Spooky!

Last weekend, I went to the Ft. Mason Craft Faire with some friends of mine from work. This is a big exposition where artisans come to display their wares each year for wholesale and retail alike. Some of the people buying are local boutique stores that sell handmade items (like Earthworks in Los Altos, for example); others are members of the general public like myself.

Last year I'd gone to the faire, but because our house wasn't yet finished, I only went to get ideas. This year I went looking to buy, since we now have some big spaces to fill.

We did a tour of the biggest building, making note of the pieces/artisans that interested us. We then went to have lunch at Greens, a restaurant I've always wanted to go to (and it was good!). After lunch, we toured the second smaller building, and then it was time to decide.

In the first building, we'd seen some incredible stainless wall hangings by Bruce MacDonald, a Vermont artisan. (How he schlepped his art to SF is beyond me... the pieces are BIG!). "Spooky" was a 4' x 8' stainless etching (if you can call it that), which has incredible depth and changes depending upon the light. I thought it was perfect for above the mantelpiece, given that the light on that area changes throughout the day and night.

As I wasn't sure whether it would be big enough (or too big for that matter), I had Kurt do a mockup for me and send me a photo. He took some of the leftover cardboard from the sofa packing boxes and made a cardboard mockup that was a similar size. He sent me the photo and I saw it would work. I'd already sent him a picture of the artwork via phone to get approval to transact the purchase.

Our good friends who live in SF were coming to visit us that evening, and they graciously agreed to take Spooky home for us in their minivan, for which I'm very grateful. It barely fit.

But you can see that it fills the space well, and makes a stunning addition to the great room. And now Kurt doesn't have to look at that MOCA poster he was getting so sick of!

I still have a lot of art to hang, including some glass art I bought at the faire. Once I get it all hung I'll post pictures of a whole house tour!

New sofa -- Flexform Groundpiece!

We received our new Flexform Groundpiece sofa from Intirium.com on August 9th, the morning of my bday party -- what timing! It came packed in three large wooden crates, and in ten or so boxes within the crates.

Before we had the delivery guys unpack it, we had them move the Ligne-Roset Multy loveseat from the family room to the upstairs guest bedroom (where, believe it or not, was its originally-planned destination, even though it had done stints in the old living room, the scraper, and the family room, before arriving at its ultimate resting place), and move our old Roche-Bobois sofa from upstairs to the family room (again, where it was intended to go). Once that was done, we took crowbar to crate, and broke open the crate and ripped apart the boxes, and had them move the sofa inside to its destination.

Assembling the sofa was really easy. Looking at the sofa layout, each identified item was a piece that had to be assembled. The sofa had three "arms," two being leather bookshelves, and the other being a fabric arm. There were three seating areas, and a number of cushions. The entire sofa sits on a cylindrical bar of metal, and each individual piece attaches together by fitting the cylindrical pieces together with fittings supplied with the sofa.

The only problem I had was that I wound up scratching the hardwood floor when trying to fit two of the pieces together. But no matter, we just moved the sofa over the scratched area, and I later got some wood-filling wax to hide the scratch, so it looks just fine now.

We moved the Ligne-Roset Didier Gomez coffee table upstairs, since it goes better with the sofa than the old Peter Maly coffee table, which has gone downstairs with the other sofa. However, the new sofa is big enough that we'll probably have to buy a new coffee table at some point. The sofa also goes perfectly with the Minotti club chairs I purchased on craigslist.org. So the great room is almost complete!

All in all, I've been extremely happy with my purchase. It's the perfect size for the space, it's unbelievably comfortable, and very beautiful, fitting in perfect with the decor. Intirium.com had great service, and the sofa arrived pretty much when they said it would. I saved a lot of money by buying it from them (versus buying locally, or even elsewhere in the US), and their service exceeded the service I've received at most local high-end furniture stores.