Our roots plug into the soil of our origin stories, deep into the fertile grounds of heritage, family and values the ones we keep and the ones we eventually show the middle finger to.

Faranaaz Veriava is propped up against her purple plush headboard chatting via Skype. She jokes about being an interior decorator in another life; about walking away from a cushy corporate law offer; and the damn fine feeling of taking on bad guys and winning.

She turned out to be a human rights lawyer starting her career at Idasa (Institute for Democratic Alternatives in South Africa) and working at the Human Rights Commission before spending some time at the Johannesburg Bar. Today shes head of the education programme at SECTION27, the public interest law centre.

Together with Equal Education, SECTION27 brought and won a legal challenge in July to compel the Department of Basic Education to continue with the Schools Nutrition programme suspended during Covid-19 lockdown. Governments decision came with the shameful cost of thousands of children going hungry.

It was the most painful case to work on because nothing is worse than letting a child go hungry, says the woman who also worked on justice for five-year-old Michael Komape, who drowned in a pit toilet at his school in Seshego, Limpopo in 2014.

That these cases stick in the public consciousness is the point for Veriava. Her outrage turns to drive and then, as a self-confessed A-type personality, she goes into high gear building legal cases and strategy for broad impact. She insists on resonance beyond a courtroom or a ruling. It should feel like Michael was every South Africans son; everybodys little brother.

Michael would have been the same age as my youngest son Reza; I never forget that, she says.

Veriavas story of becoming a fighter and defender for human rights though begins long before she was. Her roots are tangled up in a family story of political activist history and a tradition of public service. Its also a story of family rupture, sacrifice and confronting the inevitable flaws of beings human. Veriava claims all these histories. Struggle against injustice has given her an internal compass, and surrender to the certainty of human frailties has given her empathy.

I want my boys to understand that who they are in the world does not necessarily make them better, and if theyre better at some things its because theyve had different opportunities, she says.

When I was about 11-years-old my father, a public health doctor, was arrested under the state of emergency laws and detained at Modderbee Prison. I remember visiting him in prison and crying thinking he would be killed because it was just a few years earlier in 1977 that Steve Biko had been killed and my father was among the people demanding the doctors who attended to Biko be sanctioned, she says.

Two years earlier her parents had also got divorced. It meant moving from Lenasia to Laudium to be raised by her single mom and aunt. There taught her independence and hard work but there would be labels: daughter of a divorcee; the daughter of political activist; and being secular born into a Muslim community.

Being an outsider though was a super power of perspective. She could get over needing to pray five times a day to fit in with my Muslim friends at school. She would also grow to recognise complexity and shortcomings in her parents and the adults in her family. They were the imperfectly perfect of just being human, heroes too to her.

At Wits University studying law and politics were magnets. So was student politics of the late-80s and the man who would become her husband, Kenneth Creamer. He is a publisher, economics lecturer and member of the presidential economics advisory council.

The relationship would be love, but more labels and lessons would follow. They are an inter-racial couple with different religious and class backgrounds. In the beginning, they made concessions like living together but provinces away from family and expectation. They even settled for a fusion wedding combining religious rites.

She says: We got together in that magical year of 1994. We believed in the same politics and values of a non-racist and non-sexist world. Maybe we were nave thinking we were going to change the world.

Now in the middle of her life, she acknowledges that things have become more complicated. Identity politics of today, like the Black Consciousness Movement, are critical to get over an inferiority complex, to recognise oppression but it has to move beyond this and it needs to overcome opportunistic exploitation, she says.

Complicated is not the moment to look away though. Its not the time to shrink from personal power, responsibility or action, she says.

The fight for her is still about upholding values that build a strong state; one that delivers better quality public services. Its also to push back against the erosion of civil liberties and human rights. She keeps telling this to her boys Adam (15) and Reza (11), the law students she teaches and SECTION27 research interns she mentors.

I want my boys to understand that who they are in the world does not necessarily make them better, and if theyre better at some things its because theyve had different opportunities, she says.

She leaves them with heavy things to think about but its to shape them, not burden them. She adds that she anyway wins hands down as cooler of the boys two parents from my R&B and jazz music, to fashion or anything cool, she says with a laugh. She concedes though that shes rubbish at getting excited about sports.

But the family may take walks together. Nature is her freedom, she says, religion almost. And its trees in particular that shes drawn too. Theres a kindred connection, or a metaphor at the least: growing from roots grounded in promise to release in canopies of fulfilled potential; and always the sure daring to stand firm. DM

Five Questions for Faranaaz Veriava

What image is on your phones home screen?

Its a photo of my boys. In the photo Adam is four and half, hes wearing a dashiki and hes holding his brother Reza who was four months old at the time. Both boys are also wearing garlands we made for spring day; its a beautiful pic.

What would you spend your last R100 on?

