5 bucks to help...

everyone can afford $5 to help earthquake relief efforts in haiti- text "yele" to 501501, and 5 dollars will automatically be billed to your cell phone, or if you'd rather donate with a credit card, or donate a larger sum, click here.

guess who?

you might think this is a pricy albrizzi box from a fabulous and chic modern design store like moss or twentieth, but you'd be wrong.

le tarjay. $9.99.

you're welcome.

a year in the life of a room... (and a wee bit of design philosphy)

well, a year and a half in the life of this room, actually...

in the summer of 2008, the late, great domino magazine sent out emails to bloggers asking for shots of their homes for inclusion in a feature on blogger's homes for their october 2008 issue. of course, when domino asked, m21 scurried to take some snaps! unfortunately, m21 didn't make the cut for domino but all was well, as the pictures ran later online on the material girls blog, and were also published offline, accompanying our 'blog watch' profile in home plus scotland magazine.

the reason we mention this, is this morning we snapped the same basic angle of our living room to give a potential buyer an idea of the scale of a chinoiserie screen offered in our marketplace (as you know, that's our favorite part of our "catch and release" personal decorating- we get to use pretty stuff and then pass it on before our decorating ADD gets bored with it!). our living room is basically the same in both photos you'll note- we just moved a few things around, and shifted out one dramatic piece (the etagere) for another (the screen). maison21 is a firm believer in using a dramatic, large scale "something" in a room whenever possible- be it a screen, a sculpture, a painting, an unusual etagere- there should be something big(ish) and a little unusual, to catch the eye and spark conversation. (you can tell by the pictures, we also enjoy the small things- never met a tchotchke we didn't like!)

by switching one major element, m21 thinks the room feels a bit different in each photo, yet hopefully preserves the eclectic vintage modern/traditional tension we love to use in our own personal decor. for m21 and his magpie nature of collecting the newest, shiniest bit of pretty, change comes fairly naturally, but he doesn't think anyone needs to be tied to a particular piece, or to a exact room arrangement. rooms can be fluid and grow, yet still retain the overall look and style you hope to achieve, after changes are made... in other words- if your room isn't perfect now, it can be in the future if you keep working on it, changing and rearranging; and if it is pretty darn close to perfect at this moment, don't be so tied to it that you never attempt to make it even better! it's all part of the fun of decorating...

summer, 2008

january, 2010

which version do y'all like best? or neither? m21 won't take offense- promise! it's all likely to change soon anyway!

weird.

maison21 grew up in southern california, and the weather here just isn't hard to predict- if the sun is shining, it's nice outside. easy, breezy.

sunny = warm

so that is why m21 just can't wrap his head around the weather forecast on his google homepage for his friends back east- if the little sun icon is not obscured by clouds, in our mind, that means it should be warm outside! honestly, we have trouble fathoming 24 degrees, yet sunny! it just doesn't seem right, unless we have pieces of fiberglass strapped to our feet and are zooming down a mountain. even then, that sh*t is cold...

same sun icon, two wildly different outcomes

and no we aren't trying to gloat- just observing that sunny and below freezing is a foreign concept to us. it's just plain weird... (those of you with frostbitten noses can return the sentiment in kind when the san andreas fault finally blows and m21 slides into the ocean).

perhaps the stupidest product of all time, yet we kinda wish it did get cold enough here to buy one for mona ;-)

in the meantime, stay warm, kids. wrap yourself (and your best friend) in a snuggie, curl up with a good book, or your favorite trash tv, and enjoy your day from the safety of a warm bed- and if it lasts much longer, should m21 make up the guest room for you?

j'accuse!

if you didn't look so guilty every i walk into the room, i wouldn't constantly suspect you of being up to no good! remember, the ashy paws incident was only a month ago, so you are still on probation, buster!