Decorex Joburg | Part 2

Aug 122012
 

For those of you who missed Part 1 of our Decorex adven­ture, Decorex is the largest décor & design show in South­ern Africa, fea­tur­ing the lat­est on the local and inter­na­tional front.  Today we have some more of the fab­u­lous items & designs exhib­ited at this year’s Decorex Joburg in the 2nd part of our post.

Tex­tiles & Linen

 Decorex

Her­tex Fab­rics’ stand with some of their new ranges on dis­play.  Her­tex is launch­ing no fewer than 45 new ranges this year.

Decorex

100% Linen with a sil­ver Foil print from the Van­ity Range by Her­tex Fab­rics.  I absolutely fell in love with the look and feel!

Beau­ti­ful bed linen and unique scat­ter cush­ions by Anne Colle.

Clas­sic Stripes, Burlap and Typog­ra­phy at Clas­sic Bond

Fur­ni­ture

TradeS­e­cret buys “can­celled orders” and offers it to the pub­lic at a dis­counted rate.  On dis­play was hand­crafted French oak cab­i­nets & dressers, 100% nat­ural linen sofas and tex­tiles and a huge “got to have” oak indus­trial style side­board.  No longer a trade secret!

The “Con­tem­po­rary Coun­try” dis­play by Entrepo.  The name itself is derived from early 18th cen­tury French, mean­ing ‘to store’, ‘among’, or ‘to place’.  The place to find unique decor items, their felt run­ner is hand­made from 100% wool.  The size of the indi­vid­ual fibres are roughly as thick as a fin­ger!  It has to be seen as the image sim­ply doesn’t do it justice.

Sus­tain­able Design

RAW offers designs in sus­tain­ably sourced, engi­neered mate­ri­als.   Ikonik™ is their take on the tra­di­tional steel locker, pro­duced exclu­sively from Finnish Birch Ply­wood (even the hinges).  It has become a very pop­u­lar must-have object.

Bam­boo fibre home prod­ucts offer a fresh and styl­ish solu­tion for peo­ple wo want to live a green lifestyle.  Made mainly out of bam­boo pow­der, it is sold by Bam­boo Fibre Table­ware.

Walls & All

Fresh ideas to cre­ate a per­son­alised, unique inte­rior.  These gor­geous wall pan­els are avail­able from What Works Design.

Exquis­ite is the only way to describe these tiles from Shell Shock Design.  As well as fresh­wa­ter and wild sea Mother of Pearl, they incor­po­rate all kinds of nature into our prod­ucts: plants, shells, peb­bles, semi-precious stones, even beans.  The mother of pearl is cut into chip sizes which are secured to Mesh, Acrylic, Alu­minium Hon­ey­comb Board or Mag­ne­sium Board.  Options include Capiz Shell Dec­o­ra­tive Pan­els, Shell Lam­i­nates, stun­ning Mosaic Tile Designs and Wallpaper/Border Strips.

The Luxe Factor

Vic­to­rian is not my usual style, but this bath­room by Vic­to­rian Side Bath­rooms are the ulti­mate in luxe.  Vic­to­rian Side Bath­rooms are renowned for bath­rooms of time­less ele­gance.  The high­est atten­tion to detail with only the best fit­tings, much thought has been given to the lay­out and the ulti­mate sen­sory experience.

I could spend extended time in a bath­room like this…

 

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Off-the-grid hideaway with an urban edge

Jul 282012
 

Two archi­tects trans­form an aban­doned sta­ble on a rugged plot of land in Extremadura, Spain, into an off-the-grid hide­away with an urban edge.

To min­i­mize the impact on the unspoiled envi­ron­ment in the province of Cáceres, the archi­tects — and own­ers of the sustainability-focused design firm Ábaton in Madrid — reused the stone from the old sta­ble to con­struct their remote fam­ily get­away. Reclaimed oak doors and ceil­ings and recycled-steel beams con­tribute to the weather-beaten farm­house appeal.  On the inside, the design is closer to a mod­ern ware­house loft. Con­crete walls, lime­stone floors, and pati­nated rail­ings are tell­tale signs of this aes­thetic. The loft bed­rooms were con­verted from the stable’s orig­i­nal hay lofts and a min­i­mal­ist kitchen fea­ture a sleek coun­ter­top that extends into a din­ing room table. An inte­rior court­yard and foun­tain pay homage to the home’s power sup­ply with the help of wind tur­bines. Win­ter­time energy is har­vested from two moun­tain streams and in the sum­mer, solar pan­els do the trick. “We’re always try­ing to respect the envi­ron­ment by learn­ing as much as we can from it,” say the architects.

Off-the-grid hideaway

Off-the-grid hideaway

Off-the-grid hideaway

 

Source: remodelista.com

Classic urns add unexpected sculpture in the landscape

Jun 032012
 

Clas­sic urns have uses far beyond hold­ing olive oil and flowers. They can be used very effec­tively to add unex­pected sculp­ture and more in the landscape.