A book, it would probably have to be second-hand one at R100.

Whats the worst piece of advice you ever took?

Thats easy behave like a lady.

The thing you wish you learnt earlier on in your life?

I was submissive for too long. As a young black female advocate at the Johnnesburg Bar I tolerated intimation and exclusion and allowed it to make me small; I wish I came into my own confidence and power sooner.

Three books that have changed your life

Books have been my security blanket all my life. My three book are To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee ; Animal Farm by George Orwell; and Nervous Conditions by Tsitsi Dangaremba.

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Faranaaz Veriava: Always ready to take on the good fight - Daily Maverick

The Walt Disney Family Museum in the Presidio of San Francisco hasnt forgotten about Disney fans and their relentless desire to continually learn about the people and events that make Disney what it is. That drive never sleeps.

So in this time of physical distancing, the museum, operated by the Walt Disney Family Foundation, is delivering talks with the folks who make the history directly to your computer.

Here are several of the upcoming bookings. See all of the details and more on their events page at https://www.waltdisney.org/calendar.

Ray Spencer

Art Director and Former ImagineerRay SpencerFri, Aug 21 | 5:30pm PT | Zoom WebinarFREE | Sign-up Required

Join Art Director and Former Imagineer Ray Spencer for backstage stories from his projects for Walt Disney Imagineering, including Buena Vista Street, Trader Sams Enchanted Tiki Bar, and the reintroduction of the Hatbox Ghost character to TheHaunted Mansion.

Bobby Moynihan

Actor Bobby Moynihan Wed, Aug 26 | 5:30pm PT | Zoom WebinarFREE | Sign-up Required

Join actor, comedian, and writer Bobby Moynihan for behind-the-scenes stories from his voice work on several Disney projects, including roles in DisneyPixarsMonsters University(2013) andInside Out(2015), Disney Television AnimationsDuckTales(2017present), Lucasfilm AnimationsStar Wars Resistance(201820), and Disney Channel Original MoviesDescendants 2(2017) andDescendants 3(2019).

Robert Kondo

Animator Robert Kondo Wed, Sept 2 | 5:30pm PT | Zoom WebinarFREE | Sign-up Required

Robert Kondois co-founder and president of Tonko House, a San Francisco Bay Area-based studio focused on creating animated narrative content. Formerly an art director at Pixar Animation Studios on films such asRatatouille(2007) andToy Story 3(2010), he lends his unique design sensibilities and passion for storytelling as co-director of the Academy-nominated short film,The Dam Keeper(2014). Originally from Southern California, Kondo graduated from the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena as an illustrator.

Tania Norris

Interior DesignerTania McKnight NorrisSat, Sep 19 | 1pm | Zoom Webinar$12 | Sign-up Required

Tania McKnight Norriswas born in Scotland and spent her childhood in the United Kingdom. She trained as an interior decorator in London before moving to Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). In 1963, she moved to Los Angeles for her husbands profession.

Norris was hired in 1964 as an interior designer at WED Enterprises, the arm of Walt Disney Productions that covered all projects apart from films. She worked with many Disney Legends on projects spanning Disneyland attractions, original concepts for Walt Disney World Resort, and Expo 67 in Montreal. In addition to contributing to the overall design of New Orleans Square, one of her signature contributions to themed entertainment history was her design for the iconic purple wallpaper used in theHaunted Mansion.

In the 1970s, Norris became Project Designer for the RMSQueen Maryin Long Beach. This was followed by a move to central California where she opened an antique shop, anchored a weekly antique-focused radio show, and participated in antique shows across America.

Norris interests include gardening, photography, travel (she has visited over 130 countries), cooking, needlepoint, and botanical art. She is a member of the American Society of Botanical Artists, former President of the Botanical Artists Guild of Southern California, and created the Beverly Hills Rose Society. She also established an endowment fund for botanical art at the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino and donated her rare collection of botanical books and Renaissance woodblocks to the Getty Research Institute.

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Walt Disney Family Museum "Happily Ever After Hours Talks" Just Where You Want Them - At Home - wdwnt.com

Studio Peregallis Swiss Vision

European charm is out in full force in this Swiss kitchen, which was created by AD100 firm Studio Peregalli for a publisher client. The kitchens wooden table and chairs were created in the countrys Engadine Valley. The star-shaped pendant light fixture and floral backsplash tiles were, however, another story. The latter, which are Portuguese and date back to the 17th century, add a charming sense of blue and white to the Alpine space, which Architectural Digest visited in December 2012. They are also evidence of the firms effort to use old materials whenever possible, because of their rich patina, as architect Laura Sartori Rimini said at the time. Other notes of blue and white can be seen elsewhere throughout the interior, from a statement dish here to a well-place dish towel there.

Giverny? No, but close.

