End of the semester & Avey & Kría

Sorry for the extremely minimal amount of updates lately.  Finals week and summer is just around the corner so I've been working intensely on my final design project, preparing for tests, writing a paper, applying for jobs/internships/scholarships, and preparing (mostly mentally) for my study abroad trip to Italy.  Phew!

I'm still chipping away at my final design project.  I've been feeling really weird about it since presentations were last Monday/Wednesday so I felt like some weight should have been lifted off my shoulders, but then every time I walk into to my room I see it sitting there still needing to be finished and detailed!  It is actually due this coming Tuesday though so I just gotta keep on pushing!  Here's some exciting news about my project though;  

My clients for the project are Dave Portner (A.K.A. Avey Tare), the lead vocalist of Animal Collective, and his wife Kristín Anna Valtysdóttir (A.K.A. Kría Brekkan), former member of the Icelandic band múm. 

I was trying really hard to contact them to find out more about their taste and make the experience more realistic, and, Kría e-mailed me back last week!  I almost died when I saw "Kria Brekkan" in my inbox.  Here's my questions and her answers:

Could the size of your family possibly change over the next 5 years?

Yeh possibly!

What do you like to do in your free time?

we both like making visual art. listen to music, make music, we both read alot, and sometimes watch movies.

What are your current ages?

26 and 29

How tall are both of you?

both 171 cm

The space is to be located in New York.  Any specific city or area you like?

we [like] fort green[e] and red hook

Do each of you have a need for individual privacy?

actually alot.

Do you have any pets?

no but would happily wana have pets.  our appartment is too small now.

Do either of you make art, other than music?

yeh we do! and kindof make mess

What colors inspire you?

the whole spectrum

What design style do you like most?

i like everything very old and wooden.  but not in any country-kindof way.  I like white space too, and light and brightness.  and oddly shaped spaces,,or kind of,,like on different platforms.

I loved reading her answers.  They were so perfect, from the broken-english, to the occasional misspelling, to their heights given in centimeters.  These two are such creative and awesome people.  It really made my project so much more exciting.  Just reading them again as I post this made me feel a lot more motivated to start working on my project right now..so I better go and do that before I lose momentum again!

On a final note, I want to keep featuring other design students work like I did in my previous post.  So, if anyone has a project they would like to share, please e-mail pictures/scans and a short (or in-depth) explanation of the project to kickbackcustoms@gmail.com.  Make the subject something like "ATTN: Student Project for Blog" and I would be happy to feature your work!

Student Work: Joanna Tzilos, Lawrence Tech

Joanna is a junior majoring in Interior Architecture at Lawrence Technological University in Michigan.  This is  a residential project she completed at the beginning of the semester:

Here's her living room plan which features a steel staircase, orange wall paint, and a white Barcelona chair/ottoman set.

This is Joanna's dining space plan featuring a centrally located black and white dining table, black and white dining chairs, a modern baroque chandelier in a black finish, and a gas fireplace.

She has a really awesome kitchen design, too!  It has high-gloss red laminate cabinets with frosted glass, 3 modern stainless steel barstools lining the center island counter, and stone tile flooring.

Her bedroom space has huge floor to ceiling windows and a huge sliding door that leads out to a balcony.  She chose a really cool metallic silver paint for the walls, and a low platform bed.

2 Words....

Final Project.

Interior Design School Videos

I found these 2 interior design school promotion videos that I liked on YouTube today.  They tackle the interior design issues and present the importance of education in the field by showing how complex the work really is.  The narrating voice in one is slightly cheesy but it's cool to see how prevalent the interior design school issue is and how important it is to so many other people.

This video is video for the interior design program at Berkeley in California

This is a video from St. Clair College in Ontario.

Rendering Markers

My final interior design project has to be rendered with markers, and even though I have done a lot of marker rendering in the past, I really want to explore more markers and see what I like.  I wish it was possible to test all the markers I've ever wanted but that's just not possible at this point because all of these makers can get quite pricey.

