Pouf

January 17th, 2011

Craigslist is a fickle beast of a monster.

Seemingly, I search CL nonstop for deals on furniture…even though space is becoming slightly tight around these parts. It’s been awhile since I picked something up off CL, wait, hold the phone, what was the last thing I grabbed? This coffee table? OK, maybe it hasn’t been that long.

Well, I stumbled on a post about an African leather ottoman and hearing that siren call of vintage goodies, headed out to the boonies of Sage in search of the miraculous. Sage is kind of like Hemet, but very much not. It’s this weird/beautiful valley full of ranches and horses and windy mountain roads. I met up with an older couple that built a nutty newfangled adobe (horribly pictured above) overlooking this crazy beautiful view of a horse type farm.

Boom. Vintage leather pouf. With just that perfect amount of beat-up wear and tear on the hardiest leather in the land.

The Eames lounger has been needing an ottoman, but the search has been difficult since: A: hard to find an Eames ottoman by itself & B: the den is really really narrow. If you put a real Eames ottoman with the chair it blocks the traffic through the den and into the kitchen and to the sofa.

This leather baby is kind of the perfect in-between size. Put your feet up and relax without losing a lot of space. Plus I like mixing up the Eames with something less traditional.

Bowie approves. This has been his new perch for monitoring and harassing Iggy (obviously since Iggy is MIA – its working).

Ah man. I should have gotten a shot of the bottom – its woven together with a big leather thread. Like a corset or something. Just take a moment and try to imagine it. It’s cool, right?

Ceramic Addict

January 14th, 2011

Ceramic collection? Getting out of control.

Almost every surface in the house is starting to get covered in vintage pottery. It could be worse, I mean it could be covered in dolls or Precious Moments figurines.

*I predict vintage popularity of Precious Moments in 2020. Stock up now.

**For real though, do you guys ever wonder what the next big vintage collectible thing will be? I do all the time. Love to hear your predictions…

Homemade Handmade

January 13th, 2011

I am shamelessly reposting these images from Andrea Zittel’s A-Z West, because I can’t get Garth and his home out of my mind. These images are of Garth’s handmade pool and sauna which make up just part of his incredible desert domicle up off of Gamma Gulch in Pipes Canyon. The pool built straight into the rock has me hypnotized with its curling lines of brilliant meandering color paired with those incredible rock formation and landscape views. Just the idea floating around on a hot day and then stretching out on that bed of warm stones in a personal sauna makes my heart flutter.

There is something fascinating about people who reshape the world around them, continuously test out ways of living and experiment with those notions of home we all seem to refashion in response to needs (or what we thought we needed).

I’ve had this above image in my “do this” landscape folder for some time. It’s of Andrea’s patio, which includes a spectacular fire pit fabricated by TK. The concrete stairs that seem almost pored into the rock and the chunky organic furniture mixed with the modern Bertoia chairs just hits me right in that sweet spot. It’s lovely and unfussy, casual and considered, examined and inviting all at once.

I recommend reading through all of A-Z West. It’s completely inspiring as is an in depth inspection of A-Z’s institute of investigative living.

Something about this sort of wild west handmade desert architecture reminded me of this book about the rambling and pieced together architecture of Woodstock homes in the 1970’s. I am enamored of the raw initiative of these places (and BEE – it made me think about you).

Woodstock Handmade Houses by Robert Haney, David Ballantine and Jonathan Elliott.

All images via Old Chum. Visit the Old Chum Tumblr as well.

“heavy on imagination, light on money”

While the clutter and disarray would make me feel slightly overwhelmed, it’s refreshing to consider a less rigorous and more investigative way of approaching space and how to live in it. I admire the gumption, the making do, the slow and constant arc of reassessment and collection that necessitates homemade architecture.

As we continue experimenting with our little home,  it couldn’t hurt to instill some of that can do 1970’s hippy attitude.  Or furniture…

Now I just need a couple of acres in the desert and a shack to build out.