The Dandelion- Beauty, Love & Health

{Botanical.com}

With Spring here, one of my favorite weeds starts going wild, the dandelion.  The pleasure I get from this...

...far outweighs my annoyance with the yellow flowers trying to take over my lawn. 

Yesterday afternoon, I got the sweetest knock on my office door.  I looked outside to see Christian (5) with a bouquet for me.

Like so many weeds & wildflowers, the smell of dandelions instantly brings me back to my childhood.  It makes me so happy to watch my boys enjoying the nature around them and having fun with plants & flowers & yes, of course, weeds.  Even the baby has fun with them...

{Louie, 11 months}

Christian made him a pile to play with and he loved throwing them around on the patio last night.

Justin (3) below, hanging out in my flip flops with a dandelion:

I'm not sure there's much that makes me happier than getting "flowers" from my little guys.  

Dandelions also have medicinal properties and can be eaten. 

Here's some info I found on the LeafLady about it:

"Suppose your doctor tells you, on your next visit, that he has just discovered a miracle drug which, when eaten as a part of   your daily diet or taken as a beverage, could, depending on the peculiarities of your body chemistry: prevent or cure liver diseases, such as hepatitis or jaundice; act as a tonic and gentle diuretic to purify your blood, cleanse your system, dissolve kidney stones, and otherwise improve gastro-intestinal health; assist in weight reduction; cleanse your skin and eliminate acne; improve your bowel function, working equally well to relieve both constipation and diarrhea; prevent or lower high blood pressure; prevent or cure anemia; lower your serum cholesterol by as much as half; eliminate or drastically reduce acid indigestion and gas buildup by cutting the heaviness of fatty foods; prevent or cure various forms of cancer; prevent or control diabetes mellitus; and, at the same time, have no negative side effects and selectively act on only what ails you. If he gave you a prescription for this miracle medicine, would you use it religiously at first to solve whatever the problem is and then consistently for preventative body maintenance?

All the above curative functions, and more, have been attributed to one plant known to everyone, Taraxacum officinale, which means the "Official Remedy for Disorders." We call it the common dandelion. It is so well respected, in fact, that it appears in the U.S. National Formulatory, and in the Pharmacopeias of Hungary, Poland, Switzerland, and the Soviet Union. It is one of the top 6 herbs in the Chinese herbal medicine chest.

According to the USDA Bulletin #8, "Composition of Foods" (Haytowitz and Matthews 1984), dandelions rank in the top 4 green vegetables in overall nutritional value." 

It can be drunk as a tea but at home, we eat the leaves in salads, which are really bitter and take some getting used to.  I can't explain it, but it's the type of food that you can really feel is having an impact on your digestion.  (Like mint tea or tomatoes.)  When I eat dandelion salad, I almost feel hungrier afterwards & feel like it's kicking my metabolism into gear.  (This is where my family usually rolls their eyes at me with the "That's just Lauren" crazy look, but I can honestly feel that it's good for my body.)  While the claims made on the LeafLady are pretty amazing and I'm sure it wouldn't work to that extreme for most people, I do strongly believe in dandelion's health benefits.

The first time I made it at dinner, my husband literally said "This is disgusting."  (...After all of the training of trying to get our kids to say, "I'm not really a fan of this" when they try a food they don't like.  Go daddy!! ;) 

But, I'm more of the "You'll get used to it" type of person, so I kept making it.  Now, he honestly loves it and it's almost weird.  It's definitely an acquired taste, so if you do try it, be ready to try it more than once.

Because it's so bitter, I HAVE to have our Maestranzi Oil & Vinegar dressing:

Fillipo Berio Olive Oil (a pretty good amount)

Balsamic Vinegar (only a little)

Salt & Pepper- more than you think... The mixture should taste salty

Onions- Sliced very thin so they get all sogged up with the dressing

Toss the dressing with the onions & let sit for at least 5 mins.  Then, toss in your dandelion greens and FOR REAL- let them sit for at least 30 mins, if not more, so that they really absorb the salty-oniony oil.  This takes out a lot of the bitterness.

