2007 NWSID Golf Tournament

Partial proceeds from this year’s tournament went to ReFIT (Remodeling for Independence Together). ReFIT is a non-profit volunteer organization providing home modification services for physically and financially challenged homeowners who wish to remain living independently in their homes. For more information go to www.ReFITPortland.org

All in all this year’s tournament was a testament to the dedication and commitment of the members in this organization. It is people like you that make it possible for us to achieve our goal of helping our community and showing the Portland area what a great organization NWSID is. If you would like to participate in next year’s tournament, e-mail us at nwsidgolf@msn.com.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

Ottoman Bench - A Great Accent Piece For Any Room

Jesse Akre has written an article about the Ottoman Bench:

One of the best types of accent furniture that you can buy is an ottoman bench. Many people spend their furniture shopping time focusing on things like beds, cabinets, and desks. There are more furniture items out there that you need to consider, though. You can sleep in your bed, but you cannot play cards there. You can do some work at your desk, but it won't provide extra seating when you have guests over. Accent items are important pieces because they complete your home's look and they add to the primary furniture items that are already in place. The ottoman bench is one of those items that you don't have to have, but it adds something to your house that other furniture items cannot.

If you want an ottoman bench, you aren't limited to one size, color, or style. More and more people are becoming interested in buying these items, so there are plenty of options out there. If you like leather, then choose from many wonderful leather options for your ottoman bench. That isn't the most popular type of ottoman bench, though. Generally, people prefer softer upholstery for their accent items. Since these items will not be used in seating most of the time, they will be there for looks.

Generally, the ottoman bench is a big item that can seat up to two people. Unlike its smaller ottoman counterpart that attaches to a small chair, this accent item is meant to accommodate more than one person. Because of its bulky size, you will need creative when figuring out a good place to put it. Ottoman benches are usually found in large hallways towards the front of a home. Other families choose to include the ottoman bench as a part of its living room furniture. This is alright as long as it is simply an extra piece and not the actual couch.

As far as shopping for an ottoman bench goes, people have become very creative in the past few years. Around ten years ago, people would use furniture stores almost exclusively when shopping for an item like this. These days, folks are much more willing to use the internet in order to find a good deal on an ottoman bench. There are plenty of dealers on the internet that are willing to give you a good deal on one of these items. Others have done one better, bidding on items at places like EBay in order to find a great deal on an ottoman bench. This is probably a little bit irresponsible, though, as you are never sure what condition you will get on items like that.

An ottoman bench can do wonders for a home that is in need of a little bit of accent furniture. It can provide not only a good look, but a place for people to sit when they come to visit your home. Finding an ottoman bench on the internet has never been easier, as well.

Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery carries many styles of ottoman benches. Those pictured above are examples from Sherrill, Sam Moore, Whittemore - Sherrill, and the Moondance collection from Stanley.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

Marriott Works With Hekman

Marriott has opened a luxury hotel in Grand Rapids, Michigan reports Chris Knape and Jenna Carlesso.

From the giant Polish vases filled with locally provided flowers to the hundreds of photographs from sites in Ga District, Ghana; and Perugia, Italy; and other Grand Rapids sister cities, the glittering downtown hotel is a study in cosmopolitan fusion.

Local touches were everywhere during Monday's "sneak peek" media tour of the landmark $100 million, 337-room luxury hotel.

[..]

Furniture from local companies -- primarily Steelcase Inc. and Hekman Inc. -- is found around every turn.

Yes, Hekman is a local company in Grand Rapids, however Marriott is very sensitive to every detail in this spendy refuge for travelers and still chose Hekman. We are proud, as well, to feature Hekman products.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

The Sultry Shades of Gray

Tracy Bulla Senior Product Editor HOME ACCENTS TODAY.RELISH writes about "Smoke & Mirrors."

Gray, the color of the season, arrives in sultry shades of platinum, gunmetal, slate and anthracite. Poised between black and white, gray lends the illusion of mystery, intelligence and extreme sophistication with a silvery smooth, fluid presence. While subtle whispers betray an aura of cool, collected and infinitely understated richness. Whether applied to classic or contemporary designs, the result is effortlessly modern in the absolute.

