SPRING NEWS & TREND Predictions

I hope you had a wonderful weekend!  

Need help finding cool things to spring-ify your home? I'll make it happen for you. My eye muscle is trained well and my kids have been teasing me that my online shopping addiction is my own version of 'gaming'.  Haha.  I may not be knowledgable on a lot, but I do know I have some great current and colorful sources on things.  And if we can't find what you're looking for, we can usually customize something for you!

Here are my hot picks for spring.  With Easter coming up real quick, I'm loving this mix of MINT, PEACH, Ombre wheel of HOT PINK, and ICY BLUE.  If you'd like to shop this look, you can go here.  Can't find what you're looking for there?  Maybe you'd like me to create a board to suit your style?  Or have something customized to suit your needs?  I'm happy to do that.  Just give me a call:)

Here's a virtual room above that I put together using those items in the board on top.  What do you think?  I love the peach to pink ombre.  OMBRE is still hotter than ever.  Did you notice that House Beautiful 's magazine cover page text was ombre last month?  LOVE it!  For spring, I predict we'll see a lot of ombre in varying shades of spring colors.

IN OTHER NEWS...

I told you we have chickens, right?  We inherited them from Will's dad who passed away just before Christmas.  This is a pic of Sylvia when the chickens first came to the new house property.  She looks thrilled, huh?  You can tell we're city folk.  I wasn't quite so sure about doing this chicken thing either. But, it's actually really easy, and fun.  They are so pretty, too.  They didn't lay too many eggs at first, and Sylvia was shy with them,  but now she and baby John-John love taking care of them.  John clucks at them like crazy and then laughs.  We like to go check on them every day after school.  Sylvia gets so excited to see how many eggs they've laid.  A good day is four to six, but lately, it's gone up to nearly a dozen eggs per day!  We have an abundance as you see here below.  Now we just need to move in and get to scrambling some eggs on the new stove. 

Will did a little reading up about the chickens and feeding them. We've been giving them scraps of veggies, fruit, and peelings.  I think that's why they are producing so many.  

In other news, I HAD to share this sweet little invitation below with you all.  A young girl threw her dear friend a baby shower here at Pickwick House over the weekend.  It was library themed shower and the invitation is an old library check out card.   Isn't it adorable.  I thought it was such a sweet idea for a shower.  Babies can't have enough good books, can they?

Tea Bar and Bites catered the party with their yummy spread!

Speaking of Tea Bar...Eleanor {my girl} whipped up a most delish new blood orange cupcake recipe last week.  She filled the pastry case with this amazing delectable.  I kid you not, these are THE best cupcakes I have EVER, EVER had!  There is a homemade curd surprise in them too!   And, just so happens that the beautiful oranges are from Home Grown Foods.  How 'bout all that for a batch of local goodness from all our wonderful neighborhood market vendors here on Pickwick street!  I feel so blessed to be here.  I hope you do too.  

Be sure to stop by and say hi to us if you see us at the new house, or Pickwick House...and come see the chickens too.  Cluck, cluckety, cluck! haha.  

Have a great week, everybody:-)

xx

sharon

Pickwick House is a full service design/build company in the heart of the Midwest!  {Springfield, Missouri's Rountree Neighborhood}.  We handle all aspects of residential renovations from small to large projects and are available for full service and consultation design, and/or stylizing from East to West Coast.  Call or email us today.  We may be on location, but we'll get back to you in no time.

 417-459-8988 *sharontaylordesigns@yahoo.com

PSST!!!

Morning Lover-lies.  Thank you all for voting for my olioboards for the get published camp!  There were a LOT of amazing boards submitted.  I'm pulling for Jennifer Reynolds, an interior designer based in Atlanta, Georgia.  Her entry board was titled, 'Crazy for Stripes'.   The judges will be announcing the winners soon.  I had unrealistic hopes for winning, but that's okay, mine are not even close to being in the running.  I am now familiar with the wonderful olioboard tool, and now I am familiar with the rules to the contests. I will try, try, again:):)  Thanks again for voting!

While I am on the subject of voting for things, I have a dear friend's daughter who always makes strides to make a difference for the less fortunate.  She's a 19 year old asking for our votes so she can take part in a traveling campaign to help kids in Africa.  It would be so wonderful if you could take a minute of your time to read her short entry bio here and vote her in to the top 50 people who deserve to go on a Tom's Giving Trip.  Thank you in advance!  Btw...PSSST!!!! she's currently #79 out of 9,000 applicants as of today.  That's so close to the #50 mark!  GO ALEX!!

