30% Off Robert Allen Fabrics

We've had a good response to our Robert Allen/Dwell Studio fabrics. We've been inspired to offer 30% off on all  Robert Allen fabrics during the holiday season. Email your fabric and color choices and we will send you a quote.  There is a 4yard minimum. If you have upcoming drapery, upholstery or pillow fabrics to purchase... now is the time.  All orders ship UPS ground. It's that easy, so happy shopping.... and Happy Holidays.... Fay

Vintage Style

This West Palm Beach house was built in 1926 is up for sale. It's exterior says Spanish vintage but it's renovated interior is contemporary.  It's a classic beauty and there's not much for me to add so I'll just let you enjoy. 

images: NY Times

 living room

sunroom

 master suite

 

 master suite

 guest room

Landscaped yard with stone fountain and covered dining room.

Landscaped yard with stone fountain and covered dining room.

Husbands and Wives

When it comes to the bedroom most husbands don't want to feel as though it's been decorated without him in mind. I haven't met the guy who's comfortable in a frilly pink bed covered with  fluffy lace pillows. After all, he sleeps there too.  So, what I do suggest to bring him into the fold is choosing fabrics and colors that he can live with. Why this bedroom works for husband and wife has a lot to do with color and fabric. The blue is a soft ethereal shade that brings softness to the room. The fabric choices  are complimentary. The plaid brings in the masculine side while the brown velvet on the duvet is for her. The pillows are in many shapes and sizes. Accessories round out the room with chunky night stands and feminine lamps. I like pretty in the bedroom but when it's shared by the man of the house it can't be pink.

image: Red River Interiors



Casa Midy Chairs

I love chairs and I especially love these from Casa Midy in Mexico. Check out their web site for more of these hand crafted works of art. If you love them as much as I do... let me know.  I'll ask George to send a quote.  All items are special order so they do take time.



Bits and tidbits

Some notes from the arts editor's desk on this fine Monday:

• This Wednesday, Foothill College hosts a free screening of the film "Food, Inc." at noon. I can't stop giggling at this line in the press release: "Snacks will be provided." Is that wrong?
  
• Someone sent me a copy of the CD "Broadway's Carols for a Cure." I'm devastated that there is no Palo Alto angle for the cast of "Mamma Mia" singing "O Holy Night."
• After writing about the new play "Bashert!" in last week's Weekly, I took my mom to see it this weekend. We were completely charmed. Bravo to the cast and creative team, especially Palo Alto playwright Caryn Huberman Yacowitz.
• I've still got gypsy jazz music dancing in my head after catching The Hot Club of Palo Alto performing in Menlo Park yesterday. Weekly story to come soon.
  
• The chiaroscuro woodcuts currently at the Cantor Arts Center look very cool. Newsprint would not be kind to them. Sometimes I don't like newsprint.
  
• Really, if anyone should sing "Do You Hear What I Hear?", it's the cast of "American Idiot."

Pictured: The movie poster for "Food, Inc."

Menlo woman opens new art gallery

If I have to write about another art gallery in this area closing, I might dump a bucket of paint on my keyboard. And I wouldn't even get anything artistic out of the splashes. I can't paint with anything but words.

It's been a low few years for local galleries, to say the least. So it was really (sigh) nice to read about a local woman creating a new gallery, even in the big city. Last week, our sister paper the Almanac reported that Joan McLoughlin of Menlo Park was just opening up her McLoughlin Gallery on Geary Street in San Francisco. The spot is focusing on "established European contemporary artists and local emerging artists." It hosted its first opening reception last weekend.

So far, McLoughlin -- a longtime art collector who worked for several years in medical start-up companies -- has an eclectic and modern mix of creative types. There's Iran-born Dalia Nosratabadi, who photographs landscapes and other scenes reflected in puddles of water. French pop-art artist Renaud Delorme creates collage-painting hybrids that often incorporate found objects such as toys and computer bits.

My eye was particularly caught by Christine Comyn's portraits. The Belgian artist depicts women with an elegant, historic flair that has recently been inspired by Marie Antoinette. But the medium is modern: Many pieces are digital compositions on Plexiglas.

Pictured: "Adieu le plus aime," a digital composition on plexiglas by Christine Comyn, from the McLoughlin Gallery website.

Powerful profiles

Doug Fort fell into the gang life at age 13, after, he says, "crack came into our community." Today he works in violence prevention.

His is one of five stories told in video profiles, all talking about life and loss, violence and rebirth in East Palo Alto. For those of us who remember the frightening stories coming out of the city in the early '90s, the stories are grim and powerful reminders.

Made by high school filmmakers, the videos are paired with seven spoken-word pieces by youthful poets in a project called "Alive and Free." The idea, as described on the project website, is to "shine a light on exemplary folks who found a positive pathway threaded through the violence, or who had turned their lives around from the lure of gangs, easy money and violence."

One thing that struck me in particular is how calm Doug Fort was during his video interviews, how easily he spoke about the pervasive violence that must have left a terrifying imprint.

The profiles and spoken-word videos can always be watched online, and they'll also be shown on the local Channel 27 on Friday, Oct. 22, at 6:30 p.m. The project is a joint effort by the Midpeninsula Community Media Center and For Youth By Youth.

Pictured: A peace-march photo from the "Alive and Free" website.