A French Kitchen Reminiscent of a Famous Interiors Touchstone

For many fans of blue-and-white kitchens, the ne plus ultra example is the cook space of Impressionist artist Claude Monet. Located at his famous Giverny home, it gives the surrounding garden grounds of the property a run for their money. This kitchen contains many of the same hallmark elements. Black traditional built-in French range? Check. Blue-and-white tiles seen behind it? Check. A litany of copper pots and an overall embrace of wood? Check, check. Fittingly, this space, which appeared in a fall 2011 issue of Architectural Digest, is located in the country region of Auvergne, France.

Ahoy, this kitchen beckons.

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15 Dreamy Blue and White Kitchens from the Pages of 'AD' - Architectural Digest

Its hard to think of a decorator more associated with traditional than Sister Parish, whose use of striped ticking, floral chintzes, whitewashed antiques and patchwork quilts is widely credited with launching American country style into the spotlight by the 1960s. Funny, then, that in recent conversations with Parishs great-granddaughter Eliza Crater Harris, the topics were decidedly 21st century: Instagram Live, e-commerce, and even transparent pricing. Crater Harris was well aware of the potential irony. It may not be expected of us to embrace contemporary design dialogues, but in fact Sister was someone who loved change, she says. We often ask ourselves, What would Sister do?

We is Sister Parish Design, a fabric brand founded in 2000 by Susan Crater, Crater Harriss mother (and Parishs granddaughter). The family connections go deeper. At the time, Crater had just finished collaborating with her mother, (Parishs daughter) Apple Bartlett, on a book about the legendary decorator. From that experience sprang another idea: Why not resurrect some of the prints Parish and her business partner Albert Hadley had created for private clients? I think it was kismetwhich was also the name of one of our prints, says Crater. Launching the firm was about not wanting the Parish-Hadley legacy to die. Whats better than bringing the prints they did for their private clients into the marketplace? Otherwise, people might not have ever seen them again.

What originally started as a historical rescue mission has become a much more forward-looking enterprise, a process hastened by the 2018 appointment of Crater Harrisan interior designer who previously worked with Markham Robertsas creative director of the brand. I visited Craters home in Bedford, New York, this March, just before the coronavirus pandemic triggered nationwide shutdowns; as I sat down with all three generations of the Sister Parish legacy, it was clear that they were brimming with plans for the brandfrom new patterns and colorways to transparent pricing and plans for street-level retailand also that they werent planning to modernize Sister Parish Design at a hesitant, one-step-a-time pace. This was a confident stride into what the family sees as the future of design. And if they have to brush up against a few traditional industry taboos to get there?

If we are really listening to Sister, then our brand should not be an altar to the past, says Crater Harris. [It should be] a design studio concerned with how decorators work and design today, and how people live today.

Sister ParishCourtesy of Sister Parish Design

Parishs home in Maine, as featured in House & Garden in 1977Courtesy of Sister Parish Design

Left: Sister Parish Courtesy of Sister Parish Design | Right: Parishs home in Maine, as featured in House & Garden in 1977 Courtesy of Sister Parish Design

In 1933, a 23-year-old Sister Parish launched her design firm, finding early clients in friends who admired the unique sensibility she had deployed in her own home, in Far Hills, New Jersey. Nearly three decades later, she met the young Hadley while working on the Kennedy White House, and the pair founded Parish-Hadley Associates in 1964. Their work and style would dominate American decorating in the coming decades, and they continued to work together until Parishs death in 1994, all the while nurturing the next generation of great American designers. Like the push-and-pull between history and innovation the brand faces today, the Parish-Hadley relationship was often one of opposites attracting. Parish was known for her floral, feminine approach to decorating; Hadley was a modernist who prized an edited, architectural look. That yin-and-yang energy propelled their work to greatness, with a client list that read like the eras whos who: Astor, Getty, Vanderbilt, Whitney, Paley, Mellon, Rockefeller. She wanted to hire someone to take over. She wanted to retire, Hadley told The New York Times in 1996. Thirty-two years later, we never retired. We had a marvelous relationship.

The Sister Parish story, then, is Hadleys too. Indeed, the archives that inspire the companys patterns are a mix of textiles Parish collected on her travels and Hadleys original designs. That said, there are few exact reproductions in the line; each pattern has been updated gently to resonate today. We're not just resurrecting these textiles, we're also refining them, says Crater Harris.

Sintra in Fern, printed on grassclothCourtesy of Sister Parish Design

The rebirth of a pattern called Sintra perfectly illustrates the Sister Parish Design ethosa tree of life pattern on a piece of quillwork in the Parish-Hadley offices that the two designers would ultimately turn into a hand-screened textile for curtains in Brooke Astors Money Room. (So called because it was where she sat to write checks for various charities.) Albert designed Sintra from a piece of quillwork, but now we're printing Sintra on a piece of grass cloth, says Crater Harris. And the colors I've chosen for Sintra might not have been colors he would have chosen or that Brooke would have wanted, but were moving forward to serve the designers and clients of today.