If it doesn't sit a while, the salad will pretty much just be bad.

Then I add in any extras I'm in the mood for- shredded parmesan - ALWAYS

and then things like scallions or walnuts or tomatoes... or whatever else floats your boat.

{Image from Tammy's Kitchen with a recipe for dandelion salad -i haven't tried it- here}

...So, with all of this about picking & eating and loving dandelions, I'm off to work on a new textile design.  Wish me luck!!

Hope you have a great day and are enjoying Spring!!  Let me know if you have any good recipes for dandelion salad!!  (I tried one at a restaurant once with LEMON!! OMGoodness!!!!!)



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

Ceiling Fans & Eye Candy

Ceiling fans are no-nos to many a decorator.  I'll be honest, I generally try to avoid them whenever they're not needed for comfort to get the opportunity to bring a great light fixture into a space.  

{One of my favorite Cottage Living Houses with a ceiling fan on in the pic }

Men seem to looooove ceiling fans.  (Stay tuned for my upcoming post "What {Most} Men Love.") I've scared plenty of husbands with the removal of a ceiling fan but many have been reassured that if things get too hot, they can always bring in a cool vintage-style floor fan, like the Allaire from Restoration Hardware:

In all of my ceiling fan replacement-experiences, I think I've yet to hear of anyone actually bringing in a floor fan...  except me!!  I have a thing for fans and tend to leave the AC off longer (because having open windows makes me really happy) than I should, so people would wilt in our house if we didn't use fans.  In my new house, especially, fans are pretty much a necessity.  

We have lots of massive windows and skylights letting in a ton of sun and pretty much baking us inside.  Additions were also added previously & the owners at the time didn't do a very good job of making sure the new spaces would heat/cool adequately.  (Fixing this kind of thing is really just  SO FUN!! $ $ :/  )   Add to all of that the fact that our AC is BROKEN right now (shouldn't normally be an issue in April but we've had highs or almost 90 already this year!!) and I really have ceiling fans on my mind.  In the Fall, we replaced the ceiling fan in our breakfast room (see above pic of our house "BEFORE"  in the background) with this one from Restoration Hardware:

I love how it's ended up looking and -of course- feeling when our AC stopped working.  I should mention that it's a LOT lighter & more silvery than pictured here.  Definitely a galvanized steel finish, but fresh and bright, not moody like in the photo.

In our bedroom, (BEFORE photo, below) we still have the ceiling fan that was here originally. At first I thought I'd replace it with a light fixture but we love sleeping with our patio door open (We've knocked out the entire wall you see below with the windows on it & replaced it with a massive glass door, which opens to out little garden.) and I've been absolutely LOVING my ceiling fan at night.  So... we're replacing the original fan with a new ceiling fan and I'm on the hunt.  I love the Restoration Hardware one we selected for the breakfast room so I might go there again and possibly paint it black.

  So... even though ceiling fans are a typical designer "no no," I have to say that they do give a house a certain type of feeling that I really love.  Tom Scheerer - who is probably my absolute favorite interior designer- uses them in his work a lot.  His projects feel fun, fresh, laid-back, cool, relaxed and totally down to earth.  There's an authenticity to his work that really resonates within me.  Some of the homes he's worked on feel so perfectly "undecorated" which is the best type of design to me.  I can appreciate a perfectly pulled together room -and even go gaga over them- but I truly love and get excited about the more imperfect spaces.  

Here are a few (okay way more than a few) examples of Tom Scheerer's work so you know what I mean:

The bones of the homes he works are typically so interesting.  There's an age and a patina to the houses themselves.

He might even love botanicals as much as I do:

So many of the elements he uses are unexpected:

I can't imagine pitching this flag idea (above) to a client but it's perfect!!!  His work inspires me to think a bit more outside of the box.

This living room, below, is such perfection to me:

I could move right in.  When I first saw my new house, I thought about that room.

