He responded “Without a Facebook Page you aren’t a real company!!!”  And that simply won’t do!

So now we have a Facebook page.  Hop on over and show us some love!

Well, here is your answer:

The exquisite Mercer Bench by Jan Showers, available through Bailey Fox Interiors

The affordable and funky Glamour Bench available through Bailey Fox Interiors

Did you guess right? Commenter Jim did, and hit the nail on the head when he mentioned the craftsmanship of the benches being different.  Good eye Jim!

If the $6k+ price tag for the Splurge bench is out of your budget, the Glamour Bench is a really great alternative, and comes in a variety of colors:

If you are a regular reader of the Copy Cat Chic blog, you’ve probably come to realize that you can usually tell the difference between a really high-end item and a budget item.  Although spending more money on an item doesn’t guarantee you a better product, you can bet that quality craftsmanship and quality materials usually have a price attached to them.

But quality isn’t the only difference between high and low — often differences are a lot more subtle.  High end products, like those sold strictly to designers through places like The Merchandise Mart, generally have more pleasing proportions, colors, and styles.

There isn’t anything “bad” about budget items, as long as you understand that you might be sacrificing a bit of style and a lot of quality.  Everyone has budget items in their home – I just completed a renovation on a $2million dollar downtown town home where we purchased several items at our local Home Goods.  Not every item in a home needs to cost big bucks.  Designers are adept at telling you when to splurge and when to save and when you’ll notice the difference.

If we contrast the two items on Copy Cat Chic today you can begin to see what I mean.

Pictures from  Home Depot and Ballard Designs

In addition to the obvious craftsmanship differences, the umbrella on the right is much more visually appealing.  These umbrellas are meant to give your yard a graphic punch, hard lines contrasting the organic shapes of plants, grass, and clouds.

The right hand umbrella achieves that goal better – there is more contrast between the colors, the octagon creates stronger lines, and the stripes themselves are solid and clean, unlike the doubled up stripes on the left hand umbrella.  Proportion, style, and color all cost money because it takes a better eye (read expensive salary) or lots of market research to create a more visually appealing product.

I’ve put two benches below.  One bench retails for $6500 while the other retails for $650.

Can you tell which bench is the splurge?  The blue or the yellow bench?  Come back tomorrow to find out!

My friend Karissa recently snapped this photo at a Target and put it on Facebook.  These jewelry hangers have replaced human heads and arms with metal necklace holders – because nothing says I want to look pretty with jewelry like headless, armless females.  Don’t buy this.

Instead, store your jewelry in something really pretty that will make you feel good when you go to find that perfect accessory.  Here are my top picks for stylish jewelry storage:

1. Chinese Cloisonne Stacking Boxes through Vintage and Modern

2. Hand Printed Paisley Box through Ethan Allen

3. Shagreen Boxes through Mecox Gardens

4. Lacquered Wood Trays through Bailey Fox Interiors

5.Geometric Wood Box through Bombay & Company

6. Burled Olive Ash through Bailey Fox Interiors

Bailey Fox Interiors is designing this family’s entire home, and we are working on the main level.  We weren’t on the hunt for a rug that day, but this piece really spoke to us.   It is perfect for a study that we will design this summer on the second floor of the house.  After a quick call to her husband to confirm that he liked it and was ok moving up the time line for the office redo, we scooped it up.

I’m working on color plans for the room this weekend.   The entire home has splashes of orange, light blue, sage, and cream.  We’ve kept the main floor light and airy (a must for a family moving from the Caribbean to Chicago!) so we can afford to go a little darker with this room.  The study will be used by the husband and he wanted a masculine color scheme.  The wife wants it to be bright enough that she doesn’t avoid the room entirely.  Here are my color sketches:

I know what the husband will lean towards and which one the wife will want (and they aren’t the same – of course!).  Which one is your favorite?

This is a relatively tiny kitchen in a downtown Chicago condo. The ceilings are tall, but that is about the only luxury of space this unit has. When we started this client’s main concern was that the kitchen not feel claustrophobic.

Do you have the same problem in your home – a small kitchen that feels cramped? Here are a few quick designer tips to make your small kitchen feel huge:

See that space behind the range on the far side of the photo?  It looks like a pass through to another room, right?  Wrong…it is just a trick of mirrors.  But it makes it feel like this room has some inviting space beyond it — even though you consciously know it is just a mirror, subconsciously it feels like the room extends beyond the boundaries of the walls.

