February 2012 - Posts

White Out: Choosing and Mixing Your Own Shades of White!

White is a beautiful stark backdrop to statement furniture pieces, large-scale art, or any decor pieces you wish to accentuate. However, one white is not like another. Despite being a non-colour, (or all colours, if we're talking about light), like grey,
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Mood Board: Move Over Tangerine, Make Room for Kelly Green!

If you haven’t been already, Kelly Green is a colour to watch. We’ve seen it floating down fashion runways for some time, not to mention in notable interiors such as the trend setting boutique hotel designed by Kelly Wearstler, the Santa Monica Viceroy
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HGTV.ca Original Home Tour: Lily & Brad's Colourful Charmer in Vancouver

Who: Lily is a homemaker, blogger and co-owner of an online vintage shop, Birch + Bird on Etsy. In her spare time she organizes handmade and vintage markets with her business partner, Rachel Janzen. Their fourth event, Scout Handmade + Vintage Market
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Hollywood Set Decorator Talks Oscar Movie Secrets and More!

The Oscars didn't need to sell it quite so hard last night (what with all the 'theatre nostalgia'), because everyone loves to lose themselves in a great movie. But when the story unfolds in a particularly rich setting, my eyes tend to stray off the mark
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Samantha Pynn Reveals Her Colour Secrets and Her Living Room!

A good stylist can come into your home and manipulate the space using paint colour, fabric and accessories to take it from blah to vavavavoom. The secret to making colour work is a little repetition . Truly, I believe that repetition is the greatest decorating
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Top 3 Friday: Top Three Colour Combos for a Fresh Look

If decorating with colour doesn't intimidate you, then creating a fresh and striking look is as simple as selecting two colours that lie directly across from one another on the colour wheel . Complementary colour schemes are formed using one warm tone
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Sam Pynn Gives Step-by-Step Advice on How to Choose Colour

When it comes to colour – I like them all. That said, colour forecasting and trend reports make me a little nervous. I love seeing what's hot with the arrival of every new year, but ultimately, I believe colours for your home should be chosen because
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Who Won Canada's #HandymanChallenge? Drumroll Please...

On the season finale of Canada's Handyman Challenge last night, the final four contestants -- Greg, Brad, Maggie and Mark -- battled it out on a very hot day to impress judges Mike Holmes, Scott McGillivray and Bryan Baeumler with the final challenge
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How to Choose the Right Grey for Your Walls

Despite lackluster paint swatch names like ‘rainy days’ and ‘dusty roads’, grey remains a popular choice for interior wall colour. Grey is a choice for so many due to its contemporary feel and neutral tone -- it's basically the new beige . Grey can warm
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Glamour, Romance & Nostalgia: Two Oscar Films to Redecorate By

To me, Oscar time is the brunch of seasons: that awkward period between winter and spring that doesn’t feel quite cold enough to call winter, or warm enough to call spring. It’s sprinter! Personally, I like to celebrate this most mercurial time of year
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Tweet Live with Mike, Scott, Bryan and Jillian #HandymanChallenge Finale

After auditions in Vancouver, Halifax and Toronto and three rounds of challenges in Hamilton, the top 12 contestants on Canada's Handyman Challenge have been whittled down to the final four : Greg and Maggie from Halifax, Mark from Qualicum Beach, BC
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Bargain Saturday: 5 No-Sew Projects to Do with Fabric This Weekend

I can't possibly be the only one with a lot of fabric hanging around my house. I do sew some things that I put to good use, occasionally. But, more often that not, I'm hoarding yards and yards of it for that future project that may or may not come. So,
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Top 5 Friday Quiz: Guess These Oscar-Nom Movies by Their Houses!

