Fluffing up our nest- Dining room light fixture inspiration

As I mentioned, there are some updates I would love to make to our little nightingale nest.  As David will attest, it has been in somewhat of a state of flux since we were married two years ago!  The living area of the house is very open.  From the front door you walk right into the living/dining room and can see straight through into the kitchen.  It feels a bit like a loft in that respect, and I have such respect for people who live in open concept spaces like ours because, at least for me, it is impossible to keep it tidy looking!  Even the smallest hint of a pile makes it look messy, which I don’t mind so much but sends Mr. Nightingale into a tither!

At some point, I would really, really love to replace the glass block window.  Before I do that, though, we probably need to fluff up our driveway area a bit, because once there is a window there it will be totally visible.  That project deserves a post unto itself!  More immediately, though, I would like to replace the light fixture, the table and chairs, and either re-cover or replace the skirted table.

The current light fixture is a simple shade from Ikea that I hung one day last summer when David Nachtigall was at work.  It was a quick fix that has served us well for the past year while I have been on the look-out for a replacement.  I really, really try to stick to a budget (by which I mean spend as little as possible!) with this stuff, because even with inexpensive items the bill seems to add up quickly! Here are some light fixtures I am thinking about:

 

{Schoolhouse Electric}

 

 

{Etsy recycled brass chandy}

{Another Etsy find, the temperance chandelier}

 

Heck, I might even crafty and try one of these DIY numbers!

 

{Modern brass chandy via Little Green Notebook}

 

 

 

My Top 5- Jennifer Helgerson Interior Design

I have no recollection as to how I discovered the work of Jennifer Helgerson and her talented firm.  Surely a blog or mag out there somewhere, but I am such an ravenous media omnivore that I can’t remember. Hi my name is Laura and I’m a mag-a-holic.  Anyway, she is the first non-LA-based of the top 5, but she is in Portland, so another West Coast gal.  Her work is simple, livable, beautiful, and strikes a balance between polished and casual, which I am learning is an overarching aspect of my design aesthetic.  Check it:

Love this classic kitchen. Can’t remember the name of that kind of stove, but I’d love to put one in our bungalow!

Groovy finished attic.  Would be cool to do in our attic (if we could ever remove all the insulation snow!).  The skylight is crucial.

Simple, clean bathroom. It is definitely modern and yet fits the architectural style of the house.

A darling little boy’s room! I love the blue-gray walls and red bed. Presh.

Kitchen opening on to breakfast nook. I love that the glass fronted and backed cabinets creates a clear separation without sacrificing light.

A different view of the same kitchen/breakfast nook.

Cement tile floors + casement windows = dream come true

A perfect little office nook.

A groovy kitchen.

Groovy kitchen part 2. The windows are giving me inspiration for our own kitchen windows…uh oh 🙂 

I am downright obsessed with this bedroom.  Look at all of the storage for such a small space!!! Lay me down and die.

{all pics via Jennifer Helgerson Interior Design}

I am clearly harboring some kind of infatuation and have posted almost every image from the JHID portfolio.  You’ll just have to check out their website for the rest.

xo LFN

 

My Top 5- Nickey Kehoe

It wasn’t until I started thinking about my top 5 list for interior design that I realized how many of my favs are Cali/West Coast designers. Go figure! I guess my brief stint in LA rubbed off on my subconscious aesthetic. It makes sense, though, because I am constantly trying to get David to move to LA.  It is the freaking promised land!  The weather seriously makes me high on life. I digress…

The second member of my list of top 5 designers I try in vain to copy cat is, like Commune, not a person but a team.  Nickey Kehoe is a design firm that was created when designers Amy Kehoe and Todd Nickey merged their raw talent into an awesome powerhouse of designabilities.  And, they even have a store! In the promised land itself!

I first stumbled across their work in an edition of Domino (I think…could’ve been Lonny) that featured Sunrise and Mark Ruffalo’s amaze pad in LA.  As my 11th grade art history would say, it is “lay me down and die” g’lookin.

Why do I want to copy cat them?  Well, Nickey Kehoe’s work is is handsome enough to suit David’s need for a masculine-looking home while at the same time it is beautiful enough to suit my tastes.  It’s got enough funk for me and enough tailoring for mi esposo.  Perfecto!

 

I love the simplicity of this dining area.