In his work, I've noticed lots of photos of great transitional spaces.  Hallways and stairways are often overlooked due to budget constraints and priorities being elsewhere, but when I look through his work, the hallways seem to lead you through the story of the home so perfectly.  It really shows how important these often-overlooked spaces are:

Love this stairway shot:

...And the foyer, below, is so down-to-earth and inviting.  It really feels collected as most of his work does.

This bedroom, below, is such a great mix.  It's got more going on than a lot of what I've shown does, but I just love it.  His style is just so much fun and so fearless.  His spaces feel happy, which isn't always "in," especially not right now, but it's the type of spaces I strive to create, and he does them so perfectly.  There's a cheerful clutter to this pretty room that I love.  It's the epitome of "charming" to me...

This room, below, is a little "cooler" (both in color scheme and in style) but it still has a that great relaxed-collected feel:

...So... now that you see how crazy I am about Tom Scheerer's work, you can see how ceiling fans might have grown on me:

I think about the vibe in the room above more often than I should.  I just love its simplicity and the cool vintage island feel it has.  Tom Scheerer seems to have quite a bit of work in the Bahamas and I find myself just wishing we could go on a vacation in one of those homes.  (He did India Hick's guest cottage there!!) 

 Ceiling fans definitely affect the vibe of a space.  To me, they make a room feel more summery, a little lazier in a way.  A little more relaxed and they call to mind vacation or "island time."  They make me think that the windows are open and that relaxing is going on.  I don't associate ceiling fans with suits and work, but more with bare feet and fun.  They don't work in every house and with every type of architecture- especially in DC-  but it's the feeling I'm after in our place, which is sort of contemporary-natural, so I'm excited about that.

Here's another space that's really inspired me.  (Remember Justin's old nursery with the blockprint-inspired canopy we made?}  I'd never noticed the ceiling fan until now:

Ceiling fans almost always look great on porches:

When are you not relaxing or having fun if you're sitting on a porch??

And, in the photo below, the ceiling fan is just one of the many clues that the home is somewhere wonderfully warm:

 A lot of his fans are black and I love the contrast here:

Something like that would be great in my bedroom.  

This modern fan, below, just seems to disappear, which is perfect for this room, which actually does feel a little but more "put together" than some of the others.  If you mentally take out the fan, you can see that the formality goes up a hair...

And finally, one of my favorite spaces, check out this dining room:

The fan becomes this interesting sculptural element that again, plays up the island location of the home.  It's the perfect example of functional beauty and appropriateness.  

...So.. and I know it's a fairly controversial topic ;) ;) ... what are your thoughts on ceiling fans?

Does location matter?  When are they appropriate?  Are they ever okay?  Love them or hate them??

ps- I am SO in the mood to go somewhere tropical for a project after these pics!! Anyone need a decorator??

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

Most Frequently Asked Questions

Keeping up with my blog is pretty tough for me.  I love writing it & meeting so many great people and friends through it, but I simply can't keep up with it.  This morning (and many mornings really) I woke up in the wee hours thinking of all of the emails with questions I needed to get back to and how I'd never have enough time to write back to everyone.  (Or how I'd lost emails back hundreds of pages on my email list and wouldn't be able to find them again in all of the junk mail.  I get at least 100+ emails a day between work, life, mailing lists and PR lists--- ahhhhhhh!!! --- so when I'm not able to write back immediately, I often lose emails for a good long time or forever. )

{My life}

I remember when I first started blogging and I'd emailed bloggers and didn't hear back and my feelings were hurt.. so I really struggle with this.  But a year or two ago (Maybe 3?? When my second son was born possibly??) I made a decision that I had to get over it.  At one point, I realized my blog was booming and readership was crazy high, I was staying up late into the night answering questions in emails, and I was putting 12-20 hours a week into blogging on top of working... and my family never saw me.  I thought about it for a week or so and one day I just sort of decided to let go.   It was like a big exhale and it was freeing.  I realized that I put as much as I can into a blog but I can only do so much and be so much.  The guilt's still there of course, but much less.

