moroso couch

I bought my first pieces of furniture last weekend.  I have never purchased anything before aside from the odd Ikea bookshelf or desk while I was at university.  Everything else was handed down or purchased from when I was a child. 

As part of moving out and starting from scratch, I am excited by the process of researching and thinking about what I want, what matters with respect to design and comfort and obviously what can be purchased for my limited budget.  Comfort seems to be at the top of my boyfriend’s list when it comes to furniture.  We go around to stores and sit on everything and have numerous discussions about smushiness, bounce, firmness and shape.  I am learning quite quickly we have a different tolerances for what is comfortable and what is not.  My first couch purchase last week came from the Pavillion warehouse in downtown Toronto. Along with it I bought two clear plastic Eames shell chairs to complement the caramel leather in the couch.  However, as my boyfriend said, the plastic chairs are for me, not for him because he finds them uncomfortable. 

On a mini tangent I was researching stylish furniture leading up to my couch purchase and came across this Italian sofa company.   It has been designing sofas for a long time and has secured some interesting partnerships along the way.  Seeing that the company has been in the business pumping out fabulous piece after fabulous piece,  it is no wonder Moroso has super creative looking designs and are able to partner with some well known and innovative designers.  Their website is very informative with lots of pictures, product specs, ideas, and news about design.  I wonder what he would say about the Moroso chairs?  They look pretty comforatable to me.

via yliving

via hello francis

via real living

via clusterflock

via modern chair design

MADcrush

Cool idea-wine meets modern art. The event is called MADcrush in partnership with the Museum of Art and Design in New York, top chefs and wine professionals come together to share their craft.  This is a five week (thursday) pop up wine bar on now until July 30th at Columbus Circle.  Love the wine bar out of cardboard boxes.

via joonbug

via joonbug

popbar

As the summer heats up, and you are looking for something cool and refreshing to eat or to serve at an event, Popbar in New York (west village) has an interesting thing going:  gelato on a stick.  Using a unique process from Italy’s, Stick House, Popbar, rotates 25 flavours, all homemade in house and crafts beautiful looking “popsicles” out of gelato, sorbet and yogurt and covers them in toppings (almonds, hazelnut, granola, coconut).  The owners made a point to use top ingredients including hormone free milk, real fruit and no additives in the product.  

Two great things put together, custom and gelato!  Even with Popbar’s aim to keep these desserts, “kid friendly”  they look too beautiful to eat.  What’s better is that catering is available for special events- ahem anyone looking for something fresh and new in NYC.  Love it, love it!  Open in Toronto Popbar. For more pictures on how it’s done, you can check out Manila Review to see an example at StickHouse here.  

via popbar

via popbar

blik

I am preparing to move into a condo September 1.  It’s my first purchase and my first “official” try at interior design.  I’m sure there is a whole population of interior designers out their cringing at my use of the phrase “try interior design” but you know what I mean.  I am respectful of the fact that interior design is a rigorous trade, backed by years at school and in the field to work towards accreditation (at least in Canada).  I am a closet interior designer and quite frankly super excited to decorate my space. 

I just saw a post about this wall decal company, blik, and thought I would share.  I secretly want the lightbulbs but there are some cool options (my top pics are below). 

thought bubbles via blik

chandelier via blik

chair mix-a-lot via blik

aedes studio

It’s Friday and i’m happy!  I have been so busy the past two weeks I feel like i’ve barely had a moment to think of colourful, creative, entertaining ideas.  Now that I have been rejuvinated by comforting thought of “weekend,” I’m back in posting mode.  First off, aedes studio out of Bulgaria.  I’m feeling their interior design and architecture.  This “design collective” offers clients an all-in-one service package from architecture, and interior design, to graphics and identity design.  This is one company I would work with from start to finish-

The first couple pictures of the group are what caught my attention to dig deeper into who was behind the architecture.  It was posted on Plastolux.  The others, I dug up.  Enjoy.

via plastolux

via plastolux

via plastolux

via building of the year

via deview

via aedes studio

New Preston Bailey Blog

Preston collaboration with Betsey Johnson via preston bailey's blog

via preston bailey's blog

via preston bailey's blog

chocolate raspberry layer cake

I made a chocolate raspberry layer cake this weekend out of the new Bon Appetit magazine.  Recipe is here.  It was a hit with the guests.  There were six adults and the ate half the cake by the time I returned at the end of the evening.  Comments were that the cake was moist, dense but not overly sweet which is nice.  The ganache, raspberry jam layer which I changed to a blackberry jam layer and the raspberries all worked nicely together.  No flavour overpowered.  The end result- a very satisfying piece of cake and I would make it again because it was easy.  The only thing I will forewarn, my ganache was not thick to begin and I had to refrigerate and freeze (as per recipe instructions) to get it the consistency of something spreadable (like a butter cream).  The first layer of icing, there were lots of spaces/gaps between the cake and I was strategizing that I would have to turn this thing into some sort of deconstructed chocolate raspberry shortcake or something.  In the end, the ganache reached its desired consistency and spread like a dream as you can see in my pictures below.  

As an aside, I have to admit, it’s been a while since i’ve made anything out of bon appetite with all the wonderful recipes available on blogs.  I guess magazines really do have some serious competition now that everyone and their mother is a chef, decorator, event planner and designer. 

Here is what the cake looks like in the magazine:

via bon appetit

Here is what I made:

sift dessserts HK

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via hong kong hustle

via the marriage

via next stop