Visiting the Hollywood Hills

Here's a teeny little step back into the past for today's post. Completed in 2007, but by no means any less inspiring today, this West Hollywood home was revamped by Clive Wilkinson Architects. Designed for the personal use of the Clive Wilkinson, the architect himself, the house is a relish of fabulous tangerine accents and warm wood finishes. And what fabulous exploitation of the colour wheel rules! The touches of the spectrum of blues used to set-off the contrasting oranges is so refreshing. 

What I giddily get lost in, and what is probably my favourite element, is the mixture of old-school Hollywood elegance with a completely modern approach to the execution. I love the fabulous low furniture with its bold colours nodding to the 70's, and the simple, floating wide steps merging the exterior with the interior ever so seamlessly.

There is a Clockwork Orange feel to the hexagonal, bright coloured shapes which, adorned with little creatures, add speckles of colour bursts to the space. Although, unlike A Clockwork Orange, the feeling I get from this interior is not laced with crazy uncertainty and mystery, but rather of an incredibly delectable and welcoming space perfectly nuzzled in the Hollywood Hills.

Source - inspiration feed

Images courtesy of - inspiration feed

Marble and wood, a friendship of elegance...

Nuzzled in on the third floor of a nineteenth century Spanish apartment building, this Madrid apartment owes its freshness and modern zest to a recent renovation driven by its owners desire and need for open spaces, sheer simplicity and elegant minimalism. Executed to perfect, simplistic visual harmony by Spanish architects Schneider Colao, the Orfila Flat unravels in a way that is quite unique to how we normally think of interior spaces.

Unlike your standard apartment concept whereby rooms are divided by function such as kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom... you get the gist... the Orfila Flat is defined by its wet and dry areas.  Furthermore, the wet and dry areas have been assigned a key material each, in order to keep the flow through the spaces, and the visual elegance, to a harmonious simplicity. The wet areas are appropriately adorned in marble flooring, while the dry areas sport hardwood floors. To enhance the visual harmony, and inject a common accent, the ceilings of the wet areas have been covered with soft wood ribbed panels.

Interestingly, the owners haven't simply chosen this unique way to redefine spaces for the sake of being different. The yoga and meditation lovers wanted to move freely from one space to another without defined junctions and unnecessary doorways. I find this is such a humanly relevant concept and very successfully brought to life by the architects. 

Source - dezeen

Images courtesy of - dezeen 

Sublime architecture chisels out ideal interior

Ok, so there are great interiors, wonderfully styled, adorned with the perfect furniture pieces, injections of colour, and mouthwatering wall textures, but this is oh-so-much-more-than-that!!!! This amazing space, belonging to a house design by the architects Peter Thomas Hornung & Elsa Katharina Jacobi lives on the island of Rhodes in Greece. Welcome to Villa F.

It is, in its pure essence, perfectly chiselled out to fit with its environment & compliment its surrounding climate. What stopped me in my web-browsing tracks when I came across the image of the swooping, magically feather-light stairs, was the sheer enormity of a space that is actually quite empty yet carries detailing and curves that are absolutely divine to the eye. When we think of interior design we are often presented with four walls and we adorn them, fill in the space between them in the most creative fashion that we can imagine, but essentially, we have four walls. So it is so damn refreshing to see interior design being defined by the architecture itself, so it is no longer interior design but true interior architecture.

It's quite funny, one of the first thoughts that galloped through my mind when I saw this project was how much it resembled the work of Zaha Hadid, and in further reading about the two talented architects behind this project I found out that they had actually worked for Zaha Hadid during their careers. Further to the incredible spaces where walls become ledges and roll into book-shelfs or curve into sinks and curve out into the luxury deck, the house is built to work harmoniously with its environment and surroundings. I invite you to read more on some of the architectural challenges at arthitectural.com.

