until I'd tried myself.  Case in point: a white sofa.  I have never recommended a pure white UPHOLSTERED sofa to a client.  Washable slipcovers, yes, but nonwashable, no neva.

So... before I ordered the sofa, I got the sample of my fabric- the Indoor-Outdoor Perennials Linen Collection in White- and I trashed the thing.  I smeared a greasy gob of tomato from a pizza on it.  I let it sit a while and then I worked the stain out.  It came out perfectly clean!!  You could basically just hose this thing off and it came out perfect!  Over the course of a few weeks, I'd take the memo out and shake my head that there was no residue from the nasty stain I'd made and that's really what sold me.

{And the fact that it's totally gorgeous}

I thought about using my usual trade sources but I was impatient and had already seen the magic of the fabric, so I went with Restoration Hardware.

But I'd forgotten my own previous experience with a nonwashable white sofa which is- it's not the stains that get you because they can usually be worked out, it's the daily dinge and grime that kills the sofa.  We've had a couple of times where I've had to work out stains from the sofa and it's done really well, but it's when we have lots of people over and there are lots of blue jeans and bare legs and feet on my sofa that really mess it up.  I've tossed a pretty blanket over the back rail because it's in a major walkway of the house where people tend to lean on & touch so there's no problem there but the bottom seat cushion itself didn't stay  looking good for very long.  It started looking a bit gray and just not fresh at all like the rest of the sofa.

I started thinking of my back-up plan...  (This had secretly been in my head all along but I hadn't wanted to go there.)  The indoor-outdoor fabric isn't supposed to be machine washable.  But I took a deep breath one day and threw it in the washing machine.  I couldn't take looking at the dinginess anymore.  I put it on cold & gentle and used a ton of spray & wash and it came out perfectly white.  I let it air dry.

My sofa looked so good again!!  I only washed the seat cushion and am dreading having to wash the sofa slipcover itself (and may never have to- at least for a long while) because things can tear and get messed up in the washing machine if they're not meant to be washed and I've got to worry about the shape--- but I'm definitely going to keep washing the cushion covers.

The perennials fabric itself attracts little bits of lint from people's clothing and so it looks a little pilly.  The washing didn't get rid of those and so to get rid of them, I literally have to pick them off like lint on a sweater.    It is what it is.

It's super-comfy, really pretty and a bit of a pain to deal with.

So- would I recommend this sofa?  Sofa itself, I like.  Perennials in WHITE??  Not so much.  I know that when I'm washing it, I'm getting rid of whatever is on it to make it bullet-proof.  (Washing treated fabric also washes away the treatment.) So if you HAVE to have a white sofa like I did-  I'd really recommend going washable.  At this point, I'm just telling myself I own a sofa with a washable white slipcover and I'm forgetting that it had any magical stain-proof qualities.  As a washable white slipcovered sofa- I like (and kind of love) it.

So for me, it's a "yes."  For a client?  I'd still have to say "no" because it's pretty risky.  If it was in another color other than white (the natural, for example) it would probably be great because even a slight color off from white hides the daily grime although the fuzz/pills would still slightly bug me.  (We have a very light- almost white- "natural"-colored twill slipcover upstairs and have had it for 5+ years and it still looks amazing.  (Also by Restoration Hardware!)

I will probably keep washing mine for a few years and I do plan on having an alternate slipcover made some time (way) in the future to be able to switch it up.

Anyway, hope this helps!!




If you'd like help creating a home you absolutely love, contact me about our design services.

Our kitchen Island...

....  Is ALMOST there!!  

 {our antique pulls}

I want to show you more pics but my computer is still being evil and only allowing me to put upside down and sideways pictures on the blog!!! (ahhhhhhrrrg)

But here's one sideways one to give you an idea of how they look:

 {Drawer pulls make life so much easier}

I was planning on gluing pretty old nailheads on top of the screws but now that the pulls are in, I'm not really feeling like I need to do anything to make them look better... but what do you think?
We're a bit short of wood so need to wait for more before doing the sides and I'm so excited!!  It's such a big piece in the room and so when it's finished, I really think it's going to make our home feel so much more "done."
Would love to know your thoughts on the screws!!


If you'd like help creating a home you absolutely love, contact me about our design services.