SO.... This leaves me with a great big list of questions that I haven't answered in a while (and have been feeling terrible about) so I thought I'd post some of the most frequently asked questions I receive.  It's not all of them but it's a start.  I'll definitely try to do more of these in the future!!

Here we go:

Q:Hi, I love grisaille!! Did the fabric tapestry work? How and where did you get it done? I would love to use that method in my living room. Thank you! I love your blog. 

A: Yes!  It worked really well.   You can read all about the process here

Q: Name of the Durer print?

A:  Sorry, I don't know it or where to find it again!! :(

Q: How did you feel about the Sheffield Interior Design Program? I have been looking into online programs and really don't have any advice on which ones are better than others! your blog is really inspiring me now more than ever to pursue interior design and it has been something i have been thinking about for YEARS! 

A: I thought the Sheffield program was great. The style & materials are pretty out of date so don't expect to learn much about style, but the basic design principles, history, design process, etc. are all very educational.  I definitely recommend it.

Q: Hi! I have a question about your open shelves. They are absolutely stunning and I am thinking about doing something similar in my own home. Are they 12 inches deep? I'm debating between 12" and 10" boards. Also, where did you find your lovely black shelf brackets? Did they come black or did you spray them? Thanks! 

A: Thanks so much!! :)  The shelves were 12" deep and I found the brackets at Home Depot.  (The really inexpensive standard black metal brackets they carry there.)

 

Q: Hi Lauren, I know it has been forever since you reupholstered that craigslist sofa in green velvet but I was wondering if you remembered the name of the fabric you purchased at Calico Corners? I love this color so much. How has it held up?

A:  The fabric was called "Faber" in Artichoke by Calico Corners though I'm pretty sure the actual velvet supplier for Calico has switched since I purchased the fabric almost four years ago.  I loooove this velvet but made a big mistake when I didn't have my sofa treated with a stain protectant.  My second son had acid reflux and spit up like CRAZY when he was a baby and sadly, much of it landed on the sofa...  Although we washed the sofa thoroughly after the spit ups on it and were able to get all of the smell and liquid off...  after a few years of sitting in the sun and aging, the milk/acid has done a lot of damage.  It basically bleached out the areas where it landed.  I'm thankful that I never flipped the cushions during the spit-up phase so there's not much on the "clean" side but it's still pretty jacked up.  (And I'm aware of how gross this sounds!!! Don't judge!! ;) ;)  To be honest, with the milk/ acid, I'm not sure a stain treatment would have completely protected it either, because that acid is no joke.  In areas where things like red wine were spilled, it cleaned up just fine with no evidence of anything.  

Q: Lauren- are you still loving your Smeg? After seeing this post I looked into them and I am planning on ordering the 48" for our remodel. If you have a chance let me know. Thanks! 

A:  Yes, I ADORE MY SMEG!!!  I've never cooked on any high-end appliances in my own home so keep in mind that I'm comparing it to the "normal" appliance I've had over the years, but I really love it.  Mostly because I think it's so pretty and love its looks (shallow, I know ;) ;)  but also because we use the rotisserie in it all the time and the gas burners are really powerful.  So far, the only complaint with it I have is more with myself because I can't seem to remember what all the functions on the knobs mean.  (And guests have NO idea.)  But I'm learning and I keep the manual nearby to doublecheck if needed.  I've been recommending it to my kitchen clients since I got mine because it's one of the most affordable good-looking ranges.  

{Seashell paint}

Q: Do you have a "go to" ivory paint?

A.  My most used ivory is Benjamin Moore's "Seashell." (above)  It often freaks my clients out when it's going up because it's very close to white (and white seems to scare people because they don't want "sterile") and I've had to talk multiple clients off the ledge either as it's going up or afterwards before we've brought in the furnishings.  It's pretty close to that "builder white" which everyone seems to hate so much that I don't have a real problem with.  (The problem with the "builder white" is usually more to do with the decorating and that light fixtures rather than the color itself.  People often just dislike it because it was there when they moved in, which of course is often a "sterile"-looking time for any house because all of the furnishings, art, and accessories aren't in place.  People often look for the paint color to do a lot of the heavy-lifting in a design and to really stand out and call attention to itself, and for the most part in a typical home, I'm not that into that.  If the house is architecturally-interesting enough to warrant attention to its walls & bones or if you've consciously decided that the walls need to make a statement, then that's another story.)  

