Saturday funnies

Guess which vice presidential candidate took her first four questions from a reporter on Thursday? Hint: she was on her first trip to New York. Ever. No dear, changing planes in Newark on your way to Ireland... no, Iraq... I mean Kuwait doesn't count as a visit.

Here's a highlight of what she had to say after looking down into the hole at Church and Vesey Streets: 

"Every American student needs to come through this area so that, especially this younger generation of Americans is, to be in a position of never forgetting what happened here and never repeating, never allowing a repeat of what happened here.

"I wish every American would come through here,” she continued. “I wish every world leader would come through here, and understand what it is that took place here, and more importantly, how America came together and united to commit to never allowing this to happen again. And just to hear from and see these good New Yorkers who are rebuilding not just this are but helping to rebuild America has been very, very inspiring and encouraging. These are the good Americans who are committed to peace and security and it’s been an absolute honor getting to meet these folks today."

Part of me thinks this is hilarious, but then the better part of me realizes the gravity of the situation and wants to weep.

This man is out of his mind redux

I asked this question a week ago and I asked it rhetorically. Now I'm asking it again only less rhetorically and more authentically. Seriously, why does Jonathan Adler have a career? Is it his sheer bravado? I mean, it takes a set of balls to come up with a candle called "Hashish" to begin with, but then to turn around and charge $68 dollars for it is either more ballsy still or it's just attention seeking. What a curious, curious thing. 

It made the rounds of the blogs this week and predictably, everybody fawned and cooed on cue. Hello? Has anyone out there ever read the story of The Emperor's New Clothes?

Thank you

On Tuesday at 1:20am eastern time, somebody in Phoenix, AZ entered the search terms "plywood vs. particle board" on Google and ended up being directed to this blog and an entry I wrote back in January on the same topic. 

What that person couldn't have known was that he or she was my 5,000th visitor. So thank you Phoenix. 

And thank you Greenville, SC and Findlay, OH and St. Petersburg, FL and Fair Oaks, CA and Lancaster, PA and Fargo, North Dakota and Seattle, WA and Hudson, NH and New York, London, Moscow, San Francisco, Toronto and Paris. Thank you too to Bridgetown, Barbados and Warsaw, Poland and Athens, Greece and Florence (Firenze!), Italy and Panang, Palau and Sydney, New South Wales and Bangalore, and Pusan, and Tokyo and Beijing. I seem to be violating some kind of unspoken rule in the blogosphere by acknowledging the people who read my meanderings but screw the rules. So thank you again. It is the coolest thing in the world to have a world full of people who find this site --it's humbling and energizing at the same time. Thank you.

Marvelous marble

Here are two shots of my favorite marble job of all time. I think I've mentioned this job before but I want to re-post these shots just because I think they're pretty.

This is honed Calacatta Gold Marble and the slabs used to make this counter were some of the best-quality marble slabs I've ever seen. This counter was expertly fabricated and installed by Custom Marble Works in Tampa. Their number is 813-620-0475. I lack enough superlatives to describe their work or recommend them adequately. If you find yourself in the vicinity of Ybor City, pop in there and see their showroom and slabs. It will change your life.

This first shot is a close up of the counter reaching up to the window sill. Notice how the window sill wraps around the corner of the wall and ends in a perfect half-round edge. Attention to those sorts of details is what makes a good counter job worth every penny.

I love how we made the full height back splash behind the range in this shot below. I don't like seeing big slabs of solid stone marching up a wall. Unless of course it's marble that's doing the marching. A marble such as this one is the only kind of stone I like to see on a wall. Mostly because most stones loose their luster and appeal when they're not lit directly. White marbles have a glow to them though. They absorb light and then diffuse it. Gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous. Many thanks to my very happy client who lets me show off her kitchen.

Here's what I mean by a good knock off

This is Christopher Peacock's much ballyhoo-d Refectory Kitchen. It is gorgeous and when he started pushing kitchen design in this direction, it was pretty revolutionary. Before the rise of his Scullery and Refectory designs, the high end of kitchen design was all about Tuscan and other Vegas-meets-Disney interpretations of old world styles. Christopher Peacock launched himself onto the scene as an alternative to all of that noise and brought some restraint back to the world of high end design. Thank you Christopher Peacock. As lovely as the kitchen above is, it has a price tag on it well into the six figures. It is exquisitely fitted, finished, engineered, designed, constructed and installed. It is worth every penny he charges for it and it will last a lifetime. Several lifetimes in fact.

However, the number of people who are willing to spend that kind of money on a kitchen renovation are few and far between. But the ideas he's getting across through his design have some pretty broad appeal. To wit:

Though by no means an inexpensive kitchen, here's a kitchen that would cost half what a Christopher Peacock would. This is a kitchen from Medallion and it's taking its inspiration from The Refectory directly, but it's not stealing any ideas. It's pairing a painted finish with a dark stained wood and if you look at the details, it's really a different kitchen entirely. It's also beautiful, well-designed, well-fitted, well-finished and a respectful homage. All design is derivative as I like to say, and this kitchen from Medallion is a more affordable version of an idea that Christopher Peacock had. But it's a version, not a copy and I think that's what makes what I call a good knock off.