Walking that tightrope balance between paying homage to a storied legacy and embracing the seismic changes that have swept the industryboth aesthetically and in how designers shopis no easy feat. Crater says that her daughters experience as a designer has shaped the companys vision as it positions itself for the future, unspooling some of the more traditional ways of doing business in favor of an approach that reflects the way young designers want to interact with brands today.

The most notable shift came earlier this month with the launch of a new website. We were working on updating our site pre-COVID, but the challenges of the last few months definitely accelerated the need for our company to offer more utility for the design trade online, says Crater Harris.

The website also reflects a shift in business strategy, including sample fulfillment, listed prices, and the ability to transact online. The new site makes it easier to shop Sister Parish fabrics, wallcoverings, and home accessories on your time, with better inquiry abilities for quicker responses from our teamall in an effort to untether our clients creative visions from an analog, 9-to-5 approach to designing, says Crater Harris. Adding pricing to our site is really just one of many other additions that makes it easier for our clients to do their work, and to shop as they please.

Posting pricing can be seen as a challenge to the showroom model, but Sister Parish designs are still represented in 10 showrooms across the country, in addition to its international representation. Instead of taking business away from showrooms, Crater and Crater Harris see their new site as turbocharged lead generation for their partners, delivering qualified customers to the showrooms while still allowing the brand to connect with design enthusiasts who love the Sister Parish story.

Crater Harris channels all things grandmillennial. The bedroom walls and window treatments are in the companys Dolly pattern.Courtesy of Sister Parish Design

COVID clarified our need for online support on many different levels, from e-marketing, to a better capturing of client interest, to providing additional support to all of our showrooms, said Crater Harris last week when asked how the sudden global shift had altered the familys business plans. We feel confident that this investment in our digital space will result in serious sales growth for our showroom representatives around the country and internationally. The world has changed rapidly, and this idea that a trade company that is represented at a showroom should not have an online presence is over, and our amazing showroom partners around the country understand that our ability to create energy online directly supports growing their leads and sales.

The company did recently exit the John Rosselli showroom in New York, though not because of any disagreements about distribution. Last year, the company brought its sampling operations in-house, operating out of a studio in Bedford; for now, the studio will manage order fulfillment in the New York territory, as well. Though the pandemic has delayed the companys plans, the next move for Sister Parish Design will be a street-level flagship in Manhattan, which they hope to open in 2021.

Like transparent pricing, street-level retail is part of the companys emphasis on tapping into the enthusiasm of a new generation of traditionaliststhe grandmillennials, if you will. The term, coined last September by House Beautiful, is associated with a love of ruffled florals, needlepoint pillows, and all things wicker among young people in their 20s and 30s, and hearkens unapologetically to the Sister Parish aesthetic.

The brands latest campaign was styled and photographed remotely by tastemaker Mieke ten Have. Here, a tablecloth in the new Titania pattern in Pink Green shares the spotlight with a new spongeware collection.Mieke ten Have

Its also a label that neatly captures the passions of a certain group of devotees that had been interacting with Crater Harris in the brands Instagram feed. Our brand has connected with the hearts of a new, younger audience that is highly engaged with us on social media, says Crater Harris of the excitement around the Sister Parish look among a group of young people perhaps not quite ready to hire a decorator or order custom drapery. When it went live, the site featured new ways for these fans, young and old alike, to access and interact with the brand: an online shop with hats in Sister Parish fabrics that sold out almost overnight; a selection of pillows and table linens; and a collection of spongeware plates, bowls and pitchers. A campaign featuring the tabletop products and two new fabric patterns was remotely styled (and shot on an iPhone) by tastemaker, stylist and editor Mieke ten Have in a COVID-era creative partnership brokered by strategist and consultant Sean Yashar, who felt that ten Have, like Crater Harris herself, uniquely embodied the grandmillennial sensibility.

Fabrics and wallcoverings will remain the heart and soul of Sister Parish Design as the company forges aheadCrater Harris sees the foray into home products not as a push to enter a new market, but rather as a service to an already-existing audience eager to be part of the conversation. Based on feedback [from our followers], we felt a responsibility to connect with them more deeply, but until recently, our product offerings were trade-only, she explains. With the site relaunch, we have also invested in a more diversified home accessories collection specifically to speak to our growing grandmillennial audience that wants access to the Sister Parish lifestyle through tabletop, linens, pillows and apparel.

A new storytelling initiative, Tell A SisterInstagram Live conversations between Crater Harris and like-minded creatives that are then recapped in a bloglike formatalso tap into the burgeoning passion online for that Sister Parish ethos. My great-grandmother really believed in a beautifully designed home, but also that that was really just a backdrop for a full lifea life filled with kids and dogs and a career, she says. I see this series as a way to connect with our clients and our community, bringing together designers to talk about those things.

