Diary of an Interesting Year

 

A Rendering of my Living Room done by Michelle Morelan and given to me as a Christmas gift.

2009 is a great year to reflect back on, now that it is almost over.  Whew, what a turbulent year - full of challenges.  I am not one to buy into the doom and gloom of the economic climate (I have weathered others through the years: early 80's, early 90's, late 90's), but this year was a year of an down economic climate that has seemed to have escaped no one in the 'world.'   There is a saying that when the going gets tough, the tough get going.  It is hard to see when you are in the midst of chaos, until you have come through it.....hopefully we are through it!!!  One of the benefits for me was that I kept busy and was continually looking for ways to recharge and re-inspire. I was fortunate to have four wonderful trips this year to do just that.  It is very important when you are working in a creative field to be continually evolving and expanding your horizons, and travel helps me to do that.  I also full filled a life long dream this year and went back to school and took two Art classes in Mixed Media Painting.  I subsequently turned my garage into an Art Studio and have spent many glorious days there immersed in painting.

Palm Springs in the early Spring - where I became fascinated with and wrote a Blog posting on the Mid-Century Post Modern resurgence of 'screen block.'

Palm Springs Modern Architecture and the Use of Screen Block

A trip to the Okanagan with my Dad and a visit to the The Nk'Mip Winery and Resort in Osoyoss - where I was inspired by the use of Rammed Earth in Modern Architecture.

Rammed Earth Wall NK'MIP Winery Osoyoos

A trip to New York in September and another in December.  What can I say about New York, other than that it is one of the most exciting and visually stimulating cities in the world.  Being able to see the artwork of great masters at the MOMA, Georgia O'Keeffe at The Whitney, and Kandinsky at the Guggenheim - it just doesn't get better than that. I shopped for clients at the D & D Building, A & D Building, and the New York Design Center, explored Soho, Tribeca, the Meat Packing District, Canal Street, walked Central Park, 5th Avenue, tried the Subway, enjoyed live theatre, ate at wonderful restaurants, enjoyed the lights and shop windows all decorated for Christmas, met new friends, and connected with old friends.

  
Kandinsky at the Guggenheim / The Meatpacking district and Highline / South Pacific at The Lincoln Center 

Mixed Media Painting Classes at Emily Carr University of Art

Frottage 1  24" x 36" Mixed Media: Pastel, Acrylic, Gesso on Glassine

 
Experimenting with Mono Prints

Acrylic on Canvas

The Salton Sea, CA 23" x 36" Mixed Media on Paper

West Coast Landscape 24" x 48" Acrylic & Mixed Media on Canvas  

Triptych: Be Still My Bleeding Heart 72" x 36"' Chinese Ink on Bronze & Silver Metallic (left) / Diptych: Koi Pond 16" x 16" Gold & Pearl Opalescence (right)

 
My painting companion - Nicole


I am very honored to be on the 'Board of Experts' for LoftLife Magazine in 2009, and to have an article published in BC Home Magazine

I wish you all a very Happy, Healthy, and Prosperous 2010 and may all your dreams come true!!

Patricia Gray is an award winning Interior Designer in Vancouver, Canada who blogs about WHAT'S HOT  in the world of Interior Design:

Here's To An Organic New Year!

Hello, I'm back!
I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas. Mine was a bit tumultuous, but more on that later. For now, lets talk about what we want more of in the new year! For me, organic and beautiful design sits high on the list:)

Wrapping up 2009

I always revel in the week between Christmas and New Year as a time diverge from routine, and welcome the New Year in with a change in what I usually read throughout the year, which are books on Interior Design.  One of the ways I make a choices on what I want to read, is to leaf through several books and read the jacket covers or page through the book randomly to see if anything speaks to me.  That is how I choose, What the Dog Saw by Malcolm Gladwell. I had previously read his book, Tipping Point, and then saw him interviewed on a talk show on his third book - Outliers.  While paging through his most current book, What the Dog Saw, I was immediately hooked on his article entitled: The Ketchup Conundrum.  This book, What the Dog Saw, contains Malcolm Gladwell's favourite pieces that he has written over the last several years for the pages of The New Yorker.  "Good writing," Gladwell says in his preface, "does not succeed or fail on the strength of its ability to persuade.  It succeeds or fails on the strength of its ability to engage you, to make you think, to give you a glimpse into someone else's head."  It is a fascinating read.

Another favourite way to choose a book is to ask people what is their favorite book they have read.  Usually they are so enthusiastic in recounting the highlights of the book that it gets me excited to read it.  The outcome of my most recent enquiry was - the New York Times Bestseller by Muriel Barbery, The Elegance of the Hedgehog.  This book is set in Paris, which immediately attracted me, but the real focus of the book is about a woman who is a concierge at a bourgeois building in a posh Parisian neighborhood.  She (Renee) has a secret: she is a ferocious autodidact who furtively devours art, philosophy, music, and Japanese culture. Renee hides her true talents and her finest qualities from a world that she suspects cannot or will not appreciate them.  It is a story about living out her life in obscurity to hide this fact about herself, and how she reconciles herself to owning her brilliance. 

Last night on Charlie Rose I watched a fascinating interview with the brilliant Orhan Pamuk, a Turkish novelist and winner of 2006 The Nobel Prize in Literature, on his new book: The Museum of Innocence.  The story, which takes place in Istanbul between 1975 and today, is about obsessive passion and the great question: What is love, really?, as well as a look into the minds and culture of the Turkish society.  I am off to purchase this book tomorrow to wrap up my reading for these last few day left of 2009.

What is your favourite book that you have read lately?
Please leave a comment here, and let me know.

