High Style High Rise

It’s not very often that you can see the designs of six major Atlanta designers all in one building, but Atlanta Homes & Lifestyles is making this possible.  AH&L is sponsoring High Style High Rise, a tour of six superbly designed homes at The Residences at W Atlanta – Downtown, which benefits the High Museum of Art running from March 8th through April 1st.  Each featured designer is paired with a local retailer.  The pairings include Michel Boyd for Bradley Hughes, Amy D. Morris for The Mercantile, Bill Peace for Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams, Barbara Westbrook for Room & Board, Kerry Howard for Redefined Home Boutique and Susan Ferrier for R Hughes Showroom. 

See and hear Barbara Westbrook, one of the designers, in the video below as she talks about how she gets started with designing a space.

You can attend a VIP preview event for the newly designed residences March 8th from 6pm to 9pm and enjoy cocktails and hors d’oeuvres all benefiting the High.  Tickets for Thursday night’s event are $100 and are available online HERE or RSVP to atlantahomesmag@gmail.com to pay at the door.  After Thursday’s VIP preview event you will be able to tour these show homes for $20 per person through April 1st.

LiveJournal Tags: atlanta homes and lifestyles,high style high rise,The Residences at W Atlanta – Downtown

Press

I think every designer has hopes of seeing their work in print one day.  I’m so excited because Cottages & Bungalows and the Atlanta Journal Constitution’s Homefinder both featured my work this month.

Cottages & Bungalows magazine featured a guest bedroom from a house I designed in Dallas, Texas in their “Inspiring Bedrooms” article.

[Cottages & Bungalows]

An office and bar area that I designed in the same Dallas home was featured in the Atlanta Journal Constitution Homefinder along with a children’s room that I designed locally.  Also featured in the article were designers Christiane Lemieux, founder and creative director of DwellStudio, and Carter Kay, owner of Carter Kay Interiors.

[AJC]

A big thank you to Cottages & Bungalows and AJC Homefinder for including me in these issues!

LiveJournal Tags: Atlanta Journal Constitution,AJC Homefinder Cottages and Bungalows,Christian Lemieux,Dwell Studio,Carter Kay

HGTV’s Elbow Room

Wow, has it really been almost two months since I’ve written a blog?!?!?!  I guess it has.  There has been so much going on and it’s been so hard keeping up with my blog. 

The main thing that is taking up all of my time is the new HGTV show that I am working on!!  We started filming at the beginning of December and have been going non-stop.  HGTV finally put out a press release this week so I can actually talk about it.  The new show is called Elbow Room and is set to premier on HGTV in May.  Chip Wade, previously a contractor on Curb Appeal: The Block, is the new Host and Designer on the show.  I’m assisting Chip as Design Coordinator.  My main responsibility is styling the renovated homes.  A lot of my work is behind the scenes but I get some camera time too.  It’s all very exciting. 

Here’s a description of the show from an article on Bizjournals.com...

We have filmed 5 episodes so far and have 8 more to go.  It has been so much fun getting a behind the scenes look into how an HGTV show is created.  My mom came down to visit and described it so perfectly.  She said “it’s like a Nascar race…when you watch a race on tv you know that the cars are going fast and you know it’s really loud.  But, watching it on TV is nothing compared to being at the real race and seeing the cars in action.”  At any moment there could be 30 people on the set going a million miles an hour and each doing a different task.  When the cameras start rolling though, the only ones in the scene are Chip and the homeowners.  It’s really fascinating.  I’m so lucky to be a part of it all.

I’ll make sure to post updates about the show as I have them.  I’m looking forward to the show’s premier in May of this year.  Thanks to all my readers for sticking around during my lack of blogging.  You guys are the best!  xoxo, Cristi

LiveJournal Tags: HGTV,Elbow Room,Chip Wade

Attic Inspiration

We all have that space in our home that we wonder what to do with.  For some it’s a guest bedroom, for some it’s a basement and for some it’s an attic.  Well, get out your pen and paper because you definitely need to take some notes on this space. 

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

Believe it or not this stunning attic space used to look like this…

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

The plain white attic was in a charming 1940’s home on the East side of Atlanta.  The owner of the home, interiors photographer Christina Wedge, was looking to spruce up the empty space.  Designer and stylist Alexandra Hernandez stepped in, worked her magic and completely transformed the space into a luxurious retreat with high style on a small budget.  It worked out great for Alexandra in the end because she was actually able to rent the attic space.

