Head and Shoulders Above the Rest

I read somewhere that every room should feature a sculptural element that adds dimension to the space. Does that mean that Michelangelo's unsheathed schlong should peep out at your guests from the darkened corner of the living room, like a creepy neoclassical sex stalker? Not so much. I also feel that this is inappropriately inflicted on visitors:

OWI

There is a worse view, but I'm really too kind to force the full frontal on you. I think the lesson here is to save the kinky stuff for the bedrooms, people. And also that it would be cooler to keep anatomical sculptures above the nipple line. Clothing is nice, too.

Abigail Ahern

Trust -- you need a bust. True, the eyes may track your movements across the room, but that's better than... other things following you.

Francois Halard

Karly is going to like this post because she has enough heads to fill a stadium full. Of heads. But not as many as a certain someone else we all know and love:

Kellz is totally into heady tableaux, as seen on her overstaffed dining room table. Click this link to check out more examples of her head games.

Skona Hem

Never fear. Despite her best efforts, La Wearstler hasn't (quite) cornered the market. Busts abound.

Paul Costello via Roseland Greene

I want to live in this room forever and ever, amen. The chairs.. the logs... the windows... the lady head. Yessss.

Eddie Ross

Miles Redd

Simon Upton

Nick Olsen

Abigail Ahern

Paul Costello

Now these heads are all well behaved, polite and easy to talk to. But tune in on Wednesday for a collection of busts that belong only in the homes of brave and adventurous people. That means you, right?

I thought so.

My Dream Life In Pictures

Ok, first things first, I owe a big fat apology to every single one of you for sitting out Monday's post.  We here at DC headquarters went ahead and pretended that the 4th of July was a 4 day weekend and the blog writing suffered without any warning.  We are bad bad horrible people.  Ok, mostly me, Erin had the day off anyway.   I have to admit that today's post is not going to be jam-packed with all the hard hitting wit I usually like to deliver because once again, you kids are getting usurped by my big giant closet project (we finally finished at midnight Monday, but now I'm so so sleepy and can only think of well organized clothes and matching hangers).  However, the meat of this post is still tender and juicy:  I've got some delicious pictures to share with you from a fantastic interior photographer, Paul Costello.  Paul also shoots fashion and lifestyle pictures but since I wear the same thing every day (beret and turtleneck) I just picked a few of my faves from his interiors portfolio.  Strap on your bib and saddle up to the table,  it's going to be a yummy ride.

There are so many amazing elements in each of these rooms that my head is spinning right now... sort of like that giant disco ball in the last picture.  So I'll leave you with this:  I apologize for the lame lame opening paragraphs today, I'll be back in full form Thursday (look for an awesome post from Erin tomorrow).  Until then, I salute you:

I'm bringin sexy black

This morning's post is 100% in honor of my good friend Tod (toddybear, todler, todathon, todathalon, tod-a!) who is smack dab in the middle of a renovation insane foray into the deepest darkest depths of home rebuilding.  He's just now approaching the fun cover-up-the-drywall-pick-out-the-pretty-stuff portion of his hero's journey, which is right where I LOVE to butt in.  Everyone needs a little k-dawg input, right?  Of course.  We spent a good portion of last Sunday evening pontificating on the glories of various floor finishings:  while Tod is uber-minimalist to the ma-xxx (note the lack of an excessive second 'D' in his name) and high polish concrete would look divine in his 1920's rehab, homeboy is livin large on a pier and beam foundation that simply doesn't lend itself to that sort of earth-shattering weight.  He's going with my dream surface: hardwood.  Now I just need to convince him to use my dream color:  black (midnight, darkness, ebony, inkjetness, onyxabod, blackademicawesomeness). I reminded Tod of last year's Top Design finale where - married with child(?) - matt went head to head in a bloody loft battle with Carisa.  Both designers chose to use black floors, Carisa won my heart with the use of wood:

Top left:  Matt's painted black floors.  Top right & bottom left: Carisa's luxe black hardwoods.  Bottom right: Carisa's kitchen (tod just wanted to know what color she used, I don't love it).  I did get all hot and bothered over the stained black hardwoods and decided to see what else I could find.  Tod, look closely.  Everyone else, take a shot every time I type Tod's name.

Two residences by (Erin's term) Uber Glam Goddess Kelly Wearstler.  Both with magnificent black floors.  I LOVE the zig zag installation in space #2.  If Tod (shot!!) really wants to go all gangsta, he could lay the wood on a diagonal, helping to expand the space and counter-acting the room-shrinking dark floors.

More sexified darkness:

Left: a suite at Paris's Hotel Sezz; Right: private residence by Ghislaine Vinas interior design.  (Does anyone know how to make a little spanish do-dad over that N in Vinas?  There's supposed to be one there.) I la la la love the image to the right: black, white, lime & light-friendly partitions.  Hey, who stole my dream and turned it into a room? C'mon, stop kiddin around.

TOD! TOD! TOD!

If everyone can still read after that last round of typing TOD! TOD! TOD! then go ahead and take a gander at this:

Right: Private residence shot by Paul Costello; Left: Private residence from Survivestyle5's flickr photostream.  Ok, so clearly the stripes in image one are the showstopper here, but the unadulterated hotness of those black floors simply can't be denied.

Are you convinced yet?  Teetering?

True or False:  a zebra rug is required with black wood floors?  Just wondering.  I really do love how the black floors anchor all of these spaces. (Image courtesy of Survivestyle5's flickr photostream)

However, if, like me, Tod (drink up, we're coming to a close) wants to survive the living nightmare that is spending every single day wondering who/what/where/why people are walking on his floors, he can always go with white:

Suite 7: The lute suites.  Yes, I know I know, the rock is blowing my mind too.  Let's save it for another post... perhaps a nice fantasy vacation segment, oh yes, it's going to be lovely.  For now, go get some sleep and dream about your new bodacious floors, you're going to have quite the hangover in the morning.