I'll leave you with a quick board I put together for a client recently.  It's very traditional.  While it's not the typical design style I choose for myself, I DO enjoy reading different people's/client's styles and wishes.  A home should be something you love, and if traditional is what you love, we can do that too!

xx
sharon

Pickwick House is a full service design/build company in the heart of the Midwest!  {Springfield, Missouri's Rountree Neighborhood}.  We handle all aspects of residential renovations from small to large projects and are available for full service and consultation design, and/or stylizing from East to West Coast.  Call or email us today.  We may be on location, but we'll get back to you in no time.


417-459-8988 *sharontaylordesigns@yahoo.com

Commercial Design: A SOCIAL CLUB

I can't get enough of Olioboard, now!  I LOVE it.  I promise to stop cramming this blog feed with these once the contest is over in a few days.   I've been waking up extra early to create these boards because I have a million board ideas in my head ready to throw out there...and since baby is still sick, I am really hunkering down with a goal of winning this contest as well as winning a sick baby back to health.

The concept for the board below comes from just one of three or four scenarios in my head for this particular purpose.  I have had a fantasy of creating a whole town, complete with boutique hotels, event venues, outdoor recreational spaces, country clubs, restaurants, book stores, libraries, neighborhood markets, and ice cream shops, etc.  Any investors, builders, business owners out there wanna talk?   Haha.  I can do it.  BOUTIQUE style:)

One of my most favorite things to do when traveling to big cities is to visit boutique hotel lounges, restaurants and portly bars, so I've always thought it would be fun to do a spin off of the studio and create our own PICKWICK HOUSE {a modern, underground social club} for our own little small town.  Don't you think there's a market for that here in the Ozarks?  So, that brings me to the question:  Would you go to this type of boutique-social house?  Would any of you locals frequent this type of place?

When dreaming up a description for this 'Pickwick House' {a modern, underground social club}'.  I describe it as 'underground' because it's just a 'virtual-invisible' brick and mortar, 'Non-existent', hence underground.  {NOT planning a real one, any time soon.}  Anyway...

DESCRIPTION:  Drawing inspiration from Charles Dickens Pickwick Papers, this modern day social house is meant to be a place for many characters to stroll into the underground club for a regular dose of humor, advice, poetry, extravagant travel stories, historical studies, romantic love, and bizarre anecdotes, live old jazz, and five piece swing bands, all while imbibing in STRONG cocktails from a bygone bootleg era. "Cozy up to the fire, read a good tale, pour yourself a glass of something you'll never experience any where else'~Sharon Taylor. 

This version is a bit glam, but I thought the worn leather chesterfields brought down the glam factor a little bit.  I thought the gingham was fun, and an ode to old fashioned southern charm.   I've noticed a revival in largescale gingham with a couple of my fave designers trending it at the moment { i.e., Miles Redd, Tobi Fairley, Barry Dar Dixon, and Nick Olson.}  I misspelled by name in the watermark, but once it was published, it was too late to edit.  

So, what would be your choice drink be here?   Think Frank Sinatra style or, Hemingway, The Fitzgeralds, Degas, T. S. Eliot, Matisse, Josephine 

Baker to name but a few.  A mint julep, rusty nail, or an old fashioned?  

So, do you have any favorite hot spots you like to go to? Sounds like another post about REAL life boutique hotels is in order, huh?

Oh, I should mention that you can vote for me.  I've been receiving email updates directly from olioboard alerting me of the people that have voted for me.  Today, I have six.  THANK YOU!!  {I can think of nothing more wonderful than a few votes:)}  You can vote for all of my entries once a day for the next five days, I believe.  Here's the link to my latest entry to vote on. Just click the check mark inside the red heart.  Thank you, so kindly.

Hope you have a wonderful weekend, everyone.  

xx

sharon

Whippoorwill

Thank you all for your sweet and interesting comments to my last post.  I really appreciate the love and suggestions received in my inbox too.  Thank you!!  Someone's response to me was, "It's a small, temporary problem."  That is so right.  Very small, indeed!

Spring cannot get here soon enough.  Little guy has stomach bug again, poor fella.  Are there two strains of that virus this year?  Crazy.  So, while I'm working from home today, I'm catching up on an old movie I haven't seen in years.  "Legends of the Fall".  Gah, I had forgotten how incredibly sad and complicated it was.  What a timeless, most beautiful set design and cinematography.  And, Julia Ormand, Brad, and Aiden.  Sigh.