[photo credits – Christina Wedge]

Alexandra is currently working with me on the new show for HGTV [details to come soon!] and she’s incredibly talented.  I was blown away when I saw the pictures of her attic abode in an article that Brian Patrick Flynn wrote for HGTVremodels.com.  I knew you all would be blown away too so I just had to share!

To add some interest to the plain Jane window wall Alex came up with a pretty clever and inexpensive solution.  She covered the entire wall with inexpensive burlap wrapped and secured around small pieces of foam.  She also covered her headboard with the same burlap. 

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

A great way to save pennies while decorating a space is buying flea market finds and freshening them up.  For the one of a kind storage below Alex purchased a $10 thrift store chest.  She gave it a fresh coat of paint and purchased decorative pulls from Anthropologie. 

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

I love how she layered old frames on top of the mirror.  The rustic wood gives the space such a comfortable feeling.  Laying the mirror and frames on the floor is a subtle reminder that the space is still an attic.

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

Since there is very little storage space in the room Alex’s Expidit shelf unit from IKEA doubles as extra clothes storage.

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

[photo credit – Christina Wedge]

If you have been stumped on what to do with your extra undecorated space hopefully this space gave you a little inspiration. 

LiveJournal Tags: HGTVremodels.com,Brian Patrick Flynn,Attic,IKEA,Burlap

A Winner + Lovely Bedding

How was everyone’s Thanksgiving?  I hope it was filled with love.  I know mine was.  It was wonderful to gather with my family and spend precious time with my little one…who is getting very big way too quickly.  He turned 6 months old today. My how time has flown.  He’s going to be a year old before I can blink!

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A Winner

Thanks to all of you who entered my Shabby Apple dress giveaway last week.  The winner of the dress is Andrea Mickelson.  Andrea please send me an email as soon as you can.  Thanks!

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And on a totally random note I’m digging this mismatched bedding from Furbish.  Love this store.  I Wish I lived a little closer to Raleigh so I could visit.  Maybe I’ll have to take a trip one of these days.  I’ll have to add it to my never ending list of things to do.

LiveJournal Tags: furbish,giveaway,chase

Giveaway – Shabby Apple

I’m so excited to bring you my newest giveaway from Shabby Apple.  If you aren’t familiar with Shabby Apple please head over to their website and look around.  They have some of the most beautiful women's dresses and killer accessories. Many of their dresses have the look of vintage dresses and are just precious.  I wish I had known about their maternity dresses when I was pregnant.  They have some adorable ones. 

Here’s a small sampling of some of my favorites at shabby apple right now.

They even carry adorable little girl’s dresses.

Lucky for you Shabby Apple is giving away this Da Vinci dress to one of my readers.  It could be you! 

To enter to win this Shabby Apple dress "like" Shabby Apple on Facebook and then leave me a comment saying you did so.  To get an extra entry tweet about the giveaway on Twitter and then come back and leave an additional comment saying you did.

I’ll be accepting entries for the giveaway until Friday night, November 25th, at midnight and I’ll announce the winner of the giveaway on Monday, November 28th.

Shabby Apple is also giving all of my readers 10% off of their apparel and accessories.  All you need to do is enter CHARMHOMEDESIGN10OFF at checkout.  The coupon code is good for 30 days from the date of this post so get shopping!

**To enter this giveaway you must have a US shipping address.  There will be no exchanges for the winning dress.

Good Luck Ladies!!

LiveJournal Tags: giveaway,shabby apple,womens dresses

A Winner and the Reveal

The winner of the lovely pillows from The Taylor Galen Workroom is EKL Designs.  I don’t have your email address though so please send me an email at charmhomedesign[at]gmail[dot]com.

There was also another winner…US!  We won the viewer’s choice for the best window display from Window’s on Design.  Here’s a look at our window design.  We can finally reveal it on the blog.  A few of you may have seen it last week when I briefly revealed it then took it down.  Whoopsy…I didn’t realize I wasn’t supposed to reveal it until after it was down. 

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-Only a few more weeks until I start shooting the regular season of my new show on HGTV.  I’ve been crazy busy with the team designing, planning and purchasing for this season…hence, the lack of posting lately.  I can’t wait to tell you all more details about it!! 

xo, Cristi

LiveJournal Tags: giveaway,windows on design,hgtv