Wow, all that to describe gray! Too bad you aren't able to see the two page photo layout of Smoke & Mirrors, but Relish is not online yet. I will tell you that I will keep the magazine in the store. You should also know that we ordered a gray sofa some weeks ago and it will be on our floor soon. Give us a call to see if it has arrived.

UPDATE: The sofa is here and it's Fantastic!

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

Hekman: Tuscan Estates

At the October Fall Market 2007 Hekman will make some exciting new introductions.

Hekman has a long Heritage of shopping Italy for unique antique furnishings in the areas century's old estates or in the fine shops of the Tuscan Region running along the Tyrrhenian Sea trom Carrara to the north to Capalbio on the south, Cortona on the west, with Florence right in the middle.

This Tuscan area is full of fine artisans who reproduce and finish these antique finds in small family run shops where time honored techniques continue to be used to manufacture and finish furniture. It is not unusual for family members to labor over pieces for weeks using old world lacquer techniques and adding layers of color, sanding through the finish build up with river rocks and river sand to produce an exacting replica of a fine antique from one of the Tuscan Estates of the area.

Hekman over the years has stored in a warehouse their favorite samples of these fine antiques from the Tuscan Region and is reproducing them and some adaptations in a collection they are calling Tuscan Estates.

This collection consists of two dining rooms, four occasional groupings, entertainment and home office pieces totaling 31 items. The crafting of this collection reflects the use of the time honored techniques of the artisans of Tuscany using hand planed thick veneers randomly laid in horizontal and diagonal patterns and hand rubbed with bee's wax to reflect the patina of an old planked floor. This creates the core finish to the collection named Weathered Walnut. Then on a select number of pieces with generous turnings and carvings Hekman layered color and lacquer and then sanded through these layers using old world sanding techniques to create a rich Rubbed Onyx color.

Hekman married the Rubbed Onyx color in tandem with Weather Walnut to high light the carving details and the flowing lines of each antique reproduction. To finish the collection they have reproduced a jewelry finish called Tortoise Shell using hand detailing like, the ancient artisans to create the mix of colors necessary for this finish.

Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery is proud to have carried Hekman since 2001.

Bev & Mike

Get Out of Your Overwhelm!

Is this you? You are a mother to two children, a wife trying to find some quiet time with your husband, fitting in an exercise program, working 7 days a week as a designer, feeling lots of stress, and feeling guilty because you think you should be able to handle everything in your life better.

Nika Stewart, a Designer's Success Coach, writes

I know the feeling too well. I wish I could say that I don't, but I am prone to feeling overwhelmed. As designers and business owners, with so many external and internal factors to deal with - the economy, the housing market, our families, our own homes, the demands of our clients, backordered and discontinued fabrics...(oh my gosh, I am feeling anxious just typing this list!), we are bound to feel overwhelmed and stressed sometimes.

The experts say when you are feeling stressed, you should take a break, get a massage, or take a bubble bath. But, who has the time.

Stewart writes, "When I am too stressed and too busy to take even a little time for myself, that is when it is absolutely critical to do so!"

If you are feeling the stress, she recommends an Intention Break

• Step Away - you can NOT stop the ongoing overwhelm if you do not physically step out of the situation.
• Reflect on your goals - remember your priorities, think about your dreams. Write your intentions down, and keep this paper with you always. Post it where you can see them often.
  
• Go back to your regularly scheduled life - If you are continuously reminded of your business intention (reading it when you wake up, glancing at it from time to time as you work, saying it to yourself over lunch), you will make choices on a daily basis that bring you closer and closer to your goal - and further and further away from overwhelm.

I wrote down some of my goals for business and posted them on the kitchen cabinet. I see them all the time. When I'm feeling overwhelmed, I remember one ofmy goals is to retire at 60. Retiring for me might mean working only two or three days a week. I don't know how yet, but thoughts of how to achieve the goal come to me while I shower or drive to the store and I make choices during every day that bring the goal nearer. I let go and let my subconscious find answers.

BTW, Stewart had an online seminar in which she discussed "how I turned my struggling 7-day workweek into a thriving, successful design business (where I work only 4 days a week, make lots more money, and enjoy my life more than ever!)." Maybe, she will schedule another or there may be slides available of her talk.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

The Phillips Collection

High Point is coming soon! Show dates are October 1st - 7th in North Carolina. We are receiving some very interesting marketing pieces from vendors and I thought this was unique for giving a flavor of a company's design. The Phillips Collection, where every piece is a conversation, has been in business for 20 years. We carry many of their accessories at Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery.



Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

Hemlines Are Plunging

Check out this "Boomer" friendly news from The Wall Street Journal's Cheryl Lu-Lien: Tan

The fashion pendulum is swinging to extremes these days. Pants, which were super-skinny just this summer, are flaring out to sail-like widths this fall. Tent-like trapeze dresses are giving way to close-cut pencil skirts. And now — most dramatically — hemlines are dropping.

One of the biggest themes emerging at this year’s New York fashion week is the longer hemline. Here’s a peek at a few top designers’ sketches of this new look.

One of the biggest themes emerging this week at New York fashion shows, which are displaying styles for next spring, is much longer dresses and skirts, many extending to midcalf or even the ankles. Today, Badgley Mischka and Bill Blass are scheduled to present long dresses and skirts for the spring. In the following week, labels including Michael Kors, Donna Karan, Peter Som, Nanette Lepore and Tracy Reese are planning to show longer pieces, many of which are flowing dresses meant to be worn during the day.

The longer looks are a big departure from the micro-mini shifts and short, youthful baby-doll dresses that have dominated stores and runways for several seasons. Just this spring, thigh-skimming looks reminiscent of the mod 1960s were the big trend that retailers and designers were pushing.

Designers — who pooh-pooh the old stock-market adage that falling hemlines presage a falling market – say it’s only natural for the fashion pendulum to swing toward a new shape as the industry seeks to capture shoppers’ interest. Fashion has been careening from one extreme to another particularly quickly these days amid speedier clothing production and broader consumer interest in frequent updates.

As an unofficial and unelected member of the fashion police, I am charged with ticketing any violators of this new fashion, even though it will probably take a year for it to get to PDX. I will say this is great news for boomers and our gravity challenged skin above the knees.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

Spotlight On Lighting

We received some lighting tips from Julie Johnson at Lux Lighting. There's some great information here about lighting your home interior:

To Make A Room Appear larger

• Use wall washers on a large expanse of light colored wall

• Use up lighting to bounce light onto the ceilings and walls

• Create panels of light at one end of the room - your eye will be pulled toward it, making the room appear larger.

To Make Your Room Appear Taller

• Use vertical light beams

• Hang pendent lighting low
  

To Make Your Room Appear Cozy

• Use several table lamps to create low pools of light

• Don't allow light onto the ceiling

Julie has many more tips to share and she's in the Pearl.

Lux Lighting
1333 NW Glisan Portland, OR 97209
503-299-6754 X110 or julie@luxlights.com

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

New Products at Las Vegas

Home Furnishings Business has photos of new products at the Las Vegas show in late July.

A small Arabesque table from Global Views offers an airy feel with a hand-tooled leather top.

Hand-decorated wooden vases from Bard International appear to float on black pedestal bases. Suggested retail is $229 for the set of three.

Part of the Candice Olson collection at AF Lighting, this clever lamp features natural horn on a square base.

Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery, located in the Pearl Design Center, offers accessories from the vendors and much more!

Bev & Mike

SALI Interview Of Bev & Mike

Kathy Long of Passionate Interiors just lit up her MySpace page with an interview of Bev & Mike for Cascade Artisans Guild which is part of SALI.

Founded in 1984, the Stencil Artisans League (SALI) is an international non-profit organization dedicated to the promotion and preservation of the art of stenciling

Stencils include decorative painting, e.g.: faux finishes, murals and trompe l’oeil, stenciling, business and more.

We are pleased to be singled out for an interview and hope that interior designers and contractors will contact Kathy Long and her organization for some wonderful ways to decorate the walls of a home.

Passionate Interiors, LLC
11965 Northwest Kearney Street
Portland, OR 97229

(503)819-6758

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

Hammary to roll out first retail display format

Thomas Russell at Furniture Today, writes that Hammary will show new contemporary collection.

Hammary Furniture is rolling out a new retail display format for a contemporary style occasional and casual dining collection.

The 40-piece Modern Hammary collection includes cocktail, end and accent tables as well as dining pieces, a low profile room divider and a sofa, chair and ottoman. Finishes are black, ash and merlot.