But back to seashell... All of my clients are happy with it in the end because in the houses I use it in it, it becomes that perfect warm "glowing" ivory and acts as a non-color which isn't too warm or cool... BUT in all honesty, I've probably spent at least ten hours of my life calming down various clients about this color or colors close to it over the years.  I'd like to sponsor a public service announcement for ivory paint.  ;)

                                         {Seashell paint... Paint can look very different in different spaces}

My own home is in Benjamin Moore's "Ancient Ivory" which is very close to seashell, but a tad warmer.  (It typically goes yellowy in a lot of houses but not in mine.)  I would also stress to anyone painting cream/ivory/white over another color that you'll probably need more primer/coats than you think.  One of the toughest colors in my experience to paint over has been that sort of silver-sage old Restoration Hardware color.  It just won't die and that green seems to really come through the creams.  Be sure to mention this to your painters because I've found even painters don't expect this to happen.  If the undertone's not right, the perfect glow you're after just won't be there.  

Anyway, I'm off for the day, but I'll try to make a habit out of posting more FAQs.  There are so many more I wasn't able to get to this morning and my apologies to everyone who's asked questions that I haven't answered yet!!  I really appreciate your taking the time to get in touch!!  Have a great weekend :)

If you'd like help creating a home you absolutely love, contact me about our design services.
*Photos by Helen Norman

Client's Family Room Before & After

We've had a busy week so far over here & I just got photos back from my good friend & photographer, Helen Norman, who photographed a couple of our finished projects on Monday.  I'm so excited to share the before & afters with you!!  My incredibly sweet client is very laid-back and relaxed and wanted a home that felt calming, pretty, comfortable and relaxed.  She & her family love spending time on the water and when we looked through inspiration photos together, she was mostly drawn to coastal-feeling homes.  Her kids are older now and she was ready to completely redo her home and get it exactly as she'd always wanted it to feel.  Here's how the family room looked before:

And here it is now:

I really love my client's style... she loves natural materials as much as I do, so I used lots of them which makes it feel really textural and natural- seagrass, linen, burlap, jute rope, driftwood and raw woods mixed with metals...  My client really trusted me in the space and I was so excited when she decided to take a risk on the rope chairs!!  They're one of my favorite things in the room and they are sooo comfy & fun!!  The curtains also really change the feeling of the room-  they're a soft watery ikat comprised of blues & greens & chartreuse.  We had them hung above the arched windows which simplifies all of room's the lines a bit and makes it feel more classic and architecturally-pleasing.

The sea life prints are a mix of vintage and new prints that I've been collecting for a while.  Because my client's so trusting, she was comfortable with me finding all of the pieces over time and hanging them for her, sight unseen.  (This is always so much fun for me because I feel like I can stretch my "wings" a little and I can do things that might seem a little disjointed on paper but that look great in real life, which is more how I design my own home.  You'll notice that there are lots of different frames hanging up there and that they're hung pretty randomly, but I'm happy to report that she loved it. :)

And, my client is super-talented... unbeknownst to me until I saw this gorgeous painting she did for the family room:

{Pillow Fabrics: Pear Linen, "Tree of Life" by Jasper, and Squircles" by Lauren Liess Textiles}

She said she was "just fooling around" but if I could fool around like that, I'd call myself an artist!!!  I asked her if she'd be open to painting more for future projects and she said she would be, so I'm thrilled about that.  She used so many colors & there's so much depth to it... I love how it turned out.  

And, finally, one last pic of the whole room:

I hope you enjoyed this peek into my client's home...  I'll be back later this week with photos of her dining room and foyer!!  Have a great day! :)

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