You Said It: ‘They Looked at Me Like I Had 10 Heads’

Baby, it’s hot outside! Houzz has been helping us figure out how to keep cool (and how to keep our cool) in July’s heat. This week I learned how to cool off without running the air conditioner (or — let’s keep it real; I live in Atlanta — how to keep the A/C unit from cranking so hard 24/7). I virtually toured a house that needs no A/C, because it’s built almost completely in a hillside, and I read about a woman who created a fantastic portable weekend beach house for $10,000. In terms of keeping our cool, Houzz revealed the secrets to furniture arrangement and to why your garden may be failing. I learned how to make storage a fantastic architectural feature, just how good laminate cabinet facing can look and how to see the best in a tiny kitchen. I’m feeling cool as a cuke; I hope these highlights will do the same for you.

“When I told my parents about my idea, they looked at me like I had 10 heads.” — interior designer Bridget McMullin

McMullin is referring to her plan to create a portable beach house along the New Jersey shore, in a used 1998 trailer. I had so much fun hearing and retelling this story. It was a joy to see a designer who is known for refined designs just go for completely playful and downright zany in her weekend home. The trailer is the home version of switching out your weekday power suit for your weekend flip-flops and hot-pink tunic.

Full story: Budget Beach House: A Trailer Gets Ready for Summer Fun


“Unless your room is especially small, avoid pushing all the furniture against the walls.” — Fred Albert

Thank goodness for this ideabook. Whenever I scroll through the Houzz discussion boards, I see that furniture layout is something that confounds a lot of people. Albert clearly explains where to begin, how to get a seating arrangement right for conversation, where to put the lighting, the best place to put furniture in relationship to the TV for maximum viewing pleasure and much more. I wish we had a mechanism that would automatically lead everyone having a layout conundrum to this article; it’s a fantastic resource. Bookmark it.

Full story: How to Get Your Furniture Arrangement Right


“I would like to let you in on a little gardening secret: Successful gardens begin with the soil.” — Falon Mihalic

If you’re feeling like a failure at gardening, chances are that it’s not you, it’s your soil. Mihalic leads us through soil types, how to do a quick DIY soil test, how to pick the best plants for the soil you have and how to enhance your soil if you need to. Read up, get a little dirty and discover the green thumb you never knew you had.

Full story: The Simple Secret to Gardening Success


“The matching 1970s club chairs here are meaningful to her, as they were hand-me-downs from her parents. She had them reupholstered in an indigo-dyed organic cotton hemp denim that was left over from the first season of the couple’s clothing line.” — Nanette Wong

These chairs are such a great example of how something tired can be all shiny and new again. The relationship between fashion design and home decor has always fascinated me, so being able to peep at how clothing designers applied their skills to this home was a real treat. Their house is full of sentimental hand-me-downs, vintage finds, their own artwork, pieces found on their travels and more. It has all the style of a very well-curated wardrobe — each room is like a fantastic outfit.

My Houzz: Clothing Designers Bring Their Fashion Sense Home


“The email that architect Jeff Fountain received from his client was short: ‘This is going to be FUN,’ it read.” — Matthew Ankeny

What you are looking at in this photo is the earthen roof of a house. Nestled into the hillside, the architecture is unobtrusive and smart. The architect used Passive House principles and created a cleverly efficient footprint. If there were such a thing as “most unique,” I’d say this was the most unique Houzz Tour I took this week, but there isn’t. Just ask my seventh-grade language arts teacher, Mrs. Zando.

Full story: Houzz Tour: Having Fun With a Half-Buried House


“Whether you live in the city or country, whether your yard is small or large, finding a way to enjoy your outdoor space after the sun goes down is worth the effort.” — Laura Gaskill

Highlighting this article is my excuse to ask: Did any of you catch the supermoon a few days ago? It was spectacular, and I found myself stepping out on the front steps about every 30 minutes to go look at it again. I wish I would have read this article first. It’s not only a simple pleasure to sit outside on a mild summer evening and enjoy the stars, it’s also good for the soul. Gaskill offers up some ways to make it social, like campouts and al fresco dinner parties, as well as how to get comfy with the right (lack of) lighting for the best viewing.

Full story: Simple Pleasures: Savor a Starry Evening


“Wood-patterned laminate can emulate exotic materials and graining without the limitations and scarcity of the real thing.” — Fred Albert

I have to admit that I never would have guessed that these cabinets were not wood. This ideabook taught me all kinds of things about laminate cabinetry I never would have known. If you’re considering new cabinets or new cabinet facing, look into this laminate ones. The biggest takeaway is that they can save you 15 to 30 percent over wood facing.

Full story: Get the Look of Wood Cabinets for Less


“I mean, really, what more do you need than a bottle of wine, a couple of lemons and some parsnips?” — Becky Dietrich

If you have a small kitchen and you’re bummed about it, take a breather and enjoy Dietrich’s article. You may look at your kitchen and appreciate its charms for the first time. If you don’t, she also has suggestions for how to incorporate more modern elements. Also, if you don’t have a cottage kitchen but you want the charm of one, she provides a laundry list of elements that will give you the look. By the time you’re finished, you may just wish your kitchen was even smaller.

Side note: I very much wanted to use “Where I drool, he spits,” as the quotation for this one, because Dietrich’s personal touches always make me smile, but I just couldn’t work it in.

Full story: Cute, Cook-Friendly Cottage Kitchens


“To help maintain those cooler temperatures during the day, reduce anything that generates heat in your house or apartment. For example, don’t use the dryer or oven and try not to open the fridge too often.” — Mariana Pickering

Even if you are not able to turn off your air conditioner during the summertime, these tips will help you cut down your costs by keeping your home cooler naturally. Pickering’s tips hark back to a lot of the things our grandparents did before A/C existed — making the most of cross breezes, closing shades and drapes at certain times of day to keep the sun from baking a room, strategically planting trees, setting a chunk of ice beneath a fan and more. I had never even thought about giving my appliances a rest during the hottest times of day, but now I will make it a regular practice.

Full story: 6 Ways to Cool Off Without Air Conditioning


“The owners of this apartment in New York City were on a quest to eliminate clutter by being able to put everything away.” — Annie Thornton

This ideabook shows us that storage can be a compelling design feature — there’s no need to keep everything in a closet. Thornton has found four examples where storage solutions were incorporated into stunning architectural features. It also reminds us that before planning out storage, we should inventory everything we need to store and design the system accordingly.

Full story: 4 Homes With Major Storage That Looks Great

URL: You Said It: ‘They Looked at Me Like I Had 10 Heads’ http://www.decor-ideas.org/cases-view-id-24254.html