Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Oscar Nominations

Surprises?

Melissa McCarthy in Bridesmaids for Supporting Actress.

Gary Oldham in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (the Academy officially hates Leonardo DiCaprio).

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close a contender in a few categories.

Note:

I want Jean Dujardin to win best actor, not George Clooney!

So looking forward to the Oscars!


Monday, January 23, 2012

More than a Rebound: How I Got Over Being Dumped by Domino

I will never forget the day that I learned Domino magazine was canceled.

I received a letter in the mail that the magazine was no longer going to be coming to my house each month and that in its place I would be receiving Martha Stewart. I still cannot look at a Martha Stewart magazine on a newsstand without feeling the injustice: that magazine survived  white collar prosecution and public persecution of the woman behind the brand and Domino magazine closed without fanfare, breaking the news to me in a form letter.

An assistant at Domino named Michelle Adams decided that the format that gave Domino a loyal following was not a losing formula but one that simply needed to be reinvented for the digital age. The result? Lonny Magazine. The best part? I finally got over when Domino dumped me and left me with a stack of gardening editorials and craft templates.

Get to know Michelle Adams





Get to know Lonny Magazine

And the Oscar Goes to...

Tomorrow morning the 2012 Oscar nominations will be announced with The Artist as this year's frontrunner for best picture (with The Descendants at a close second). I also cannot help but root a little for one of my personal favorites from this year: Midnight in Paris from director Woody Allen. With TEN spaces for potential best picture nominees there may be plenty of other films receiving nods (Hugo, Tree of Life) but these three are the frontrunners in my mind.

I am also excited to see whether Elizabeth Olsen will garner a nomination for her role in Martha Marcy May Marlene although the best actress race will almost certainly be between Meryl Streep in The Iron Lady (who took home the Golden Globe for best actress in a drama), Michelle Williams in My Week with Marilyn (who took home the Golden Globe for best actress in a comedy/musical) and Viola Davis in The Help (a movie I watched for the second time last night and that never fails to make me cry).

A champagne toast to the fact that the Oscar countdown will finally begin tomorrow morning!




Sunday, January 22, 2012

More Treats for the Home

Mustache Mugs at Kimay on Etsy


Picasso, the Acrobat—An Example of the Amazing Collection of Museum Prints available at 1000 Museums— A Collection of Art Prints from Museums all over the World


All that Remains of Domino Magazine other than its Still Loyal Fan Base—the Coffee Table Book available at Amazon


Gwyneth Paltrow's Cookbook for those of you Who did not get enough from Spain on the Road Again or the Goop "Eat" Section; Available at Amazon


Unique Cutting Boards on Etsy



Choisette Demi-Apron Sold on Etsy

Violet May Wall Art on ETSY

blanca gomez prints available on ETSY

How to Make Your Junk Drawer Bearable



Drawer Liners Sold at Hammocks and High Tea

Save the Date

January is almost at a close and I still have not found a calendar that I love to keep track of all the important days in my life during 2012.

Recently, in the Lonny Magazine gift guide, I saw this Criminels Du Monde calendar and fell in love only to discover that it was sold out!

So I leave here a "save the date" for next year—check out Mr. Boddington's Studio where this calendar once lived in order to keep those dates more chic-ly in your new year!

In the meantime, I continue my calendar search (and hope to get a response from Mr. Boddington's Studio as to whether they plan to do a reprint before 2012 gets even further underway).


More Options

For a More Modern Look and a Calendar that Will Last for Each Passing Year




Desk Calendar Sold at Luxe Paperie

Linda & Harriet Wall Calendar that Doubles as Postcards once you Take it off the Wall
Sold at Luxe Paperie

Saturday, January 21, 2012

Ring Me on the Telephone

The telephone...the source of so much wonderful comedy throughout movie and television history. The Petries on the Dick Van Dyke show and the Riccardos on the I Love Lucy show relied on the telephone for many of their comic stunts.

Who can forget the scene in Meet Me in St. Louis where Rose, the eldest sister, receives a call from an Ivy-League suitor all the way from NEW YORK?! During the call, they marvel at the modern technology of the telephone and how it FEELS LIKE THEY ARE IN THE NEXT ROOM (the caps are because they are yelling throughout the entire exchange about how it is EXACTLY LIKE they are one room away from each other).

Pillow Talk used the telephone to emphasize the sexual yet discrete and appropriate relationship between Rock Hudson and Doris Day.

Downton Abbey shows the butler Carson uncertain of how the new-fangled contraption works.

Today, the phone is still a useful source of movie plotlines but in a very different way and the ubiquity of the smart phone has made certain movie scenes of the recent past seem even more dated (for example, in Notting Hill  Julia Roberts enters Hugh Grant's flat to use his telephone...thank god he had that landline just a few yards away!)

I yearn for the return of the landline and the answering machine. I do NOT want to be reachable at all hours of the day via phone or text and I think there is something decidedly less charming about the sleek and slim design of the smart phones of today in comparison to the phones of yesteryear. Also, I feel as though the stories revolving around Smart Phone interactions lend themselves slightly less successfully to comedic timing.

