The Muenster Mash

At Owen's Bagel and Deli, the home of the amazing steamed bagel sandwich, there is no elegant menu board organized by type of meat or bread - the menu is about 50 8.5" x 11"ish homemade signs made by employees, customers, whoever hung randomly wherever there happens to be a space. This deli has a great fun, funky vibe and certainly isn't trying to impress you with fancy decor, but ironically, this is what impresses people. People feel at home, they write all over the walls, and interact with the employees and each other. It's such a fun and unique place - and the food is great!

So, here is my addition to the OBD menu, the Muenster Mash. My delicious vegetarian sandwich with hummus, bell peppers, onions, meunster cheese (of course), lettuce and tomato on a bialy. mmmm! It's the Muenster Monster!

Porch Bench - Now with Flair!

We were given this old park bench from a friend who was moving. It has served it's purpose just fine as a stained wood bench, but since I can never leave unpainted things alone we now have an outer space bench for our porch. I was inspired by the 60's artist Peter Max and his fun whimsical, almost trippy art. The stars are painted in a metallic silver so they sparkle. Now, I'm just not sure if I actually want people sitting on it...

Art Card

This is an art card that I made for Max Arledge, an Anderson SC painter. He needed a card that patrons could take away from exhibits to contact him and be reminded of his work. I used four images of his work to create the card and featured two quotes of the artist discussing his style and background. Below is the front and back image of the card.

35th & McDowell Development

YSS was contracted to assist with the client selections and design of the ten home 35th & McDowell project located in NoDa here in Charlotte. I worked with the new home owners while their homes were under construction to guide them through the processes of exterior selections (paint, stains, brick, stone, lighting, etc) as well as interior selections (paint, granite, appliances, tile, plumbing fixtures, lighting, cabinetry, etc). I also worked with the contractors to coordinate scheduling and ordering of products and completed invoicing. It was a great experience to step into the role of project management.

This home did not have an owner when construction was started so it became the show home for the development (until it sold shortly after completion). With no home owners input, it was open to our own design devices... within reason. For the exterior, we wanted to do something other than the typical white trim so we went with a dark charcoal gray for the siding and a nice gold beige for the door and window trim.
Here is the back view of the house and a glimpse of the neighboring house which I also worked on.
The open floor plan of this house made the kitchen very important. It is the center of the home. The cabinets are two toned to add more interest - a nice taupe color for the main cabinets and a ebony island each with black granite. The lighting became important and was a bit of a challenge because of the high vaulted ceilings, we had to make sure that it could hang low enough. The is a pot rack over the island with lights, and clear pendant lights over the peninsula and sink. In the dining room, there is a Capiz shell light that I spent entirely too much time altering! It was three separate lights that I reconfigured to make one large light. Had I known what I was getting into, it may not have happened. But it turned out very cool and was a unique light for the space that coordinated very well with the stone fire place so, I'm glad I did it.
Here is the living room with the grand stone fireplace. The walls are a nice warm gray that give the space life and color, yet is still neutral enough for a home on the market.
This is the formal living room located just inside the front door. Painted a nice golden beige with an awesome brick tile fireplace. The tile has a very subtle stripe similar to linen.
And the guest bathroom with bright white cabinetry, black granite counter tops and translucent blue vessel sinks to coordinate with the wall color. Not a bad place to send your guests!

My bathroom

Here is the bathroom in our house, it's very small but we are stuck with that for now so we had to make the best of it. There was a strange tile-esque linoleum with a pink flower in each 4" x 4" square on the wall when we moved in, so that was the first thing to change! Instead of taking the linoleum down though, I just primed and painted a chocolate brown right over it to keep the tile texture and add another little bit of interest in the small space. I found this cool chandelier at the Habitat Restore and painted it red and changed the bulbs to round ones (I mean, are the flame shaped bulbs really fooling anyone?). Then, I painted the ceiling a teal color to compliment the red chandelier and brighten up the brown walls. Maybe it's not a 500 square foot spa escape complete with dual rainfall shower heads, but it's mine and I love it!
The bathroom before... exciting, I know!

Playing around with acryllics

This is a painting I did at least seven or eight years ago. It was shortly after I had my big trip to the art store when I decided painting would be my new hobby. I was mostly just getting a feel for mixing paint and brush stokes with this piece, but I also like the tension that it creates with the angled line. My own little analogy to life, neat and orderly but then something unexpected.

SURFACES :: Orchid Ceramics

SURFACES is a yearly industry event where floor covering professionals from around the world come together in a 350,000 square foot space to show off new products and trends. Jeanene and I were asked by Orchid Ceramics to design their temporary showroom for the event. The idea for our space was to create mock rooms to show uses for tile all around the house. This was a very successful method and offered much more visual interest than endless racks of tile samples.


In the Kitchen, we contracted the local cabinet designers/builders, Hefner Woodworking. They created the cabinets used. We used a variety of tile on the counter tops, floors and back splash to create the modern look. In the Living Room, we used a unique floor tile and made the tile sample boards into the artwork of the room. We also incorporated two paintings from Charlotte artist, Charlotte Foust. The chain columns were built by Hefner Woodworking and consisted of hundreds and hundreds of feet of ball chain suspended in circular form with lights in the center. Two barcelona chairs and a natural wood side table completed the look of this room.

In the center area of the showroom, there were more examples of tile as art. The wall was created with a sheets of aluminum behind a wood veneer with 2" - 4" holes cut out. The veneer framed the tile to display it to potential buyers.
The Garden Room used the tile as art again on the walls, it was also used to build an outdoor sofa and on the floors. Three pouf chairs were between two custom built planters. As in all of the rooms, textured wall panels were applied to the wall to add another layer of detail.
The bathroom was a calm and chic room with two tones of tile used on the floor to create interest. The custom platform bathtub had a ledge around the bottom for pebbles and the floating cabinets featured a step ledge.