For all of the companys bold moves, much of its business modeland core customer baseremains unchanged. Its a path forward that acknowledges both that the old way of doing things is still incredibly viable (no, the showroom isnt dead), while also leaning into the possibilities that come with building consumer loyalty around the brand. We are always guided by Sisters philosophy, which still runs through every decision we make, says Crater Harris. She said, Innovation is the ability to reach into the past and bring back what is good, what is beautiful, what is useful, what is lasting.

Homepage photo: Eliza Crater Harris, Susan Bartlett Crater and Apple Bartlett | Jonathan Becker

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What would Sister do? A traditionalist icon embraces the future - Business of Home

There are dream clients, and then theres the young family that Michael S. Smith helped settle in at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue back in 2009. A veteran interior designer, he landed an interview to design the Obama White House through a series of connections and flashes of kismet. But he didnt officially have the job, of course, until he met the client. Thankfully, they hit it off. He said, Call me Barack, Smith tells host Dennis Scully on the latest episode of the Business of Home podcast. And ... that was the first and the last time in basically 10 years I ever called him Barack.

Interestingly for such a high-profile project, Smith has kept fairly quiet in the media about his experience as the first familys decoratorthere was only an initial press release, then an Architectural Digest article in the final months of Barack Obamas presidency. Now, however, hes telling the whole story with a forthcoming book, Designing History: The Extraordinary Art & Style of the Obama White House, which he previews in this podcast. In it, Smith shares everything from the advice he got from Nancy Reagan to the secret code his staff used to refer to the Obamas.

Below, listen to the show and check out a few takeaways. If you like what you hear, subscribe to the show (free of charge!) and every week a new episode will be delivered to your smartphone.

High-Stakes DecoratingMake a faux pas in a normal project, and youve got an angry client on your handsmaybe youre out a few thousand dollars. Make a mistake at the White House and it can lead to a national media scandal. (Remember the kerfuffle about Trump and the Oval Office busts?) Smith, no stranger to high-profile clients, was well prepared. What you want to avoid is creating news, he says. If youve ever been in the middle of a celebrity divorce, you absolutely understand[its] great advance training for working [in] the White House. ... Theres that old [medical doctrine]: First, do no harm. [Here, it was]: First, make no news.

Checks and BalancesEverything about the experience of designing the White House, Smith shares, is a little surreal. That includes the process itself. First, theres the challenge of keeping the project under wraps, and making sure vendors dont send out a press release announcing their trim is on a pillow in the White House. Then theres the arduous process of actually getting stuff into the building. He explains, The person you buy a lamp from has to be vetted, to make sure that they arent a violent criminal[theres] all these different things, these criteria. Then it has to be delivered to an off-site location, where its inspected by security people. Heavily inspected. Then it has to come to the physical White House, then you have to find a time when the familys not around, when you can be there, when somebody can get into the building and get into the room, with security. Thats different than [a typical decorating job]: I go to the store and buy a lamp, I bring it over, and plug it in.

Big PictureOf course, designing the White House changed Smiths lifeand for a designer already obsessed with the history of decorative arts, participating directly in that history was a dream come true. But interestingly, he says, it didnt necessarily lead to a crazy rush of new business: In the world, presumably Im better known now, but I dont know. The majority of my practice is still clients that Ive had for a very long time. Listen, it doesnt hurt.

Homepage photo: Michael Mundy

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The inside story of decorating the Obama White House - Business of Home

If you are now finally ready to transform your dream home into a reality, you need the right home builder for your project. Should you have fancy house ideas that include stylish premium details and finishes, then you need to work with luxury mansion buildersthat have the right team, equipment, expertise, and supplies to give you the upscale and luxurious look you wish to see in your future home.

A house is a big investment, so picking the right builder will have a huge impact on the final output. If you choose a great firm, you will have a genuine and true partner who will bring forth to life what your heart desires. With the right team, you will avoid a construction nightmare! Instead, you will have a smooth and fun time building and designing your home, which will safeguard your loved ones and precious belongings. Here are some considerations you must weigh when selecting your construction builder:

Do Your Research

It is always best to work with referrals. You can start by asking relatives, friends, neighbours, and colleagues for recommendations. Chances are someone in your network will know or will have heard of a reputable custom home builder. This will make you feel at ease knowing someone you trust can vouch for a firm.

If asking for referrals doesnt uncover any superstars, go the extra mile and search on the internet. Be very specific and search for terms like luxury mansion builders near me. List down your prospects and visit their official website to peruse their past-work. Also check ratings, reviews and testimonials because these elements say a lot about the reputation of a builder.