For me, Prismacolor makers are the old standby.  I've used them ever since the beginning of high school and own a set of 48 (plus some additional colors that I randomly bought).  I don't find anything specifically wrong with these, just for some reason I think there's something "better" out there. ($3.79 each)

This is an AD marker by Chartpak.  This girl in interior design, who I really look up to when it comes to rendering skills, told me that she recently tried these out and found them to be really nice. (around $4.10 each)

This is a Copic marker.  Someone had them in studio the other day and everyone, including my teacher, was going crazy over them.  They did look really nice but for the darker colors, they seamed to streak a lot when the marker overlapped and that's something that really bothers me. ($5.99 each, but they are refillable)

These are Pantone markers.  I haven't really heard to much about them but they're supposed to be nice.  I know they've been around for a long time and have the whole Pantone color matching thing going for them! (around $4.00 each)

I would love to know about anyone's opinions or experiences with these markers!  Thanks!

London Calling

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For some reason I've always been really attracted to the city of London and this summer, I'm finally getting my chance to go!  My friend Jess and I are heading to London after our Interior Design and Architecture study abroad trip and I can't wait to go to places like Abbey Road and Topshop.  It's getting unbelievably closer and closer to our trip date.  It's exciting and nerve-racking at the same time.  I have so much stuff still to do in preparation for the trip!

Here's where I'll be traveling this summer:

Rome, Italy

Naples, Italy

Florence, Italy (hopefully a little side-trip here to Bologna to see WHY?)

Venice, Italy

Vicenza, Italy

Milan, Italy

London, England

Ciao!

High-End Sleeper Sofas

As I was working on my final interior design project for this semester, I found it extremely difficult to find a contemporary high-end sleeper sofa.  I was looking for a sectional style one with the typical pull-out section, but all I kept coming across was subpar "sleeper sofas" that, in my opinion veered more on the side of some up-scale futon.

I paged through Architectural Digest and went to the website of just about any furniture company who's ad I came across.  There's plenty of really awesome sofas out there, but it seems that sleeper sofas is something that the high-end companies haven't really tackled.  But, maybe I just wasn't looking in the right place?

Anyways, by this time I was in a bit of a time crunch and was between a sleeper sofa by Avery Boardman and one by (I think) Innovation Furniture, which I couldn't find an actual company website for.

From left to right: Avery Boardman sectional that can be custom made as a sleeper sofa, Innovation Furniture split-back sofa bed with "ottoman" to make it look like a sectional.

I wasn't actually satisfied with either of these so if anyone out there has any insight or opinions on this subject, PLEASE let me know!

Huge Thanks to Desire to Inspire!

The authors of the blog "Desire to Inspire" were kind enough to feature my blog in their weekend links post known as "Winks"!  They make a post every weekend showing interesting things that they have found throughout the week.  They also have tons of insight into some really awesome interiors as well as the photographers that shoot them.  Make sure to check them out!

I really want to know my reader's opinions and input on what they would like to see on my blog!  Please don't hesitate to comment!

Now even the Wall Street Journal is at it...

It seems like the whole decorator vs. designer and legislation issue is really heating up!  Yet another article (entitled "Watch Out for That Pillow")  was published (on April 1st) completely making a mockery out of our push for legislation.  I was under the impression that the Wall Street Journal was supposed to be a reputable source, but what a wrong impression that was...

Click here to view the article.

It's great to see so many professional interior designers leaving comments and saying their piece though.  You can view the comments page here.

"Imagine you were a state legislator and some folks asked you to pass a law making it a crime to give advice about paint colors and throw pillows without a license."....Oh PUH-LEASE Clark Neily of the Wall Street Journal.  Puh-lease.

Intelligent Design

ANOTHER article about interior design has been published in the State News today! This time, the article showcased the hard work we really put into this major and tried to emphasize that we do way way way more than just "decorate".  The pictures they used were a little hypocritical since we were trying to argue that we don't just pick out pretty colors but..."there's no such thing as bad publicity" according to a lot of people.

I wonder if the publishing of this article had anything to do with all the comments left on the previously mentioned article about interior design legislation...it kind of seems like it!

The article can be viewed here. It really attempted to say some awesome things about us and I hope it can help break the misconceptions that many people seem to have about interior designers just "matching carpet to the curtains" and "picking colors".

Photo Credit: State News

Computer Update: It is fixed and should be in my hands by tonight!