I am tempted to straight up copy this look in my own dining room.  The table and wishbone chairs, at least.

I love, LOVE this bedroom. It is casual but pulled together.  It blends dark and light. Woohoo!  Could it be the perfect marriage of elements for our bedroom?!  Our bedroom is currently a dark and moody gray.  While I do like the color, it is very dark because we don’t have much natural light in the bedroom.  I have been wanting to brighten it, but David likes the darker color. We may have an answer here!

Pics from the spread that first introduced me to the talent of Nickey Kehoe (Sunrise and Mark Ruffalo’s Hollywood Hills home).  So g’lookin.

Sunrise’s dreamy hippie chick vanity.

A look that is just tff (totally funky fresh).

If we ever repaint our nest, it will be to match the look of this bungalow. The dark paint and blue door are pdf (pretty darn fab).

Amy Kehoe helped actress Ginnifer Goodwin with her pad.  It has craftsman elements which I love/wish hadn’t been removed from our house.

 

The above pics from Goodwin’s Amy Kehoe-decorated house in LA.  It is more feminine than what I have seen from her other work, but I love pretty much everything about it.

{all images via Pinterest}

Who’s with me? Do the good people of Nickey Kehoe just plain rock or what?

xo LFN

 

 

My Top 5- Commune Design

Do you remember back in middle school when kids would talk about their “top five”?  I sure do. Stuff like that was the cause of many bouts of low self-esteem, especially because I recall that my friends always seemed to make someone’s top 5, while I was feeling like a pear shaped loser.  Wah wah, I know, but I am SO glad not to be in middle school again (or high school, for that matter)!

These days I have my own top 5.   I have lots of top fives, in fact.  Top 5 flavors at Baskin Robbins, top 5 places for a marg, top 5 ways to waste time on the internet, and…top 5 sources of design inspiration/designers I try (with little success!) to emulate (read: rip off 🙂 in my own home.  Today I’d like to share some work from one of my top 5, Commune Design.

Commune Design is an LA-based firm, and perhaps my love for the West Coast design aesthetic is what draws me to them.  I love they way their designs are so easily able to blend casual/wanderlust-y/cool into a look that is done but not done up.  Here are some of my favorite designs from them:

I love this room Commune Design did for Ace Hotel.  The floor, window, and color choice are pretty darn fab.

Simple. Love this. Inspiration for our study re-do.

A more polished look. Love the color.

Bungalow kitchen of Commune designer Roman Alonso.  I love that it retains the original feel and touches of a Craftsman kitchen.

 

Again, Alonso’s  pad.  Our home is a craftsman, but it retains very few of the original architectural details.

Another look of the same apartment. 

An amazing Commune designed patio in Los Feliz.  PDF.

{All images via Pinterest}

What about you? Who is on your top 5?  Stay tuned for the rest of mine! xo LFN

 

 

 

Recovering the past

Have you guys seen this story?  The son of a Nazi art dealer willed a large collection of works to a museum in Bern.  Many of the works are thought to have been looted from Jewish families during the Holocaust, and the Swiss museum has said that, if it decides to accept the bequest, it will return the looted works to the families of their original owners.

The collection, which was discovered in 2012, had been under investigation.  The artworks were seized, and its owner claimed to have no knowledge that they might have been looted.  While it seems like a difficult claim to believe given what we know was going on in Germany at the time, he did say that he sought a “fair solution.”

I hope that the man who left the collection to the museum anticipated that they would have taken this course of action.  I would like to believe that it was his intention to will the works to each family, and so enlisted the museum to do so for him.

Stories such as this are so tragically fascinating.  The atrocities of that time period continue to affect the lives of so many families today.  In my own family, there is so little that we know of our family history, and we are beginning to discover that the secrets of the family were hidden to keep the family safe as they fled persecution in Europe and made their way in America.

A few years ago, my grandfather discovered a menorah, candles, and other mysterious items that had been buried in a trunk in his parents attic for years and then in a storage locker after they died.  The items belonged to my great-great-grandmother, Paulina, whose story we are beginning to piece together.  Our best sleuthing leads us to believe that she was a young Jewish woman who fled what was Poland at the time and made her way to Dallas somehow.  It is such a fascinating story, and I wish I knew more.  My grandfather remembers her as a very stern German woman, but he knows little of her origins.

