Antique Hardware

Here’s a great site for hardware; custom, vintage and repro. They offer door and window hardware, cabinet and furniture hardware, lighting and other home accessories.

From House of Antique Hardware:

At House of Antique Hardware we believe that period homes were designed and built with a rare integrity. For those of us compelled to restore that integrity, we share a responsibility: to stay true to the original design. At House of Antique Hardware, there are no short cuts to reproducing the past. We have one of the largest selections of original and authentic reproduction hardware on the web, and sales staff dedicated to matching the most faithful restoration project.

Living Well Link of the Week: House of Antique Hardware

Poured and Pressed Glass

Last evening, the Fivecat crew and I hopped in the Explorer and took “the long way” (I took a wrong turn) up to Peekskill for the annual AIA Westchester Mid-Hudson kick off event at Wood Designe’. The evening always starts off with an open house at the Wood Designe’ woodshop. The CNC machines are on display and several vendors are available to pitch their wares.

One very interesting vendor was 3form. Among several dozen innovative products was their poured and pressed glass. Pretty amazing stuff.

From 3-form.com:

We’ve redefined this classic material, turning it upside down, arresting your attention in the 3form signature style.

Their poured glass is a premium product that creates amazing textures and incredible depth. Their pressed glass uses everyday natural materials, such as grass (image above) or flower pedals, and uses them as an interlayer between two thin layers of glass.

Now we just need a project where we can use it.

Bungalow Tile

Another great source from Materialicious, Bungalow Tile is available direct to the consumer via their beautifully designed website.

From Bungalow Tile:

The Bungalow Tile collection features a high-fired, 3/8” thick stoneware tile, produced with traditional square edges and a flat tile surface. Choose the Bungalow Tile collection for traditional subway tile walls, elegant hex floors, period glazes and robust moldings.

Classic and affordable, this tile is rated for residential and light commercial use in all wall and floor applications. Bungalow Tile is proudly made in America, with the care and craftsmanship that comes from five generations of tilemaking.

They offer a great line of accessories as well.

Living Well Link of the Week: Bungalow Tile 

A Friend for Life

I just viewed the new ASPCA television commercial. It’s tough to watch without tearing up. I just cannot believe that there are people in this world that are that cruel.

As many of you may know, Annmarie and I (mostly Annmarie) have rescued seven neglected or forgotten furballs. Amazing Grace is a Rottweiler mix. William St. Patrick Carl LePage (aka Willy) is all Rottweiler. Gracie has been with us for almost 10 years. Willy came ‘home’ just over a year ago.

Our five cats (get it? …Fivecat), Katonah, Indy, Oscar, Charlie and Tarzan are all rescued from the streets. Indy came through Forgotten Felines (she chose me) and the others are all Katonah natives.

If you are looking for a new dog or cat, before you head out to the breeder, please check out your local SPCA first. You may just find a friend for life.

You can also help by pledging a donation. Become a ASPCA Guardian today.

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By the way… animals are not our only rescue. That’s reclaimed ipe decking given a second life as hardwood flooring under the pups.

The Shack at Hinkle Farm

The Shack at Hickle Farm, designed and built by architect Jeffery Broadhurst, was published in this month’s issue of Architectural Record. It’s a perfect example of form follows function. Heat and hot water is supplied via a wood burning stove and oil lamps provide lighting. Accessed without roads and perched above the most beautiful view, this little house is “simply” beautiful.

From Architectural Record:

Although Broadhurst thinks of the shack as a place for family and friends, it exhibits an undeniably monastic dimension. Exceedingly remote, it is inaccessible without an off-road vehicle. A long, winding drive over stones and grasses along the ridge of South Fork Mountain leads to a steep clearing where the bucolic box hovers at 3,600 feet above sea level. It’s an ideal hermitage, but on weekends in the warmer seasons, Broadhurst packs up to a half-dozen people in the 140-square-foot room.

Learn more about the shack and it’s architect here.

Weathering Steel House

From Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design | University of Toronto:

In the Toronto garden suburb of Don Mills, 1960’s ranch bungalows and their surrounding landscaping are being levelled to be replaced by substantial, clumsy, historically referential monster houses. Constructed of beige brick, taupe coloured stucco and reconstituted stone these new houses form the new ideal suburban dream house. Complimented by decorative and ornamental landscaping they are the antithesis of their modernist predecessors.

This residence sits in direct contrast to this context. Materially rich, dark, and abstract, it creates a clear threshold to the world within, to the site it creates and to the ravine edge over which it looks. The L-shaped house frames a reconfigured landscape created around shaped, tree covered mounds and a sweeping meadow. Imbedding itself into the centre of the house the reflecting pool and swimming pool beyond form the intermediary between building and landscape, weaving reflected light, motion and sound into the heart of the project.

Living Well House of the Week: Weathering Steel House

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Thanks for the link, John.

Aga Appliances

I have featured the Aga Legacy range before (we’re saving our pennies for our very own black 44), but now Aga has introduced a new line of appliances to compliment their beautiful ranges.

From aga-ranges.com:

For over eighty years Aga has hand crafted ranges of superior performance and classic design. Now, we proudly offer a collection of coordinating kitchen products so you can create the kitchen of your dreams.

With the introduction of our full-size, paneled refrigerator, our existing undercounter refrigeration, dishwasher and appliance face panels, and our oven hood, we have extended the elegance and style you’ve come to expect from Aga Ranges. You can now customize and design your kitchen with a matching suite of appliances.

Living Well Link of the Week: Aga

Favorite Firms: Bohlin Cywinski Jackson

I love this photo. I love this house.

From BJC.com:

Passage through the tightly defined timbered entry reveals an expansive living space with views to the distant landscape. Behind a free-standing stair that rises along one edge of the two-story space, a dining room and office border a steeply sloped and shaded landscape. The light-filled volume of the living space is anchored by a massive stone firebox and chimney that dominates the southern exposure. Centered on a square fieldstone plinth, the fireplace recalls the furnaces of local historic industrial structures.

Favorite Firms: Bohlin Cywinski Jackson

Living Well Poll: Dream Project

Everyone has a dream project. Would you just love to have family room with a big flat screen TV? How about a new master bedroom suite with a custom walk-in closet and a beautiful master bathroom? Click the link below and tell us what you think.

Take Our Living Well Poll Now

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Photo: Kohler

He’ll Explain Later

Just posted at LamiDesign.