Friday Favorites 4/25/2014

Karin Lidbeck Brent, Contributing Editor 
I’m very excited to share my latest discovery; a new home furnishing and design studio on Cape Cod called Porter & Mags. The shop is located right in the heart of Dennisport. Interior designer and stylist Carole King has opened a fun and trend-setting boutique with one of a kind painted and upholstered pieces, great designer furnishings, lighting, rugs, art, and accessories to infuse your home with something really different.

I had to choose one thing from the shop to share with you, and since there is such variety and unusual décor there, it was hard to select just one item. I decided to go with something traditional and timeless—classic striped and chevron linen pillows.

Photos by Karin Lidbeck Brent

What sets these pillows apart is they are made by sewing different colored fabrics together—so you can completely customize them. Best part? You get to select your fabrics from these sixty gorgeous colors. Imagine the possibilities!

Check out their website to find out more and get inspired. Better yet, go see this awesome shop for yourself. There is so much there that will excite your home decorating senses.

Paula M. Bodah, Senior Editor
We can never get enough when it comes to beautiful photographs of gorgeous homes. The latest in “real estate porn” on my own coffee table is Designs for Living: Houses by Robert A.M. Stern Architects, brand new from The Monacelli Press. The 400-page hardcover book shows off the work of four partners—Roger H. Seifter, Randy L. Correll, Grant F. Marani, and Gary L. Brewer—who lead the residential practice at the New York company and who have upwards of 120 combined years of experience at the esteemed firm.

The fifteen houses here, from New England to California, are stylistically diverse. What they have in common is their commitment to context. These homes, whether they overlook the ocean or nestle into a mountainside, invoke the vernacular of the region and sit gracefully in their surroundings. Each one feels timeless—or perhaps more accurately, reaches back to the past to create a connection between traditional American aesthetic and contemporary life.

I want to live in every one of them.

Photo courtesy of The Monacelli Press

Kyle Hoepner, Editor-in-Chief
I was at Landry & Arcari Oriental Rugs and Carpeting in Boston last night for the official announcement of this year’s winners of our 5 Under 40 awards (check our Facebook post about it today, if you want to know who they are).

One aspect of the 5 Under 40 program is that each year’s winners design custom rugs, which are actually produced and auctioned off at the September awards ceremony. So during the evening I was literally surrounded by brand-new rug designs—not only drawings of the ones by our winners, but also all the new stock Landry & Arcari has gotten in for the spring season. Yet somehow my eye kept coming back to this golden Khotan pomegranate carpet on the wall, a reminder that classic motifs—boteh, mina-khani, cintamani, you name it—exert just as much pull on my heart as anything contemporary.

Photo courtesy of Landry & Arcari