Narrow Down Your Prospects

After conducting the initial research, you have to narrow down your list to top two or three choices. It would be best to contact these people and conduct more thorough interviews. Schedule meetings with their team so you can see more of their portfolio. Get to know the team members, suppliers, and subcontractors. Go with someone who is very polite, confident, and responsive. This will show their willingness to help and their professionalism.

Moreover, you want a home builderthat can stick to a timetable and deliver quality work on time. Include a site visit so you can see the quality of their work, the finishes, the job site organization, and other safety measures. You want to assess how hands-on the builder is when it comes to project execution because you want an organized team to build your dream mansion.

Ask Detailed Questions

You must ask detailed questions to find out if a custom home builder is the right one for you. Ask how closely they are willing to work with your chosen architect or interior decorator. You will want to go with someone who prioritizes collaboration. Find out how long they estimate the construction project to last. You want a builder who can stay right on target, so there are no unnecessary delays.

On top of that, you have to find out if they have the necessary permits, licenses, tools, and qualifications to finish the building style that you want. Do include a reference list so they can give you names of past clients. Asking these questions will tell you if the firm has the confidence and capabilities to finish your project.

Discuss the Budget

Money talks, loud and clear. You want a builder who will make a detailed preliminary estimate based on the current market price of supplies. Once your home plans and specs are finalized, you need a detailed budget estimate. Since you are building a mansion with premium finishes, you want to scrutinize this comprehensive list to ensure that you get your moneys worth.

Find out who the suppliers and subcontractors are because all of these have corresponding costs. You want a building team that gives you a concrete budget so that you will not get an unpleasant surprise when the invoice comes.

Final Word

Choosing a builder requires due diligence because this will have a significant impact on your life. Your custom luxury house is a place you will call home for a very long time. This house is more than a building structure, but it will also be a place where you will be building memories with your loved ones. After all, cliche as it may sound, but home is indeed where your heart is.

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How to Pick the Right Custom Luxury Builder - Cyberockk

Concept art by Doug Chiang and John Park from Season 1 of "The Mandalorian," for which the production design team often blended the physical with the virtual to create its look. (Lucasfilm)

To reimagine the world of "Star Wars" for Jon Favreaus Disney+ series "The Mandalorian," production designer Andrew L. Jones had to build sets that could exist both in the physical world and a virtual one. The series was partially filmed in Industrial Light & Magics new 270-degree Volume soundstage, where digital environments a desert planet, say, or the infamous cantina are projected on LED screens around the actors using game technology.

Id done some work with LED screens in camera before, but not with the tracking element, on The Jungle Book, says Jones, who was supervising art director on Favreaus live-action Disney film. Jon had started a lot of the early thinking for this process on that. We were using LED panels for lighting. We were building the sets and scanning them in VR. And then Jon took that further on The Lion King. It was an evolution, and by the time we got to The Mandalorian everything had matured enough that we felt we could make it work.

The technology meant that Jones, who was nominated for an Emmy alongside art director Jeff Wisniewski and set decorator Amanda Serino, and his team needed to design and build all the sets six weeks before shooting each episode to give ILM enough time to make the virtual sets look photo-real and to add in real-time special effects.

To do that, the team filmed tangible environments, including locations in Iceland, and created realistic scans of shapes, props and scenery. In the first episode, the Clients office was scanned from the interior of a warehouse in downtown Los Angeles. Those digital backgrounds appeared on the screens of the Volume, a circular, 270-degree LED video wall housed at Manhattan Beach Studios; when it was time to shoot, Jones and Serino augmented each set with physical objects and props, including sand and dirt for the ground.

Thats a really good way to sell the illusion, to have something thats real in the foreground and then a duplicate of it in the virtual, Jones notes. If theyre lit and presented consistently, then its hard to tell whats real and what isnt.

Story continues

The set pieces also needed to be mobile, able to move in and out of the Volume quickly to keep up with the shooting schedule.

The Volume is not a huge space, and anything we want to shoot on there weve got to get it in and out easily, says Jones, who also built sets on several soundstages and on the studios backlot. For the sake of the schedule we cant build a set like you would do traditionally and spend three weeks putting it together and dressing it and painting it. Weve got to literally get that thing in overnight and do some lighting in the morning and then were shooting. Its much more like theater, where all the set pieces have to be on wheels. They have to break apart into pieces we can get through the door. As soon as ones out, the next ones coming in.

Despite having access to the latest digital technology, Jones wanted to ensure that the aesthetic of "The Mandalorian" wasnt too perfect or too manufactured. It needed to match the look of the first "Star Wars" trilogy, especially A New Hope, and Favreau was clear that the visual effects shouldnt overtake the storytelling.

