Welcome Home Phoebe!

She's a Christmas Kitty!

7 years young with eyes you get lost in. I love her. Here's our first family portrait.



She also has three legs, so I'll be doing a few accessibility projects to my studio in Providence after the New Year. First up are some pedestals for the windows, and then a ramp up to my lofted bed. Welcome Phoebe!

Anthropologie Interview T-Minus 16 Days

The interview with Anthropologie in Philadelphia for the Summer Internship is only 16 days away! I have an entire portfolio to design and print in the next week. It's going to be a ton of fun and a great challenge.

To get the Anthro-esque creative icicles falling, I took a few snapshots and did a bit of gleaning during a quick stopthinkingaboutfirstsemesteralreadyit'sover getaway last weekend to Portsmouth, NH and York Beach, Maine.











We stayed at the Ale House Inn in Portsmouth. A bit of adaptive reuse going on here - the building that houses the Inn used to be home to the Portsmouth Brewing Co. The details in this space are charming - I love the stacked birch in the fireplace, exposed brick walls, nautical antiques and wide planked floors.

Budding Architects

Today I volunteered in Miss Maynard's 5th grade class in Nashua, NH BECAUSE THEY WERE MAKING AWESOME GINGERBREAD HOUSES. I just can't get enough of architecture. Here's how it went down:

Preparations.





Building with a milk carton for structural integrity.





Landscape Architecture.



Exterior Trim and we're done!



By the time 2:45 rolled around the kids were bouncing their sugar-highed selves home.

RISD should have a Wintersession class on the art of the edible construction in conjunction with Johnson & Wales. It's not like they aren't right across the street...



My own "snowed-in" design would have benefited.

A Big Thanks

I'm a week late, but I'd like to send a big thank you out to New England Demolition & Salvage.








Without which the two storm windows in our final installation would not have been possible. These folks are amazing! Christina and I absolutely appreciated their help. The windows were a great find in one of their warehouses chock-full-o-architectural salvage. Radiators, tubs, light fixtures, molding, they've got it. Check them out here.

Desk Installation: A look back

3pm Tuesday 12/14
- we frame up presentation materials
- refinish windows
- paint chairrail

8pm
- two hours late, the class before us finally gets OUT of the gallery so that we can set up.
- bring in some staging props: plant, coffee table, salvation army desk chair
- we bring in the windows (which took 5 hours of sanding, glass scraping, and painting to refinish
- the wheelchair is unearthed from the INTAR supply closet
- sizing up the space








9pm
- tape off area of wall to paint to demonstrate elevation of common room the desk will live in
- up to 50" off finished floor is wainscot
- start painting, run out of paint 3/4 of the way through the wall!



10pm
- emergency trip to wal-mart for more paint because they are the only place open that sells paint at 10pm



11pm
- apply wal-mart paint which of course DOES NOT match the benjamin moore paint originally purchased
- repaint entire wall space with wal-mart paint

12am Wednesday 12/15



1am
- install wall shelves for models to sit on
- measure, mark, drill, level and hang first wall of frames
- stay positive!



2am
- start to place the windows and install chair rail (mock wainscot) on the elevation wall
- realize we should have marked off the areas behind the window glass to NOT paint



3am
- hang windows
- repaint "risd gallery white" behind window glass panes



4am
- wearily hang the last of the frames
- hang laser cut-and-painted title letters





5am
- place desk and stage with board games, dvds, books
- admire installation
-set up presentation chairs
- go home and DO NOT fall asleep for fear of missing final presentation at 9am





SUN RISES

9am
- torn apart by EIGHT critics from various RISD departments and actual architecture firms
- but it feels kinda good, because we're here to learn
- plus, Ralph & Eleanor from the Pine Street Inn (red and green sweaters) LOVED the desk and feel their residents will enjoy it.



10am
- smile! it's over!.....now for 4 hours of take down.



We'll be bringing the desk to the new Pine Street Inn location in February to install it for the residents. It feels great to have the project and Semester One, completed!

Post Post

I've got a bunch of awesome pictures to share from the Keyed-Alike desk installation. But first, I thought it would be nice to have a look at our studio space during the last week of finals.

Remember the studio at the beginning of the semester?



Here's what it looked like last week:











Yikes.

Finals are over.

Our critique today was brutal (I think we had eight architects between the critics) and I haven't slept since Monday night. It's time.

Just one left!

The past few days have been so busy! History finished up yesterday with the final exam and the desk is all linseed-oiled and ready to be presented on Wednesday morning.



(we love this finish - all natural and no VOC! - image via their website - visit Tried & True here)

Today is all about staging our gallery space at the Sol Koffler on the first floor of the CIT. We're turning our space into a miniature of the common room at the transitional home. We purchased windows from NED Architectural Salvage in New Bedford and a chair from the Salvation Army. Re-use, Re-use! We'll also be painting and hanging pictures frames full of our process work. Lots of final pictures to share by tomorrow morning!

For now...here's the name of the desk, defined.



...and I got an invite to interview with Anthropologie for the summer internship! It's in Philly on Jan 7th. If I do go, it means all of winter break will be spent update my portfolio. If I don't go, I'll kick myself.

And then there were two...

Two classes left that is! Monday is the architectural history exam and Wednesday is the final presentation of the desk in the Sol Koffler Gallery at CIT. Christina and I are taking a field trip today to New England Demolition and Salvage (pictures later today!) to find some props for our gallery installation.

Major Clampage

Coming along with only a few days left!

I'm exhausted. our drawing class ended tonight. I passed in the movement assignment.











Obviously I should revisit Coloring 101 for Grad Students