Today, we're turning the spotlight on Olivia O’Bryan, which is not one person, but two: the design firm is a partnership between sisters Ashley “Olivia” Waddell and Courtney “O’Bryan” Whatley. That fact nearly seals the deal for me right there, because sisters, as recently mentioned, are where my heart's at (pretend that works grammatically). Only Olivia O'Bryan's design work is splendid to boot, of course. The sister's portfolio is awash in atmospheres. That is: spaces full ...

There are certain items that people seem to routinely be in sore need of, but require a push to actually obtain. (Why is it that so often the most obvious needs are ones to which we're slowest to attend?) Non-hideous filing cabinets are among this list, certainly. Following closely behind are step stools. If I had a spoon for every time a client revealed that they were in desperate need of a step-up, I would have ...

There are two ways of thinking about challenges in your life. The first way is merely to think of them, which is to say that you spend lots of time ruminating on the roadblock in front of you. You examine it mentally from all angles, turning the problem over and over, noticing all the mini, in-built challenges you hadn't even realized existed before within the larger challenge. Frozen in an uncommitted, woeful stance, you start ...

I'm always slightly unsettled when I discover that a house tour, whether it's the home of a blogger or an A-list celebrity, is no longer where that individual resides. This almost always happens, given editorial delays, and the fact that maybe a person doesn't want the world to see where they're making their toast on the daily, and so they wait to shoot the space until just before they're out of there. Still, I end ...

My clients are my sample population, and so I pay attention to trends that emerge amongst them. When, for instance, every one of them seems to be having great difficulty saying no to opportunities and people in their lives, I conjecture that this is a thing for people and write a post like this one. And when all of them at once are desperately in need of laundry baskets, I write a post like this one. ...