Tra­di­tion­ally they’ve stored every­thing from wine to cre­mated ashes. Today, we typ­i­cally use urns in a range of styles as dec­o­ra­tion through­out our homes and in the gar­den. Lately large, sim­ple, Mediterranean-style urns have been catch­ing my eye.  They add curb appeal to entrances, draw the eye as sculp­ture, add color to the gar­den and serve as foun­tains. Check out a group of urns that range from antiques to mod­ern art, along with some ideas for how to use them, to see if using a large urn in your yard is for you.

Classic urns

Bring in a splash of color. While this home and its sur­round­ing land­scape have many tra­di­tional ele­ments, the avant-garde out­door art col­lec­tion and fur­nish­ings delight and sur­prise. This sculp­ture takes the tra­di­tional urn form, blows it up to unex­pected pro­por­tions and draws the eye from all over the yard because of its bright orange hue.

Classic urns

Make a bold state­ment. This gigan­tic urn sculp­ture is an apt choice for an olive grove, as large urns were tra­di­tion­ally used to store olive oil in places like Italy and Turkey.

Classic urns

Cre­ate a foun­tain. This designer cre­ated a foun­tain using three hand-thrown Greek urns against a stone wall and three spig­ots.

A sin­gle urn fountain’s bub­bling water invites vis­i­tors to explore a gar­den.
Classic urns

Make a focal point. A large glazed urn plays off all the shades of green in this gar­den full of con­i­cal ever­green trees and rounded box­wood shrubs.

This black urn is clas­sic because of its famil­iar shape, mod­ern because of its place­ment and dark col­or­ing.

Urns occupy the space between the ground and a stone wall here, serv­ing as archi­tec­tural bases for climb­ing vines.

Add an appro­pri­ately scaled archi­tec­tural ele­ment. Large palm leaves and other trop­i­cal plants could eat up most gar­den stat­ues like a Venus fly­trap gob­bles insects. This urn’s sim­ple shape does not dis­tract from the shapes of the lush and exotic plants.

Cre­ate sym­me­try. A pair of urns glazed in deep blue hues con­nects a per­gola to other ele­ments in the land­scape, like this pool.

Pick up on over­looked hues. The ochre of this urn ties together the col­ors of the dry grasses, the sand and weath­ered por­tions of the wooden fence.

via: http://www.houzz.com

 

 

Balancing green living with sophistication and comfort at Monaghan Farm

May 082012
 

Although it has a beau­ti­ful nat­ural set­ting and strik­ing mod­ernist archi­tec­ture, many of the most remark­able aspects of Doris and James Forbes’ home are things you can’t see. Its sur­round­ings at Mon­aghan Farm near Lanse­ria – The Cra­dle of Humankind – stir an aware­ness of our ancient rela­tion­ship with the earth, which inspired the eco­log­i­cally sen­si­tive con­struc­tion. Doris and James went to great lengths to make it a land­mark of green archi­tec­ture, work­ing closely with archi­tect Enrico Daf­fon­chio to realise their vision. The result is a home that exists in har­mony with its envi­ron­ment and engen­ders a casual, socia­ble fam­ily lifestyle.

‘They made no com­pro­mise in terms of com­fort, but it is all as green as can be,’ says Enrico.  ‘Much of the energy-saving is low-tech and is embed­ded in the design.’ The building’s pas­sive solar design makes the most of sun­light. There is double-glazing on the win­dows. The insu­la­tion has been taken to new lev­els of effi­ciency. It is, as far as he knows, a one-of-a-kind sys­tem in South Africa. ‘Even the frames of the double-glazing play a role in elim­i­nat­ing ther­mal bridges between the inte­rior and exte­rior walls,’ says Enrico, ‘as they act as a con­tin­u­a­tion of the cav­ity wall insu­la­tion.’ All out­side sur­faces are inde­pen­dent of the inside, so there is no heat soak from the out­side. ‘It’s a 100 per cent insu­lated shell.’

The hor­i­zon­tal design of the house keeps it nes­tled unob­tru­sively in the land­scape, and it is sub­tly dis­guised by its earthy colours.

The mas­ter bed­room — a study in minimalism

 The main en-suite bath­room opens onto a pri­vate courtyard.

Source: http://www.houseandleisure.co.za

 

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A small home prototype that adapts easily to a variety of settings

Apr 242012
 

Cabin GJ-9 designed by Nor­way based Gud­mundur Jon­s­son Arkitek­tkon­tor con­sists of a con­tem­po­rary small home pro­to­type, eas­ily adapt­able to a vari­ety of settings. Specifically devel­oped for mass dis­tri­b­u­tion, the con­cept of Cabin GJ-9 is highly prac­ti­cal and ver­sa­tile. The cabin below is located in Bjergøy, Norway, and dis­plays an inspir­ing exte­rior defined by wood, glass and stone, cam­ou­flaged in its nat­ural sur­round­ing. Two vol­umes make up the small, but wel­com­ing home, one of them accom­mo­dat­ing the pri­vate area, and the other the ser­vice zones. A glazed pavil­ion con­tain­ing the liv­ing and din­ing space con­nects the two areas. Wood is present through­out the inte­rior, while a stone fire­place and invit­ing seat­ing units inspire relaxation.

Source: freshome.com

 

 

 

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