I have six days left to submit as many olioboard creations as I can create to the olioboard contest.  The first two boards I submitted the last few days are pretty theatrical and whimsical in style.  I had to get that style out of my system first.  I realize it's not for everyone.  Haha.  I am open to suggestions on the next ones I create.  What's your style?  Maybe I'll create one for you.  I'm currently creating others for clients and even a potential client on IG who liked the others I showcased.    

The contest theme is STRIPES.  So, I 'have' to incorporate stripes.  I decided to go my typical bold, black and white striped background.

"WHIPPOORWILL"

When I started this board I imagined a girl inhabiting it to be a bit quirky and so I decided to give each board a personalized 'storied' description.  The one above was actually inspired by Will's second cousin.

Description: Samantha enjoys nature and the sport of bird watching. Wild birds in particular. Adventures to mossy creekside knolls, forests at dusk, and the Ozark mountains are among this stylish girl's jaunts. 
"whippoorwill!" ~Sharon

You can vote for this board if you follow this link.   Under neath the right hand corner, click on the check mark inside the red heart:)  You can vote for it one time per day for the next six days.  You can 'shop the look' there too.  

"TEARS OF JOY"

You can vote for this board by following this link.   Same instructions as the one above.

To see all the other entries in the contest, go here.

Thanks for stopping in!  Enjoy the rest of your day.

xx
sharon

Pickwick House is a full service design/build company in the heart of the Midwest!  {Springfield, Missouri's Rountree Neighborhood}.  We handle all aspects of residential renovations from small to large projects and are available for full service and consultation design, and/or stylizing from East to West Coast.  Call or email us today.  We may be on location, but we'll get back to you in no time.

 417-459-8988 *sharontaylordesigns@yahoo.com

RUBY DELIGHT Olioboard by SharonTaylorDesigns

Okay, so you remember how I went to Design Camp in October?  It was life changing for me and the business.  I won't bore you with talk of that deal, but wanted to share one of the biggest topics/tools shared there.  Leslie Carothers {twitter link}spoke on behalf of this great new tool called 'Olioboard'. Have you heard of it?  It's an online tool for drafting 2D and 3D room inspiration boards... using a full market of millions of items and brands to pull from.  Once you've created the room at the drop of a fingertip, you can 'shop the look'.  You can shop other user's boards.  Anyone can use it.  Including you.  And it's free. 

For designers it's great, because it's a quick and easy way to present a visual board to your clients. 

Many designers at camp had never heard of it.  I had, but kept resisting using the tool because I really didn't think I had time to learn one more thing.  And i didn't know you could pull antiques and oddities.   {WRONG}

Since returning from camp, I've kept Olioboard at back of my mind.  I remember Leslie encouraging us designers to expand to their larger 'PRO platform', to make more money and also promote the biz. Leslie made most campers leave camp with 'Olioboard' at the top of their priority lists.  Not me. haha.     

Fast forward four months.  Well you know how much of a fan I am of Tobi Fairley, right?  Great luxury designer, inspiring business woman and coach, and overall life-coach for all of us who strive to be better.   Elevating not only our practice, but our inner spirituality and physical strength.  I greatly admire her as a positive business woman and mom!  

RUBY DELIGHT:  A Sharon TAYLOR Designs board

I, of course, follow her on IG, and twitter and noticed that a couple weeks ago she was mentioning her upcoming  "Get Published" for April 9th. Now, I tell you, I've been trying to get to one of her camps for the last few years, but timing never was right with babies and kids activities.  

Then about a week later,  Ronda Carmen of All The Best,  announced that her forth coming book, Designers At Home,  will be launched at the Tobi Fairley camp as well.  And to top it off, Traditional Home editors are guest sponsors and speakers.  Then I was like, WHAT?!  I have to go.  

It's in Little Rock, Arkansas.  I could drive, right?   

So it just so happens that Olioboard is a Team Tobi sponsor, and is hosting a contest right now with the winner to receive 2 tickets to the camp valued at $2400 each.  I'm putting that challenge out there not only for myself, but for all of you designers who would like a chance to win it too.  But, I'm pulling for mostly me.  Haha. 

