Design Addict – Week of Design (Day 1)

When I was ten years old I got my first magazine subscriptions to House Beautiful and Vogue. Now those of you who know me well are aware that I am not terribly fashion conscious. I don’t spend any money on clothes, so I’ve been wearing the same gap t-shirts since 1994 (I even have photos to prove it.). I may not wear it, but if you ask me what’s in style, I tend to know the latest trends (even though my Vogue subscription expired years ago; now I just love the internet!).

I like to think the same goes for my knowledge of architecture and interior design.

For years I have been collecting images of design and decorating ideas for when I finally would own a house. Anytime I saw a photo I liked online or a clipping in a magazine, I saved or scanned it and put it in my ‘future house ideas’ image folder. It has always seemed so far fetching and David loves to tease me about how crazy it is that I’ve been planning this for years.

Well, I’m hoping it has paid off. We’re house hunting. Or, rather, we’re townhouse hunting, as the California housing market makes me want to cry. We’re hoping for a real fixer upper so we can make it our own. Right now we’re keeping our fingers crossed and trying to take deep breaths and stay sane…

In celebration of the possibility that we may actually own a place in the near future, I though I would post some of my favorite designs from my ‘future house ideas’ folder. So, keep checking back for a new photo collage posted each day this week.

Shut up and sing

We finally watched the Dixie Chick documentary Shut Up & Sing— it was fantastic (although I definitely liked it more than David)! What a fabulous group of sassy, interesting, intelligent, and talented women. I was so touched by their camaraderie, as well as their deep love and respect for each other. They just blew me away! It’s so refreshing seeing superstars as regular people and people you could see hanging out with (in my dreams, right?!). If you are at all a fan of their music or if you want the inside scoop on the 2003 “incident,” rent it!

    “My friends from high school married their high school boyfriends, moved into houses in the same ZIP codes where their parents live… But I, I could never follow… No I, I could never follow…”

    Oh, how I can relate to those lyrics. From New Jersey to California with no regrets.

I don’t think of myself as a country music fan, but I also didn’t realize that their new album isn’t all that country… so, I’ve decided that I am going to put my money where my mouth is and buy their cd . I want to support them!

Gardening: your civic duty

We walked into the Picasso exhibit at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and everything looked so familiar. I had seen and hated that Matt Weber piece before… I recognized that sculpture… and suddenly it dawned on me… It was the same Picasso exhibit that I has seen in New York at the Whitney Museum in November.

Only I would unwittingly go to the same exhibit on both coasts. (Btw, it was so worth it.)

Anyhow, we loved SFMOMA! There were two fantastic temporary exhibits: photographs by Henry Wessel and the SECA Victory Gardens by Amy Franceschini. Amy’s work focused on shaping agricultural and food policy and encouraging people to grow gardens for their food supply (learn more here). I am so excited about this! I had never heard of Victory Gardens before:

How cool is that?! In the exhibition they showed historical photographs of the fields in front of City Hall transformed into gardens. What a shame these practices (and ideology) have fallen by the wayside! I am so hopeful for a resurgence.

One of David and my longstanding goals is to grow our own food and, as vegetarians, we feel we could maybe just pull it off. I really, really can’t wait for us to own land. Before we redo the bathrooms or refinish the floors, we are going to sew our garden…