I hope that these artworks will help other families who, too, are re-weaving the tapestry of their family history.

The schnozberries taste like schnozberries!

Mr. Nightingale and I had the.craziest.week.ever. last week.  We each had commitments every night after work during the week, and then Friday kicked off a fantastic weekend including a rehearsal dinner, sip and see, 1st birthday party, wedding, and (very grand) re-opening of my friend’s store.  Whew!  When Sunday afternoon rolled around, we were both ready for a little fresh air and some r’n’r.

We loaded up in my dad’s pick-up truck and headed out to the farm to pick dewberries.  The harvest was bountiful!  Everywhere we looked there were brambles full of the delicious wild blackberries.  It was hot outside and my hands are still scratched all over (we forgot gloves…whoops!), but it was so rewarding.  The afternoon added fuel to my fire of wanting to create an urban garden in our backyard!

Walkin the hood

Last night I was having a precision and so my main squeeze Mr. Nightingale gave me permission to order in dinner (whatever I wanted!) without judgment. I decided to order a delicious margherita pizza (my favorite, and not just because I like to pretend that my middle name is ‘Margherita’ or ‘Margarita’ or anything by the matronly ‘Margaret’ it is) to go from Ruggles Green down the street.  I donned my widest-brimmed hat to walk the few blocks away to pick it up lest a ray touch my lily white skin, and I almost skipped down the sunny side of the street to go pick it up.

Walking in the warm, late-Spring sun, I was reminded again why I love my ‘hood so much.  We live in an old neighborhood in Houston called the Heights (fun fact: my great-great-grandfather was one of the developers and lived in the first house on Heights Blvd.) that is one of the few walkable neighborhoods of this megalopolis Houston.  Within a few blocks from our house are restaurants, coffee shops, boutiques, and other spots I am continuing to discover and explore.  It feels so magical and cosmopolitan, even though in reality I live only a few miles from where I grew up!

Do people in other cities get a spring in their step just by knowing that they can walk to pick up dinner, or is this something that only those of us who grew up car-bound revel in?  What joy not to have to fight with strangers over parking!

Do you live in a walking city?  Or, do you live in Houston?  If so, what are your favorite places to walk?

Me and my muumuus

My wardrobe gravitates towards what one would envision a pregnant lady wearing on a beach holiday in Mexico, even though I am neither pregnant nor at the beach. You can imagine that my husband loves this look. He describes my style as “wacky,” by which I choose to believe he means wacky a la Alex from Saved by the Bell the College Years, not wacky a la Mrs. Roper from 3’s Company.

For the past three days, for example, I have worn red pants (which are denim! gasp!  I have been avoiding my boss for days!) and my new favorite shirt–a white-on-white embroidered tunic-length Mexican number from Mi Golondrina that I literally bought off the back of the designer this weekend.  I. just. can’t. get. enough.

{Mi Golondrina}

Thankfully, mainstream clothiers (i.e. clothiers other than my grandmother’s beach house closet) seem to be embracing all that is Mexicaine and flowy, which makes life much easier and shopping much more fun.

As I embark on the next adventure of my life and seek greener pastures outside  of the classroom, I had a realization today that I am constrained by my wardrobe–how can I possibly be expected to have an office job when I need to be able to wear muumuus every day?!  I can’t, and that is that.  Muumuus fo eva!

Long time gone

I had almost forgotten about this little corner of the internets, but something has been tugging at me to write lately.  The other day I commented to my husband that I felt like I had lost my spark.  I don’t know where it went or when it started slipping away, but I feel like it’s dimmed little by little and now all of the sudden it’s so faint it feels non-existent.  I am determined to get it back, to get back to the basics of me and fan this flame.  Writing feels like a big part of that, like it’s integral to some part of me I feel is slipping away.  I don’t know what I am going to write. I have always had internal struggles when it comes to blogging…I mean, does anyone out there care what I have to say?  Do I have anything interesting to say?  Do I want people to read it even if I do?   This tiny post feels like a step in the write direction, though.

Not cool, Robert Frost

This will never get old or any less inspiring.  I haven’t made it over to that road less traveled.  Watching this is a call to arms, a reminder that the path of least resistance is not necessarily the path I want to travel.

“Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence.” (Thoreau)