For those readers in agreement (at least as to the charm portion of my telephone manifesto), I give you some alternatives....

Gold Handset (available in a variety of colors at amazon.com)




So even if the stories on TV have changed and the people in your real life expect to reach you at ALL times of the day, you can feel transported to a simpler time as you talk on your very modern phone.

Donald Draper is a Big Tease

The seven thousand years I have been waiting to see Mad Men Season 5 are almost coming to a close.

That said, these last couple of months are going to be the most painful with Mad Men fans scouring the internet for any hint of Season 5 news.

For all of you "mad mennies" out there (see Mad Men SNL skit with January Jones—Note: do not watch the rest of the episode...continue on to Jon Hamm hosted episodes instead), I am attaching a link to a Huffington Post article where the cast of mad men shares their favorite episodes from the seasons that have aired. Feel free to reminisce and also tear up at the fact that we have to wait until MARCH to find out the next chapter of the show...oh how that Don Draper teases his audience as well as the women in his life!

Bad News: Some of the episode favorites overlap and many are from season one

Good News: They all agree that the upcoming season is the best

Although January Jones as Betty Draper is controversial (see Slate TV watching group), I like her ice queen performance and hope to see more of her this season (on Mad Men, NOT SNL...just to be clear).

So, here is the link and ENJOY!!!!

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Downton in Vogue Reboot

I just glanced at my old posts and saw the "downton in vogue" post...seems silly now that Downton is all over the news and the awards shows as it starts its second season. I would do a post on Downton in Town & Country, Downton in Vanity Fair, Downton in New York Magazine, etc. but I would spend the rest of my blog on Downton alone.

Nice to see that the great shows are being appreciated (along with HOMELAND...congrats to the show and Claire Danes on the Golden Globe wins!)

The Emperor's New Apartment

I have a new apartment which is, in fact, invisible.

I am moving back to New York City any day now and have been dealing with the nightmare of coop boards and sellers who are unwilling to let my contractor in for even a millisecond.

What is keeping me calm as I prepare to start a new job with nowhere to live in the foreseeable future? DESIGN BLOGS giving me all sorts of ideas for design inspiration that I cannot afford.

FIRST, came the paint color. My Miami apartment was a series of Blues—Cumberland Fog by Behr in the living area and Behr Bleached denim in the bedroom and a blue even lighter than Cumberland Fog (the name of which I cannot recall) for the bathroom. I started out thinking that I wanted to go the direction of blue once again and so began the mission that drove my family crazy for days.

I started painting virtual rooms on behr.com, homedepot.com and benjamin moore.com. From that point on, the paint colors consumed all of my free moments.

From Behr blues (light french gray seemed too green-ish, other blues too baby blue—it is not, after all, a boy's nursery but a bachelorette apartment) to benjamin moore grays with a slight bluish tint, I finally settled on pale smoke (benjamin moore) for the living area and gibraltar cliffs for the kitchen. I had seen pale smoke years ago when Domino magazine (may it rest in peace) featured Katie Lee's (formerly Joel) West Village home designed by Nate Berkus where he used Benjamin moore pale smoke and cliffside gray. I always loved the entire look of that home but I did not want to settle just because I liked that one room so I took to every design blog i could find, back issues of Domino magazine, design books, Nate Berkus's website, pictures of Sasha Adler's home, Gwyneth Paltrow's homes, and Molly Sims Soho apartment. I discovered the joys of ApartmentTherapy.com and the  La Dolce Vita  blog as well as Elements of Style. I also read through the archives of Matchbook Magazine (see Andy and Kate Spade's home) and Lonny Magazine (an online interior design magazine reminiscent of domino) and in the end decided that Pale Smoke was indeed best for the main space!

So if the coop issues are ever resolved, hopefully I will be posting pictures of this new space—until then, I will leave you with some pictures of my old Miami condo, Katie Lee's West Village town home and a few of the other highlights of my paint color search for my hopefully beautiful (if, for the moment, nonexistent) apartment.

behr bleached denim in bedroom


                                                     behr cumberland fog in living area
light blue i cannot remember in bathroom



BM Pale Smoke in Katie Lee's West Village Home (Former West Village Home—Image Courtesy of the now defunct Domino magazine)

                                                               Apartment Therapy Blog
                                                                Elements of Style Blog






Lonny Magazine


                                Part of Kate Spade's Apartment as shown in Matchbook Magazine
                                          A Magazine that Somehow Taps into all of my Favorite Movies/Designs/Colors/Etc.

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

2012: The Year of the Consistent Blog Post

My New Year's resolution, made today January 11, 2012 is to be a more consistent blogger.

One might think I would get discouraged by the fact that this blog is one without followers or a clear purpose but I do not discourage easily!

2012 will be the year of the consistent blog post and by 2013 perhaps I will have at least one more follower than none. Setting my sights high! Stay tuned.