Recycled wine bottles

Yesterday re-nest published a blog post which deserves more publicity, so here goes. The idea was simply to display different ways you can recycle old wine bottles into household accessories. With a little ingenuity you could even make these from your own empty wine bottles. Just make sure that they don't start multiplying in numbers like the Duggar family.

Wine bottle torch from The Local Artist.

Wine Bottle Hurricane Lantern from LORA / LINN.

Gold Wine Bottle Glasses from Uncorked Glass.

E.H

Judge a book by its covers - Part Deux

A cluttered up bookshelf is not a serene sight. Books on top of other books, horizontal over vertical, magazines in piles on top, you know the drill.

But like it or not, if you're like me and tend to pick up and bring home every book that hits your eyes, the shelf's just going to fill up.

One solution would be to simply just put together more bookshelf's, but in the spirit of fun and unique interior design, why not clean up the clutter and show some personality by placing some of those books on top of your coffee table, on top of shelfs, on your nightstand, ...

Selecting books by their covers can bring some really unique spots of color.

Keep the placing spacious and do not over do it.

Take for example this Penguin popular classics edition. Great way to add some strong colors to the house and possibly serve as a conversation starter.

-A.S

Personal touch with Sid Dickens Memory Blocks

Sid Dickens Memory Blocks are a cool way to create unique and personal touch for your home. Memory Blocks are 15 x 20 cm and 3 cm thick tiles, hand crafted and hand painted plaster, with a porcelain-like finish and cracked for an aged look and feel.

Sid Dickens was born in British Columbia 1963 and studied arts in Vancouver. On a study related trip to Europe in 1987, he became interested in trying unusual materials and themes. Once back in Vancouver in 1991 he founded a studio where the first tiles were made. Today, Sid Dickens Inc has a team of artists who produce by hand the Sid Dickens designs.

Each tile design is only produced for a limited period, and once the tile is retired, that particular design is never used again. The collection is revised annually, some tiles are retired and some new designs are released.  Retired tiles become unique collector's items, and they are known to go up as high as 5000€ on auction. 

Beware of cheap knockoffs that are out there. Those have a distinct industrial feel to them, because that's what they are, industrially made. Original Sid Dickens Memory Blocks have a Sid Dickens stamp on the side.

Price for one is around 100€, so these tiles are maybe not the cheapest choice for filling your walls, although for a comparison, having a framing made to an old painting can easily be more. But you can start from just one and go from there. 

My advice would be to celebrate something important with a new Memory Block, such as graduating, getting married, new born child, trip to a faraway place and such. That way each tile on your wall means something to you personally. Or you could just buy a whole lot at once and be done with it, it's really up to you. How you use them is only limited by your imagination. If you Google "Sid Dickens" you'll get plenty of ideas on how to place these tiles in your home.

Picture from: http://blog.styleestate.com

More about Sid Dickens: http://www.siddickens.com/

In Finland Sid Dickens Memory Blocks are sold by Vaihmalan putiikki at Vaihmalan Hovi. Web: http://vaihmalanhovi.fi/?pg=putiikki

T.A.

Dark nights and candles

Autumn ishere again and it’s time for candles. Shops all full with different size andcolors. Something for everyone. Personally I love candles.Dark night, good book, class of wine and candle light. That’s a perfect recipefor quiet night at home.

Here issome of my favorite candles by Sia.

This is uniqueitem. Its open from the top and you can put tealight in there.

Here isanother candle from Sia. I really like the texture of this candle.

Next is twopictures are a set from Partylite. Two in one solution. Unfortunately Partylite’sproducts are only available in special ‘party’, similar to Tupperware party.

Hopefully you got some inspiration out these pictures! More inspirations can found in partylite.com. So let’s goand shop candles. Remember that candles are good way to change your décor with limited budget.

J.A

Judge a book by its covers

Here's a sneak peek of my bookshelf. Why? Well, if you look at the books, there's more in common with them besides all of them seeming pretty boring to most people. What am I talking about? The glare. All the books have covers that reflect light. All of them glister. All of them look like they have never been opened.

Now, I don't know about you, but to me this is really distracting. I want to keep only the books I like in my bookshelf, so seeing books that look completely untouched creates an image of a person who just likes to show around every book they have ever owned.

Not sure if you can see this from the picture, especially since it's taken with flash, but notice how these books have broken-up bindings and lots of "crevasses" on their backs. This is how a well read book looks like, and this is how I want my books to look.

And what does this got to do with interior design? Well, a truly lovely design starts from all the little things. Make your house your own, all the way up from the littlest things.

-A.S

Kitchen updates

I will list some kitchen update ideas below. Meaning of this collection of ideas is that you can improve your kitchen and all that time and investment will pay itself back when your kitchen becomes some much better to work with.

These are from Plain & Fancy Custom Cabinetry.

Great kitchen from Wood-Mode Fine Custom Cabinetry.

Condo kitchen from  Mick De Giulio

 Two-level island from Quality Custom Cabinetry

-T-