{No, but even if you're not a designer, it's something you could play with too.  It's like playing in a dollhouse.  Join in and try it out with me!  My profile is:  sharontaylordesigns}

 Well, you know what I did last night after reading about the contest?  Slept maybe four hours, woke up with a catapulting leap, and started plugging away...

This is my first room above.  I know I'm duplicating the one above it, but I had to showcase the amount of clutter I amassed while creating it.  I'm so proud I completed a board.  Not sure if this will be an entry into the contest yet and don't judge me for the wampiness or my untidy, unkept house I keep.  Haha.  I really wanna break out the online paper dolls now.

 Alright, so I named the room Ruby Delight.  Needs some help, but here's the Description:  This room is for the girl who is charmed by all things chic. Delightment filled by all things french, antique, adventurous travels, books, film, science studies and tea!

It was great fun and pretty easy.  With a click of the mouse, I could slide an antique One Kings Lane table out from under a crrrrrrrystal vase, and it SO didn't crash into jillions of pieces.  It was fairly easy,  and I'm already majorly addicted and I think it could work really well for me with my clients' presentations too.  Can I tell you how happy I am that Olioboard offers antiques too!!  I was really pleasantly surprised.

I published this one before I realized I forgot to put away all the things I had scrapped that are up there to the right.  Haha.  And I still don't know how to edit those out.  Anyway, I'll work on that, but I need your help, because, you see, I realize this room is very 'girly'.  And that girly stuff may not be a 'winning style'.  One plus to the contest is, I can enter as many boards as I want.

Okay, SO this is where I need your help.  Tell me what types of moods, styles, trends, products you might like to see created.  I'll incorporate some of those things into boards to create for my multiple, winning entries in the contest.  Be thinking about what some of your favorite things are, and please, please tell me.  {thank you in advance!}

I may need your help at some point too, on voting. It's a judged contest, but viewers can vote daily on their faves.  Not sure that sways the judges, but it might.  Sort of like American Idol?  Haha.

Okay, I know this is a long post, but I thought I'd leave you with an inspiration image and woman to 'glide around on the ice with' today.   I love this painting.  It's of Florence Nightingale.  I think that's one of the prettiest girl name I've heard in a LONG time.  Why has no one in my massive family used it?  Even the last name would make a pretty middle name aside from Florence, I think.

Anyway, did some reading on Florence and thought she was the perfect inspiration for my 'Ruby Delight' board above.  "She was a precocious child intellectually.  Her father took particular interest in guiding her through history, philosophy, and literature.  She was able to read and write French, German, Italian, Greek, and Latin at an early age.  Never satisfied with the traditional female skills of home management, she preferred to read the great philosophers and to engage in serious political and social discourse with her father." ~ You can read more about Florence here.

                               One more:  Miles Redd room.  I LOVE Miles fun with color!

Wish me luck, folks, and try out Olioboard, and tell me what you think.

Happy ICE DAY. Be careful out there, locals!!

xx
sharon

Pickwick House is a full service design/build company in the heart of the Midwest!  {Springfield, Missouri's Rountree Neighborhood}.  We handle all aspects of residential renovations from small to large projects and are available for full service and consultation design, and/or stylizing from East to West Coast.  Call or email us today.  We may be on location, but we'll get back to you in no time.

 417-459-8988 *sharontaylordesigns@yahoo.com

xx

sharon

Design Camp Attendee, Austin Texas

Hi All.  

To those in the midst of preparing for hurricane Sandy:  My thoughts are with you.  Sending strength and good thoughts your way!  

I just returned from Design Camp in Austin, TX.  It was the first of a series of more camps to sweep across the US.  It was also a first time camp experience for me.  I found it to be completely amazing for many reasons.   First, and foremost, so I could educate myself more for you.  I figure I owe that education to you, my clients, here in the Midwest.

Above, is a pic of the portfolio case I put together to take to camp, using an inexpensive portfolio case from Walgreens, a gold coin thrifted brooch and red ribbon.  {Super easy, super inexpensive, yet classically organized looking and hopefully professional. hehe.}

HGTV personalities and celebrity designers, Lori Dennis and Kelli Ellis {co founders of Design Camp}were warm, funny, and very generous with their knowledge as well as their a-list line up of amazing speakers!  I was extremely honored that I was a chosen recipient to receive a free tuition pass thru Ronda Carman's blog, All The Best.  If you are a designer or  in the line of this industry, I strongly encourage you to go to one of the upcoming camps.  The next is slated for Atlanta, I believe.

Happy Monday!

xx
sharon