Ever leave a movie swooning over the set dressing while your popcorn-scented pal drones on about the acting? Your friend is praising Brad Pitt’s nuanced turn as tobacco-chewing baseball manager Billy Beane in Moneyball , while all you’re thinking is:
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Real People Reno: Everything You Need to Know About Opening Up the Attic

When space becomes an issue , as with the addition of a new baby, do you move? Or do you ren-expand? The master bedroom, new third floor Many factors can affect your decision, such as the value of your home and the danger of over-renovating its value,
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Video: Bob and Cortney Novogratz Share Their Colour Tips

The season finale of Home By Novogratz aired this week -- you can watch the episode online now -- and I was struck by the colourful yellow shutters they added to their country home. It struck me because during my visit to the Novogratz home in New York
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Lunchtime Fix: More Framed Wall Colour Ideas

Because someone asked ... :) Decor Pad Carpet The World Decor Pad Woodson & Rummerfield's Decor Pad Woodson & Rummerfield's Decor Pad Related: Iconic Designer Karim Rashid on Colour Top 5 Paint Colours for a Refresh February is Colour Month!
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Giveaway: Tickets to the Calgary Home and Garden Show, Feb. 23-26

It's Home Show season! We've already given away four pairs of tickets to the B.C. Home and Garden Show and now it's Calgary's turn. We're giving away two pairs of tickets to the Calgary Home and Garden Show . Leave it to Bryan host and Canada's Handyman
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Ways to Play with Wall Colour Using Mouldings

In Canada we are blessed with four wonderful seasons that inspire our fashion choices year after year. In the spring and summer we tend to dress in airy fabrics like cotton and linen, and our colour choices are often bright and light. In the winter we
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Giveaway: Tickets to the B.C. Home and Garden Show, Feb. 22-26

Hey there West Coasters, we've got a giveaway just for you! I'm giving away four pairs of tickets to the B.C. Home and Garden Show running from Wednesday, February 22 until Saturday, February 26 at BC Place Stadium in Vancouver. Over 425 experts will
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Video: Karim Rashid Chats About the Pantone Colour of the Year and More!

Last month, I caught up with iconic designer Karim Rashid at the Interior Design Show's Conversations in Design series. He and I chatted about a variety of topics that included both design and non-design subjects, and receiving the opportunity to have a heart-to-heart talk with the renowned designer is an experience I won't soon forget. Our conversation was definitely insightful, inspiring and enlightening on so many different levels and I truly admire and appreciate his genuine passion to enrich the human experience with impeccable design.
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February is Colour Month!

We're late with February's theme , but in our defense, we're trying to make February seem as short as possible. Though I must admit that this year, February has been a real peach. I don't know how Feb's been treating you in your part of the world but
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Design Dilemma with Samantha Pynn: On Bathrooms, Colour and Shower Curtains

Sam Pynn is a nice person. She knows that we read a lot of magazines and blogs that teach us how to apply 'quick fixes' in our own homes, and she is sensitive when the results of our efforts don't quite turn out as planned, as in the case of this Toronto
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The Baby Room Craze: A Man Refuses to Over Spend

Doesn't this just say it all: the room we had formerly set aside for our drunk friends to pass out in will soon be a room for our child to pass out in -- hopefully not drunk. Eames rocker, Paul Beer's house The guestroom has begun its transformation into
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Discuss: Home By Novogratz Episodes 11 and 12

This week on Home By Novogratz , Bob and Cortney took on two very different spaces: a light-filled, modern townhouse for a young couple and a sweet, but small kids' bedroom for 4-year old triplets who needed storage and floor space. First up, Jan and
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Top 5 Friday: Paint Colours for A Home Refresh

Paint is hands down the most useful tool in the designer’s or serial renovator’s arsenal. To this day, I am amazed at what a simple coat of paint can do for a room, or a piece of furniture for that matter. I’ve been known to wander into a paint store
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Video: Karim Rashid Chats About Good Design and More!

Last week, I attended a session of the Interior Design Show's Conversations In Design series featuring Karim Rashid. The iconic designer sat down with host, Chee Pearlman, to chat about a variety of design related topics in an intimate and interactive environment. Designers, design enthusiasts and fans of the iconic designer were able to get up close and personal with him, and some even got the opportunity to ask him their own design questions. Some of the highlights included his views on the need for eco-friendly sustainable design, design longevity and his final thought about artists and designers being people who want to do something original in the world. I'm a HUGE Karim Rashid fan and I found his conversation truly enlightening, inspiring and profound.
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Discuss: Home By Novogratz Episodes 9 and 10

I apologize for the late post! Blame it on the office sickness that's lurking around Shaw Media headquarters these days. I really enjoyed Home By Novogratz this week because Bob and Cortney designed two spaces for families that were colourful, personal
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