Patricia Gray is an award winning Interior Designer in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada who blogs about "WHAT'S HOT"
in the world of Interior Design: New and Emerging Trends, Contemporary Design, Modern Architecture and Travel,
as well as how your surroundings can enhance the world around you.
© Patricia Gray | Interior Design Blog™ 2009

Christmas Greeting

I got this from a friend, and I thought it might also get you in the Christmas Spirit......
Enjoy the spirit of Christmas, wherever you may be, and whoever you may be with!!!
Patricia

P.S. And I add greetings to all the "beautiful men of this world."

My Christmas Wish

Hey everyone! Thanks so much for the great comments on my last post. All of you

are so supportive. Actually, that's why I feel comfortable sharing my

feelings, because I know you all will be so kind. I will be on the road today and

with family for the week. I'm not sure how much posting I will be able

to do, so I'm leaving a Christmas treat for all of you. I love Judy Garland so

much, and this song is just perfection. Hope you enjoy it.

Merry Christmas to all my readers, fellow bloggers, and friends!

Love

Carolina

Christmas in New York City - Art Galleries & Theatre

Christmas in New York City - Galleries & Theatre

This Christmas visit to New York I was fortunate to see the Musical, South Pacific at the Lincoln Center, and two Art Galleries; Georgia O'Keeffe at The Whitney Museum of Modern Art and Kandinsky at the Guggenheim Museum.  I love theatre in New York.  There is something very special about getting dressed up and the excitement of the opening strains from the Orchestra.  It was a toss up between the new play 'A Little Night Music', the latest revival of Stephen Sondheim's Tony Award-winning musical with Angela Lansbury and  Catherine Zeta-Jones, or the classic Rodgers and Hammerstein musical 'South Pacific' at the Lincoln Center.  I am happy to say that I saw South Pacific and it was as good as the concierge at my Hotel said it was.  There was something soothing about hearing songs that I have grown up with and are so familiar.  The theme song "Some Enchanted Evening," stayed with me for several days. Here is the YouTube version of 'Some Enchanted Evening' you can listen to.

 
South Pacific at Lincoln Center 

The Guggenheim Museum had a wonderful exhibit of the work of the Russian artist, Vasily Kandinsky, who was a pioneer of Abstract Art and broke new ground in painting in the first decades of the twentieth century.  The Guggenheim designed by Frank Lloyd Wright was opened in 1959 and, rightly so, is claimed to be one of his most famous masterpieces. The spiraling design of the interior makes this museum one of the best venue's I have ever been in to view an art exhibit.  As you walk up the spiral ramps you can view the pieces of artwork as a whole.  Magnificent!!!

  

  

 

The view from the roof top of the Guggenheim across the reservoir & jogging trail of Central Park. (above left & below right)
I want this townhouse!! (above right)

 

These are two of my favourite pieces by Kandinsky from the exhibit.  You can view the exhibit on line here.

After the exhibit we got directions to a local's favourite restaurant on E. 73rd Street and I had a most memorable lunch of Arugula salad topped with sliced roasted artichokes and topped off with large, (very large) paper fine slices of Parmigiano-Reggiano.  Yummm!!

Via Quadronno on E. 73rd Street. (left) A Beautiful piece of street sculpture outside the restaurant. (right)

The walk back to the Hotel was in typical New York style; down streets lined with beautiful townhouses all decorated for the holiday season, past apartments with uniformed concierges, amongst the locals walking their dogs, across streets backed up with bumper to bumper honking taxis, and a short jaunt through Central Park.

    
Townhouses decorated for Christmas on E 73rd Street

  
Fifth Avenue

I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas
I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas
I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas
From the bottom of my heart.

Feliz Navidad
Feliz Navidad
Feliz Navidad
Prospero Ano y Felicidad.

Feliz Navidad
Feliz Navidad
Feliz Navidad
Prospero Ano y Felicidad.

I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas
I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas
I wanna wish you a Merry Christmas

From the bottom of my heart.

Patricia Gray is an award winning Interior Designer in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada who blogs about "WHAT'S HOT"
in the world of Interior Design: New and Emerging Trends, Contemporary Design, Modern Architecture and Travel,
as well as how your surroundings can enhance the world around you.
© Patricia Gray | Interior Design Blog™ 2009

J.C.Karich publicado en China

La revista china Rayli destaca el trabajo de nuestro amigo y colaborador J.C. Karich en su última edición impresa. Los trabajos de Karich pueden ser revisados en línea en su página KARICHDESIGN.com ó a través de su BLOG.

Holiday Blues

I'm not the only one who struggles with depression throughout the holidays, right? Why is that? I really try to enjoy Christmas time, but mostly it seems to bring me down. I hate that, but its the truth. Sorry to be such a downer today. Its just that its difficult for me not to be honest. My faith pushes me to be more positive and to invite good things into my life, but its a struggle at this time of year. I always feel like I haven't done enough for everyone and another year has slipped by. I don't have enough time to send out Christmas cards and take Liam to see Santa. I usually am scrambling at the last minute to finish buying gifts that I really can't afford, but feel guilty if I don't. Ahhhh! I want Christmas to be about my faith in Christ. I get frustrated that people refuse to acknowledge Christianity as the source of "Christmas" and yet my life doesn't seem to acknowledge that either! I mean what right do I have to complain?! I don't believe in expecting other people to do things I don't do. I have to say that I'm pretty fed up with these feelings I struggle with. (I'm only writing this, because it helps me when I get it all out). My life has to change. I already have been changing many things and will share them after the New Year.

You may be wondering what in the world these photos have to do with what I'm writing. Well, I posted them for purely selfish reasons. Basically, they make me happy! I needed a jolt of sunshine and fun and these photos have that, don't you think? I found them via Living Etc.