When youve got ILM on board, we can do anything, Jones says. You can have the most spectacular skies and spaceships and visual effects. But then it would start not to be the world of 'Star Wars' and the language of 'Star Wars.' Those original films were really ground-breaking stuff, but it had a simplicity to it. We are definitely trying to respect the original aesthetic.

There are visual nods to the original trilogy throughout The Mandalorian, and re-creating the cantina was a particular challenge. Originally, the team wasnt sure such a small set would work on the Volume, but in the end they were able to make an aged replica of the space that was half virtual and half built set.

We wanted to be absolutely faithful to that set, Jones says. That was a bit of archaeology, finding what was there and how it was positioned and what would have happened in the intervening years that would have changed it. Its not the exact same thing its the same place but its later on. Theres going to be some storytelling in how things have changed since the fall of the Empire. Things have gone to seed a little bit.

When it came time to shoot the second season, which is set to premiere later this year, the team was able to bring in what theyd learned the first time around.

We found things that were successful that we hadnt expected and other things failed that we thought were going to be easy, Jones says. We learned a lot as we were going along. I think were starting to understand this process and get the hang of it. So Season 2 was just as difficult of a season, but I think we achieved greater things.

Link:
How 'Mandalorian' re-created its 'Star Wars' origins down to the cantina - Yahoo News

Another new set this time around is the office of the TBD Group, the investment firm known in season one at the Jammer Group. Last time, Mo Monroe (played by Don Cheadle) was at the helm, but now his former partner Dawn Towner (Regina Hall) has taken over, along with Blair Pfaff (Andrew Rannells) and a team of women. We wanted to lighten it up and make it much more inviting, says Contestabile, who looked to a book called Office Book: Ideas and Designs for Contemporary Work Space by Judy Graf Klein for this set. That meant removing the pencils stuck in the ceiling, cigarettes, and beer cans, first and foremost.

All of the chairs in the TBD Group were from this one place going out of business, says Contestabile.

Colorwise, it was grays and browns and dark greens for season one. For season two we went with pastel pinks, mauves, and light grays, he says. I actually found a swatch book of vintage mini blinds that had a bunch of colors in there, and I went through and picked out the colors of the new TBD Group based on that. It was a funny way to pull colors. They added a pink carpet throughout, a sofa from Galerie Sommerlath in the lounge area, Vintage on Point boomerang sofas in the lobby, repurposed green chairs around a marbleized conference table, some pieces from Casa Victoria Vintage Furniture, and, of course, plants, says Contestabile. They did not exist outside of Dawns office in season one.

Though the show mainly takes place in New York, there's a brief trip to Miami this season, where Dawn (Regina Hall, right) visits Mo (Don Cheadle) at his pink-and-orange hotel room.

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Blairs office was another favorite space for Contestabile. Within the pink and feminine TBD Group, his workspace is outfitted in a palette of red, black, and gray. We had fun thinking Blair would probably make his office aggressively male. You knowjust to compensate.

Blairs office was Mos office in season onewe really redesigned it and rearranged it to make it feel like a new space, says Contestabile.

Each setlike each characteris a colorful representation of both the best and worst aspects of the decade. There's excess to a fault, sure, but as Wilson says, it is a world full of over-the-top, lush, colorful textures, which wouldnt be the worst thing in the world to make a comeback.

Excerpt from:
Black Monday Season Two Takes the 80s Aesthetic to Another Level - Architectural Digest

Last year we had the statement chair, a sleek designer number set apart from our comfy sofas as an expression of our taste in design, and quite incomplete without the essential accompaniment of a footstool.

For 2020, statement-making in interiors has expanded to just about anything we like as long as it draws the eye towards it in the way a fireplace or television dominating a room would typically have done in the past.

Fashion designer Ted Baker's Pearl Grey rug (from 479 at Rugs.ie)

It doesnt necessarily have to be a piece of furniture, nor even something outsize that draws the eye by scale alone. It could be something as simple as an accessory, a lamp, soft furnishings or some occasional furniture; even a cheeky little object picked up on holiday or while rummaging through a second-hand shop.

A little virtual shopping expedition threw up a few in vogue suggestions from the pricey to purse-friendly, but if youre worried about something not working, remember the words of the legendary American interior decorator Bunny Williams: If you love something it will work, that is the only real rule.

Once confined to crusty Scottish baronial piles, tartan is having a moment in interiors, although its hard to envisage translating it into a suitable look for the more modern and sometimes compact home without turning it into the set of Outlander.

Someone who does it with style, however, is Ralph Lauren. Famed for his chic coastal-inspired interiors, his navy blue tartan wool pocket square blanket is a sophisticated take on tartan -99 at http://www.ralphlauren.ie- but if you want drama, Jean Paul Gaultier might just be your man.

Not only does he reference tartan in his couture collections and loves to gad about in a kilt, his furniture collection for Roche Bobois includes sofas and ottomans bedecked in the print (price according to size and fabric).