The group features a variety of items and price points ranging from a $179 glass top cocktail to a $1,400 two-piece home entertainment console with wine storage.

Other signature pieces include a $249 cocktail and a short profile room divider on casters that retails for $399.

Many of the items are sized to fit into smaller homes. For instance, one cocktail is 44 inches long compared with the usual 50 inches. The group also has a 36-inch round cocktail, compared to the normal 38- to 40-inch range.

“There is a real premium here on scale, function and price point,” Huff said, noting that this is the first time Hammary has launched such a merchandising concept for retailers.

Landfair Furniture is proud to carry Hammary Furniture. Come see Hammary and more at our new location in the Pearl Design Center.

Bev & Mike

Mondrian Art

What do you make of coincidences or are there such things?

Beverly and I were talking and she used the word "Mondrian" to describe a design she had seen. I asked her for a definition because it was a totally new word to me.

From Wikipedia:
Piet Mondriaan (March 7, 1872 — d. New York City, February 1, 1944) was a Dutch painter.

His paintings exhibit a complexity that belies their apparent simplicity. He is best known for his non-representational paintings that he called "compositions", consisting of rectangular forms of red, yellow, blue, white or black, separated by black rectilinear lines. They are the result of a stylistic evolution that occurred over the course of nearly 30 years and continued beyond that point to the end of his life.

Some examples of his art:

A couple of days later, a book I'd ordered, Spook Country by William Gibson, arrived in the mail. I sat down to read it and the second paragraph of the first chapter reads in part, "They'd had one previous conversation, the one which had resulted in her flying to L.A. and checking into the Mondrian." How weird is that?

I Googled Mondrian and found pictures of this fabulous new hotel.

Morgans Hotel Group arrived in Los Angeles in 1996, with the opening of Mondrian, located on the world-famous Sunset Boulevard. Mondrian presents the consummate expression of a balancing act between apparent contradictions – entertainment and spirituality, cutting-edge style and simplicity, fantasy and reality. The hotel perfectly captures the quintessential California lifestyle by uniting its deeply rooted appreciation of the outdoors and relaxed, casual living with a pervasive sense of magic, glamour and excitement.

After drooling over the L.A. hotel, and this Scottsdale Mondrian,



I found another example of this painter's influence. Contemporary Furniture.com has this cocktail table:



Is that it or will the word "Mondrian" lead me to some other unexpected places?

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

Mondrian

Duralee Acquires Cavalier Furniture

FURNITUREToday announces

High-end fabric source Duralee has acquired Cavalier Furniture, a 40-year-old upholstery manufacturer in Cerritos, Calif.

According to Cavalier's website, "Cavalier produces upholstered hand-tied furniture in fine fabrics and leathers of the absolute highest quality. Owned and operated by the Button family since 1964, Cavalier not only offers exceptional products, but prides itself on providing its customers with the best service in the industry."

Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery in the Pearl Design Center is proud to carry Duralee fine fabrics and furniture and look forward to having additional designs from which to choose.

Bev & Mike

Duralee
Cavalier Furniture

Sei Amici

Six friends had dinner Wednesday night at Iorio Restaurant - Southern Italian Cuisine.

What a lovely little space on 912 SE Hawthorne Blvd. in Portland, Oregon 97214.

Michael started off with caprese salad with heirloom tomatoes, fresh basil and hand pulled mozzarella. Two of us had the beet salad with dolce gorgonzola and three shared organic greens and candied walnuts. We loved the salads. We brought three different red wines and corkage was $12 per bottle.

Mike and Gerry had Tagliatelle with oven roasted tomato sauce and our choice of meatballs or spicy Italian sausage. Mike preferred the meatballs and Gerry wished the tagliatelle, wide flat pasta, had a little more sauce, but the taste was wonderful. Darryl had the Duck comfit and the three ladies had grilled Alaskan Halibut, on a bed of roasted vegetables. It was like homemade goodness. Like the best chef in the world cooked it specially for us. Crispy bread was served with a summer squash spread. Delicious.

For dessert we ordered one flourless chocolate cake with crema gelato, two apple tarts with vanilla bean gelato and three old fashioned sundaes. Fine Illy coffee was served and it was hot and thick, just as if we were sitting in an outdoor cafe in Napoli.

