Another new layout

I don't know a thing about web design. Well, I can tell a bad design, but I can't make one--even a bad one. So Blogger layouts it is.

I like this one. I like narrow formats because a full widescreen of text is difficult to read (my laptop is widescreen). I like the gray-on-gray. I need to crop my header down and spruce it up a bit, but other than that I think this may be the one.

Long time, no see.

I should share comics on this blog too-fits in with the art-and-design thing.

So, A Softer World breaks my heart, regularly.

Friend love

One of my bestest friends, and a fantastic artist, has opened an Etsy shop:

hFlowers on Etsy

She focuses mainly on graphic and detailed original linocuts, often of dreamscapes and scenes, but also assembles beautiful bead jewelry--I'm loving the pearl strand and moon necklaces. I also own "Gifts" framed, and lemme tell ya, her prints are even more fantastic in person. I've watched her grow as an artist for the last four years, and she's improved in leaps and bounds with art that consistently delight and surprise me.

And she has no clue that I've just written this, so you can be sure this isn't an advertisement--I just believe she deserves a lot of love (and sales) for her work!

The Comforter.

Must. Have. This. Comforter.

After the past two-and-a-half years with a black comforter on my dorm bed, I've come to like it--black comforters are warm, dark, and soothing. But this one POPS as well. Picture it on a slightly shabby white iron bed. My Manly Man boyfriend won't like it, but I don't care--I need this in my apartment.

Pictures of said apartment are still pending, but beware: it's MESSY, and the bathroom is WEIRD.

Comforter is from Target, here.

Beach Houses

As promised, a thrown-together post on beach style, inspired by This Young House.

John and Sherry's moodboards often include elements that scream "BEACH!" at me--natural, textured neutrals, light and airy colors and fabrics, and touches of beachy blue.  Their latest Design Dilemma moodboard especially got me thinking: Shelly's Design Dilemma, based in part on Shelly's Floridian love of ocean colors.

So I threw together (really, in about five minutes) a little collection of beachy things on polyvore:

Beach by shadowofaseraph on Polyvore.com

The Ikea Ektorp couch has always reminded me of beach-type furniture: poofy, traditional, and utterly neutral (so that none of the possible renters of your beach house will be offended by your furniture).  Hang a beach-scape print over that poofy couch, add an ottoman with those seagrass baskets with seashells in them.  The side-tables don't match--ideally, they'd be castoffs from your actual house, and at least one of them should be wicker.  Ditto the lamps, but for a little extra flair you might add in a new one in a beachy blue, or a capiz chandelier.

I actually spent some time this spring in a particularly interesting beach house in South Carolina--it was over 100 years old and furnished mostly with things the owners had gotten rid of over the years--with the exception of big matching lamps on the nightstands, and matching white iron beds in the attic:

I loved the light in that space, and the great view of the ocean.  Note, again, the slightly tacky (and redundant--the beach was right outside the window) beach painting on the wall.  The porch was even better--huge, right on the beach, white with black shutters, lots of rocking chairs and daybeds and a hammock--but I'm keeping that one to myself.  It's too good to share right now.

Apartment Therapy had a post on beach house style about this time last year: Beach House Inspiration.  Their inspiration photos are more modern and less thrown-together than my idea of a beach house, but the focus on neutrals and sunlight keeps it beachy, with the occasional piece of driftwood thrown in for good measure.

I found a post from Desire to Inspire as well that features a decidedly beachy design: Jodi Macklin.  Most of the photos are from a Macklin-designed summer house with all sorts of coastal accents.  I especially love this shot:

The white floor!  The huge porch!  The poofy cushions!  The seagrass chair!  It's probably not hurricane-proof, but it's b-e-a-utiful.

And this one:

This would be the little girls' room in the beach house, decorated more extravagantly than the adult quarters.  Turquose and bright pink are so Florida.

I think that's all I've got today--I probably won't get to the beach this summer, so I've got to dream somehow.

Coming soon on Ange de Design...

Beachy decor.

Before-ish photos of the new apartment (still very in progress).

Possibly pictures of newly-painted lawn chairs.

And maybe, a post "planning" an ideal house.

ETA:  And I'm futzing with the way the blog itself looks.  Not being knowledgeable about html, am going about this kind of half-assedly.

Girly Room

Girly Room by shadowofaseraph on Polyvore.com

After making the manliest manly man room I could last time, I decided to go for "girl" here.  And oddly enough, Wulfy said he kind of liked it *facepalm* I think he's just not picky as long as he's not really involved in the process.  I also really liked this when I made it (that tufted gray chair is so cool) but now I think it's kind of lacking.  Maybe too semetrical?  Maybe the walls need more color?  I was trying to go for a "collected over time" look with the art, but maybe it didn't succeed or the scale is off or something.  It's hard to get things on scale, that's one advantage of the true mood-board as opposed to the mockup.

And I will probably be spending time in my apartment-to-be this weekend, so I may take "before" pictures to share.  If I'm not attacked by the many pointy Christmas ornaments in storage down there first.