Designers often solve the problem of  tiny spaces by using color intelligently.  You can make a room seem large by using bright and clear colors like white, ivory, cream, and pale soft shades, and that is the standard approach most designers take.  But my client readily admits that she is messy when she cooks and feels nervous and hemmed in by a white kitchen, so that solution didn’t work for us. Instead, we tried to keep everything in the room the same tone and depth, which also creates the illusion of space because the eye continues to flow from material to material –stools to walls, walls to cabinet doors.
I chose a horizontal grained zebrawood veneer for the cabinets and had it stained a dark chocolate gray.  The horizontal glass panels in the cabinets are softly frosted and the countertop is a very budget friendly New Venetian Gold granite.

Behind those cabinet doors we’ve hid spice racks, a trash can,  a cookbook organizer and slide out pantries.  Today’s last tip for small kitchen?  Hide as much clutter as possible and customize your storage!

Hope you’ve enjoyed this quick tour!

Do you like our work?  Bailey Fox Interiors does plenty of kitchen renovations and remodels.  Check out our portfolio and send us a message here.

Taken during the Chicago Botanical Gardens Spring Flower Show

The weather man is saying that Chicago is going to have a mighty cold winter this year, so you can find me getting my inspiration at the Chicago Conservatory in Lincoln Park. I visited last year with my mother and grand mother while they were in town, and they thought it was so wonderful that we returned for a second trip on their last day here.

What I like about flowers is that they are warm and lush, dramatic and simple all at the same time. They have contrasting textures and perfect proportions. I also like to draw my inspiration for color schemes from flowers, because those color combinations are at the same time fresh and familiar.

To show you how wonderful color palettes based off of flowers are, I’ve taken three botanical photographs that I’m really drawn to and pulled out color schemes from them. You could use these colors as wall paints, fabric selections, wood tones, the list goes on and on…

The Family Room – Picture via MLS

The Trib said that Rosie is purchasing the home fully furnished, which was a deciding factor for her, but I’m a bit disappointed with the idea that she will keep the decor as is. The home is a bit dated and lacks the fun personality that Rosie is known for.

The dining room is one of the saddest little rooms I’ve seen in a while, with a mish mash of objects and no oomph to it. The dark blue walls swallow the light, and in Chicago brownstones where you can reach out your window and touch your neighbor’s house, natural light is at a premium. So the dark blue walls have to go, but the wainscoting can stay. This geometric wallpaper from Brewster Home comes in six colors and I’d choose the yellow to pump up the volume of brightness in this dining room. Added bonus – it is vinyl, and since Rosie has children, that means hand prints on the wall that need to be wiped down daily.

Next, the ceiling is really ho-hum, with a standard paint job and a hand painted medallion around the light (or is that a shadow?). I’d make it more interesting by doing a coffered ceiling treatment similar to what you see in the adjacent family room here. I would paint the beams and ceiling the same creamy white and center a new chandelier over the dining room table.

Here is my choice for the rest of the furnishings:

I’d make drapes out of this great Thibaut print and place the white buffet against the window wall, topped by a sturdy green ceramic plate that brings out the green in our chairs. The chairs would be made from durable velvet, stain guarded of course, and placed around this marble Saarinen table. Underneath the table is a wool rug with stripes of yellow, green, ivory, and blue that will both define the eating area and soften up the wood work.

The door to the kitchen on the right hand side would be flanked by a set of display shelves finished in green lacquer to match our dining room chairs. Add a family who likes to have fun, a good meal, and your done.

To see the rest of this home, check out the MLS listing here.

This cane back chair is painted a shimmery silver with new metallic turquoise damask upholstery – $120

These end tables appeared to made from a high lacquered burled walnut.  I love the waterfall shape.  And yes, those are rooster lamps on top.  They are almost so ugly I want them.  – $150

I have a soft spot in my heart for this dresser, because my bedroom is decorated in Hollywood Regency Bamboo.  I’ve paired it with a soft spa blue for a great effect. – $120

How clever!  This table is made from a sewing machine base topped with a Dark Emperor marble slab.  It would be great in an entry way or with a small chair for a writing desk. – $65!