That was one of the best dinners we've had in Portland for some time. Chef Christopher R. Thompson's signature style of southern Italian-influenced cooking is very tasty and the staff is very good. Iorio voted:

Best Italian
Audience Winner 2006

Best Date Spot
Editorial Winner 2006
Voted by Portland Citysearch

Best Romantic Restaurant 2007
Voted by AOL Cityguide

Iorio (E-Oreo) is open Tuesday through Saturday 5:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Call for reservations at (503) 445-4716

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

What is Blog Cabin?

Blog Cabin is DIY Network’s newest hit series, featuring popular expert hosts who pitch in to bring the Kinzel Springs retreat to life. Watch us build the cabin one blog at a time, then enter daily for a chance to win it!

From February until early April, 2007, DIY Network.com invited visitors to vote each day on 13 design areas for a future cabin to be built in the Great Smoky Mountains. Thousands decided on such areas as the floor plan, roof, countertops, even the front door. The results are here, and don’t miss a minute of the entire Blog Cabin television series, airing Thursdays at 9 pm on DIY.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

High Point Market revamps Web site

The High Point Market’s Web site, highpointmarket.org, has been redesigned to improve its functionality and ease of use.

The site will include guest columns by leaders from throughout the home furnishings industry, as well as clips from the weekly “High Point Market Live” video-cast.

The market’s weekly e-newsletters will also be archived there under the “Industry Insights” tab. Site visitors can register on the home page to receive weekly updates.

If you go to the front page of The High Point Market, you will see an a column entitled Encouraging Eco-Friendly Lifestyles by Sarah Barnard ASID, an interior designer specializing in sustainable design. She and Mike are both writing about "green" furniture. See his blog at Home Accents Today entitled Is Your Furniture "Green?"

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture & Design Gallery

The Landfair Retail Focus Debuts!

Mike is excited! He has been hired to post to a blog, The Landfair Retail Focus, on the Home Accents Today website. They have asked him to post to the blog at least three times a week. They rolled out a new website and his handsome face.

appears on the front page along with his first post, Establishing My Credentials. Down girls! He is happily married for 15 years..

He invites you to surf by occasionally and grade his efforts.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture & Design Gallery

Home Accents Today
The Landfair Retail Focus
Furniture
Retailing
Bev & Mike

Adam Kalkin's Housing Solution

If you follow the trade deficit numbers as Mike does, you might know that the U.S. receives those big shipping containers full with consumer goods from all parts of the world, but especially Asia. The problem is, we tend to send them back empty.

Now, hat tip to by Jennifer Chait at Off Beat Homes, one architect may have found a solution. Adam Kalkin has designed the Push Button House.

The Push Button House is exactly that: it starts as a shipping container until a button is pushed, and it turns into a house. Motorized walls unfold like a flower, revealing a fully functional house, complete with refined, understated furnishings.

Take a look at Kalkins website and watch the short video: http://www.architectureandhygiene.com/main.html

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery

How To Light A Room For Reading

This is sure to cause discussion at home.

Elizabeth Bettendorf has written an article entitled Bookworms, illuminate yourselves on right light.

Mike complains that there are few places in our home to read. He says it is too dark, too filled with ambience. His favorite place is the den with the TV off, but then that excludes me if I want to watch some Tivo'ed program. If he moves to the bed in the bedroom, he falls asleep. So now we have Ms Bettendorf to the rescue.

There's nothing better than a good book, and nothing worse than not enough light by which to read comfortably.

She quotes Michael Berman, a lighting designer for the California-based Lamps Plus. He says a good reading lamp should do three things:

1. Reduce peripheral shadow around the reading area to reduce eye fatigue. "You don't want shadows around the reading area because as the eye wanders off the page as you read, the eye has to adjust," he says.

2. Provide good illumination, but not too much. Never consider any bulb less than 100 watts for reading, he advises, with 150 watts being ideal.

3. Eliminate squinting. "When reading, you want a light that helps you focus on the task at hand

There are so many sizes, materials and styles of lamps. In our home we are still searching for the perfect lamps that will meet both our objectives.

Bev & Mike
Landfair Furniture + Design Gallery