Source - hornung & jacobi via arthitectural.com

Images via - arthitectural.com

Timid, sophisticated beauty by Ayşen Orhon

Al

There is nothing more rewarding for a blogger than to have an artist who you've featured take the time to send you a little note of thanks. It is appreciated and loved beyond words and injects bubbles of motivation towards what we bloggers do. So thank you immensely to all the busy artists and designers who take the time out of their busy and creative lives to send a little 'hi'.

One of these amazing artists is the talented, U.S. based, Ayşen Orhon. I blogged about some of her delectable work in September of last year in the post Whispers on a Canvas, a selection from her exquisite AO Collection, and as chance would have it, I'd already started preparing a new post when I received the kind word of thanks. This post has been in the pipes for some time now, one that has been somewhat pushed back by my move to Australia..... But 'pushed back' no more!!

Whale series is simply stunning. It depicts the animals in a very minimalistic and modern way, and you're not quite sure at first that you're looking at whales. Not only does this collection personify beautiful creatures through deliciously cute and appropriate names such as Penelope, Jack, Al and Humphrey, it also embodies the life and movement of these beautiful animals through a simple yet emotionally rich approach. Moreover, each whale has their own character which comes to life off the texture of each canvas and envelopes the viewer's heart. In an incredibly sophisticated manner Ayşen Orhon makes it clear that each whale is unique... Jack is playful, while Humphrey is wise... Al is timid, while Tony is adventurous. I can't say that I didn't sense a pang of sadness as Tony departed, and then a feeling of quiet relief as he returned...

Penelope

Jack

Humphrey

Lilith

Tony takes off

Tony's return

Jack's flukes

Jay Jay

Images courtesy of - aysen orhon flickr

You can find more of the artist's fabulous work at - aysen orhon, ao collection, instagram, pinterest

Super-fun Toulouse-Lautrec inspired wall stickers

Ooooh whaaaaah!! Now this is doing it with style, colour and pizazz!! Mixing surrealism with everyday life Pixers have delved into the exploration of the life and doings of circus performers to bring together a collection of rather unconventional, completely mesmerising and stupefyingly fun wall stickers. As true experts of all that is wall mural, print, poster and sticker, Pixers were inspired by the works of Henri Touluse-Lautrec who very famously depicted the life of nineteenth century dancers in his very unique fashion.

The collection makes a play of both the limelight and private moments of the theatrical characters, and is one aimed not at the boring hearted but rather those amongst us who are a little rebellious and daring. After all, that's a lot of colour to splash on one wall. 

I absolutely adore them!! More than those that brazenly stare me in the face singing 'heeeeer I aaaaam', I, just that little bit more, rather enjoy the ones that are a little hidden behind a bookshelf, a sexy sofa, or a lazy lamp. With that kind of rhythm on the wall, one needs little but the absolute basics to adorn a modern interior.

Source - freshome

Images courtesy of - freshome

Vintage funk Malmo interior swims in rich detail

WOW! Man, if I could ever have the chance to again redesign an apartment, this is what I will do. What a space! What an amazing collection of ideas all under the same roof. This is not simply interior design, this is art in its freshest form. These rooms are used as canvases where the articles within constitute layer upon layer of richness that give this Malmo apartment a very unique and remarkably funky feeling.

Where does one start? I love the vastness of the spaces. I love the control in filling the large white rooms just enough but not over-filling them. I respect this highly because this is one of my biggest problems. As much as I love beginning with a fresh white space, I too often fill it beyond visual capacity. Control is certainly an art.

Just look at the class with which the soft dress hangs on the living room wall, right at home amongst the more traditional picture frames... and the books casually but sassily affirming their presence as they sit arranged on the ground, not need for a shelf. Notice also the bed-side table, it is made of clean white shoes boxes, serving surface and storage purposes all at once. With the exception of the dining room, all rooms are immaculately painted in white. The dining room itself was painted green to embody the feeling of an old English Library and exude a genuine feeling of rich vintage.

Source - elle interior sweden

Images courtesy of - elle interior sweden