This dresser is perfect for an entry way.  The top can hold mail, give you a spot to drop your keys, etc.  I’d paint is a glossy charcoal and replace the hardware with simple but dramatic ring pulls in gold. – $120

]]> http://baileyfoxinteriors.com/blog/2011/09/chicago-style-cheap-chic-craigslist/feed/ 0 http://baileyfoxinteriors.com/blog/2011/09/chicagos-style-review-of-the-bedford/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=chicagos-style-review-of-the-bedford http://baileyfoxinteriors.com/blog/2011/09/chicagos-style-review-of-the-bedford/#comments Fri, 09 Sep 2011 06:49:10 +0000 admin http://baileyfoxinteriors.com/blog/?p=1318 My husband is a member of a private cigar club here in Chicago.  I joined him tonight to watch the opening game for football season, and the place was definitely what my husband calls a “Men Den”.  It has mahogany paneled walls, heavy leather furniture, and miles of ornate wood molding.  It is definitely the perfect place for a quintessential “man’s” night out.  It reminded me of a contrasting experience I had last weekend where I gathered up some humorous, successful women to meet for dinner and drinks at a girl’s only party.

The gals and I went to a new restaurant/lounge in Chicago’s Wicker Park neighborhood called The Bedford.  We arrived for a late supper at about 9:30 and the mood was really set by the building’s exterior.  The Bedford is tucked in the basement of a defunct bank, behind heavy Bedford limestone walls. Can you see where this place got its name?  Walls in muted colors flank the staircase to the restaurant and the lighting used here is fabulous in person, creating a soft glow throughout the room but giving off a star burst pattern on the dark wall.  I loved the humor of it – a bit of bling at the entry to the old bank.

Once you reach the restaurant a smooth expanse of terrazzo covers the floor in patterns of green, beige, terracotta, and black. Top this with ornate ceilings and shiny marble walls, and you have the recipe for a restaurant reminiscent of Mad Men.  The Bedford kept as much of the original structure as possible, and the design firm Gettys even reused marble from the teller booths upstairs  to form a mosaic feature wall.

The first thing you see when you come into the restaurant proper is a huge vault door  that was either too expensive to remove or too good of a design opportunity to pass up.  People cluster in groups around the door, staying back from it just a bit as if in awe, but their bodies are always turned towards it -  this is definitely the focus of the restaurant.

I bellied up to the bar for a drink they had on the menu – a twist on a Caipirinha called “Edison’s Medicine.”  This mix of basil, agavee syrup and Cachaca was amazing and right on point for the restaurant’s design, sophisticated and hip while still having that old school feeling. The other girls were ordering old-fashioneds and french martinis so it was easy to see the vintage atmosphere inspired our choices.

As we walked to our table from the long bar I got a glimpse of one of the lounge areas that sits behind that big vault door.  Safety deposit boxes line the entire room, their surface polished to a high shine.  No need for art here.  Mid century couches and chairs in rich hues and vintage patterns make up small seating areas with oriental carpets under foot.  At one point during the evening I popped in to see if there was room for us gals to sit and sip, but the room was full, a testament to how comfortable and cozy it feels.

Our table was at the top of an walnut-stained wooden platform and consisted of a horseshoe booth big enough to seat 10.   The booths are all tufted leather, so you feel like you are eating dinner on a posh friend’s sofa.  Those safety deposit boxes made another appearance behind our table, and the dim lighting hitting the nickel surface cast a glow throughout the room.

We ordered plates to share and settled in to take in the view.  I had a great line of sight to a double-sided fireplace wall that divided the restaurant.  There were upholstery pieces in garnet, turquoise, emerald, and sapphire throughout the space, and after a few drinks I really felt like I was sitting inside one of the safety deposit boxes – surrounded by shiny, sharp edges and jewel-toned treasures.

Unfortunately, upon a trip to the ladies room, I found the only disappointment in the restaurant — the beautifully wallpapered anti-room had multiple light fixtures hanging over a mock borne settee.  The proportions and placement were off kilter and the style of the chandeliers left me shaking my head — I even spy one from home retail giant Uttermost (two points if you can tell me which of the five). This was a missed opportunity to do a luscious mixture of vintage lighting.  Heck, even an amazing refurbished chandelier would have looked more in-tune with the rest of the restaurant.  At least the charcoal wallpaper with the pink furniture was pretty, and the old teller vaults made into bathroom stalls were a nice touch.

After dinner we made our way back outside to hail cabs, and the girls commented on how lovely and sophisticated the space was, and we vowed to get together soon….and THAT is the hallmark of good restaurant design, inspiring us to return quickly and reminisce on our wonderful evening.

All photographs are via The Bedford website.