Floor art Nothing pulls a room together quite like a rug which these days goes beyond traditional pattern to take on an arty finish.

Ted Baker is another example of fashion designer-turned-interior designer, producing a rug collection including the Pearl Grey (from 479 at Rugs.ie). Its an outsize floral with a contemporary painterly quality with just enough plain grey in one corner to site a table off centre.

Speaking of tables, our favourite place to site drinks and newspapers in the living room, and even to raise tired feet, tends to be the coffee table, and hasnt it come a long way from the rectangular shape which has always made it look like a mini-version of the dining table?

Eclectic yet functional design alternatives come in the shape of the covetable Bonaldo Pebble by Mattias Demacker (583 at http://www.lomi.ie) with red and white or white and black finishes combining curvaceous futuristic design with handy storage.

The ongoing love of shady tones sitting between the extremes of black and white means grey is now considered a neutral, so not much scope for making a statement with it. Or so I thought.

Spotting Made.coms Herman three-seater sofa in finch grey cotton, it comes with the surprise of an eye-catching shadowy tonal blot of dark grey on a lighter-hued back cushion (700).This chic black cane and velvet seated chair is from Interiosity (495).

But just as I thought the overexposed statement chair wasnt worth considering here, up pops a beauty made of black cane on a matching wooden frame with grey velvet seat which wouldnt go amiss in a modern home.

So, if youve ever thought cane to be outdated, this one from Interiosity (495) might change your mind.

Cushion soft Adding finishing touches to a room calls for the arrival of soft furnishings, in particular ever-useful cushions. The Foliage design from M&S (30) blends several on-trend colours - yellow, orange and pink but in muted form so they work together and make the necessary statement to draw the eye without being in your face.

IKEA has the large Nabbfly cushion cover (4) offering some tropical fun to brighten up a plain sofa or even a dated one for the summer season.

For a little fun Ikea has this eye-catching banana-shaped ornament (10).

The Scandinavian retailer, noted for its pared-back and streamlined designs, is injecting some fun into accessorising with the vivid yellow Kuperad ornament (10).

Shaped like a bunch of reclining bananas and looking particularly authentic at that, it serves no function other than to attract attention and elicit a comment, if not a laugh.

Read the original here:
How just one item can create a focal point in a room and even spark a conversation - Irish Examiner

When house hunting, in particular among uninhabited homes, it can be challenging for potential buyers to imagine what living in the space would look like. Savvy real estate agents long ago began advising homeowners how to scale down their tchotchkes and personal belongings in order to make a better impression on buyers. And then, in a stroke of genius, they started staging empty homes.

A few paintings here, a sofa and area rug there. It began minimally with just enough furnishings and accessories to stimulate a bit of intrigue. Then came full-blown staging. With todays multi-million-dollar spec homes on the market, the trend has quickly become furnishing to the hilt, including pricey artwork. And now, with the COVID-19 pandemic, home tours are going virtual, which makes staging all the more important to home seekers.

That is the niche that Walker Wright of Walker Wright Abodes hopes to conquer with its recent move to Houston from its home base in Los Angeles, where his firm continues with interior design, staging, and photographic styling. The expansion to Houston was partly motivated by business and partly by the fact that Wrights partner is a native Houstonian.

My portfolio and background from living and working in Los Angeles kept me busy in high-end, high-fashion prop and photo styling, which led me into taking on personal interior design clients, Wright tells PaperCity. I then took those skills and applied them to my advantage in the home-staging world because of the countless hours spent photo styling and working with interiors-photographers in L.A.

I learned and understand the best angles and spacing and proportions etc I know what will look in print and how to portray a homes unique and beautiful features or hide them.

Wrights plan for the Lone Star State is marrying the glam from Los Angeles with the timeless look that Houston shows so well showing beautiful spec houses with high-end design.

While working on a massive project for Cisco Home in Round Top, Wright landed the staging task for 38 Carolane Trail in Bunker Hill. Brookstone Homes built the 6,266-square-foot dwelling thats listed for $3,395,000 with Compass agent Caroline Bean.

In furnishing the public areas of the five-bedroom house, Wright collaborated with his partners mother, decorator Cindy Witmer, whose design store provided accessories and some furnishings. Among the notable brands included in the staging were Cisco Home, Kuhl-Linscomb, Noir, Kelly Wearstler, CWD Studio + Home, and many others, as well as art from Laura Rathe Fine Art.

The natural, casual California theme of the design can be seen in the study, mudroom, game room, upstairs and downstairs utility rooms, climate-controlled wine room, and home office. While theres neither staging nor fancy cars in the garage, we have to mention that there is ample space for three cars.

Read more:
The Secrets of Luxury House Staging Specialists Expand From Los Angeles to Houston - PaperCity Magazine