Stylish Spaces

I don't know about you, but sometimes I feel the need to runaway from everyday life, places to be, things to do, its crazy pace and not-so-crazy but nevertheless demanding  people  - and hide, almost retreat into my shell to a calmer, slower world. That doesn't mean actually running away or abandoning family to board a flight to some exotic location -no, I do not shy away from responsibilities-  but I do make myself  deliberately  inaccessible - go off the radar, put my phone on silent,  lay off tasks and meetings that I know can wait. Selfish I hear you say, yes maybe but that is the only way I can be fair to my true self. Even in my teens and twenties I was never one of those high energy, flitting from place to place person and never will be now that I am much older. Giving my self time to slow down is my way of acknowledging my value and worth to those who do matter to me the most and need me the most.  Sometimes I just...

Benedetta Ubaldini's wire sculptures Generally speaking, when one thinks of garden features or garden art, stone statues, water sprinkling fountains, rockeries and feature walls spring to mind first and foremost.  All things solid, heavy and (mostly) permanent. But some artists have blown away this myth by creating the most amazing outdoor art made entirely from chicken wire. Yes, you read it right -  plain old chicken wire that they mould and wrap around to create the most fabulously light, almost translucent and frozen-in-motion art that would be a talking point in any outdoor space. +Benedetta Ubaldini, +Derek Kinzett, +Kendra Haste, +Cedric le Borgne are amazingly talented chicken-wire artists who have created waves in the art world and (not to mention) all sorts of fine sculptures using nothing but chicken wire. Check out their profiles on their websites: www.d erekkinzettwiresculpture.co.u k...

Substance is the core matter around us, the undeniable, unshakable things that exist in all their glory or unglory (is that even a word?) - for example a chair would be substance, so would a person. Subtext are the labels we attach to substance, our opinions, our feelings and thoughts that we associate with substances around us. For instance, the chair (substance) may be refered to as a comfy lounge chair, or that ugly dump your husband insists on having that you can't wait to get rid of (and believe me you have tried spilling drinks on it, giving it a good beating in the hope the leather would split, all to no avail!). They both are the same substances, both are chairs, but we choose to see them differently based on their merits or demerits as seen by us. We do they same with people, give them subtexts based on our associations with them. We label them and choose to talk about them entirely in subtexts because thats how we see them- completely ignoring or oblivious to the fact...

Over the years spanning architectural design, a lot has been said and written about bare brickwork walls in interiors - rural, rustic, contemplated negligence, industrial -  and its prevalence in domestic interiors is nothing new - brickwork and artisans of bricklaying were highly sought and indeed travelled far and wide for their appointments as recent as last century. Back then bricklaying wasn't just relegated to being rural and rustic, some of the finest buildings were designed and built using beautiful brick and stone works -but like all forms of art that require hard labour of love, patience and precision, sadly its a dying art - I cannot imagine any young adult taking it up as a form of livelihood today. One of the things I love about the villa we are fortunate enough to call our home in Abu Dhabi is its long entrance foyer with bare stonewalls. Granted it is reconstituted stone (ground stone, pigmented with colour and shaped into different sized bricks) but the effect...

I have a confession to make - I have always found it hard to follow a recipe, any recipe for that matter. Nine times out of ten, halfway through a recipe for a delectable dessert that I really want to try - I will start doing the what ifs - what if I add orange juice instead of pineapple (and nine times out of ten that is out of necessity as I don't have pineapples in my fridge) or what if I add maple syrup instead of brown sugar - you can imagine how these recipes turn out - sometimes heading straight for the bin or sometimes so good that my husband and kids want the same again - but alas! it never turns out the same next time as by next time I have completely forgotten what I had substituted what with! So you can say I am a bit of a hit or miss in the kitchen, but secretly I think that's because I have some deep rooted problem with conformity. Anything or anyone trying to make me be or do just so, awakens the rebel in me - and I always t...

In my last post about Lebanese furniture designer  Nada Debs  I mentioned how increasingly over the years young people have turned their backs on their ancestral heritage and traditions, choosing instead to emerge themselves in an alien culture and traditions they think are more suited to their liking -  but there is also a very small (and steadily increasing) number of young people who are finding the value in their ancestral heritage too precious to ignore or discard lightly. I have tremendous admiration for these young men and women who see their heritage not as shackles that tie them down to a particular way of living and thinking, but as an opportunity to present themselves to the world uniquely. Summaiya Jillani, is one such very young Pakistani artist, who rose to modest fame in the art circles from virtual obscurity last year after she painted and exhibited her interpr...

We all subconsciously grow up surrounded by the history of our ancestors and traditions enveloping us in an embrace that sometimes, for young people on a quest to find their own identity, can get oppressive - some try and break free, move to far away places, adopt customs more to their liking, pushing their old age traditions to the far recesses of their memories.  But as they grow older, into their late thirties and beyond, something strange happens - those childhood memories, smells, sounds and traditions slip through the attic door of their brain cells and start a nostalgia of all things home. A pattern on an old fabric, a faded photograph, a whiff of cooking that reminds them of childhood - they end up reaching to the past, embracing, even devouring  age old traditions and seeing their beauty afresh - all the while watching with a wry smile as history repeats itself and the younger generation turn their backs on their heritage. I have s...