The April 2012 Issue of Atlanta Home Improvement had a great article called Shelter from the Storm by Alma Hill. We wanted to share some of the enlightening information Alma gathered.
Here are Alma Hill’s helpful hints to protect your house from severe weather.
Falling Trees
Hill suggests hiring an arborist to inspect your trees from defects and flaws. If you do plan on cutting down your decaying trees, please check with your local government or homeowners association. Continue reading
Came across this article and thought it would be a good addition to the blog. Enjoy!
Inspiration Book: A Round-Up of Recent Small Kitchens
by Andrea Girolamo
Do more with less, do more with less. In tough times, those words seem to ring through our work lives, our bank accounts, our home lives. With smaller, recession-style budgets, designers are doing more with less in the kitchen, and the results range from bizarre to brilliant.
•Treehugger expands on small kitchens, and uses the founder’s 420-sq.-ft. apartment as a model for new, smaller induction cooktops. Fancy doesn’t have to be enormous, turns out, and includes brands familiar to us all.
•Inspiration from Apartment Therapy, whose editors know a thing or two about making the most of tight spaces.
•Musing from The Kitchn about how to actually LIVE in a small kitchen, maybe something worth talking to that client about, the one who wants the 36″ commercial style range in their 8″x15″ galley-style footprint. The takeaway? Be prepared to clean A LOT AND CONSTANTLY.
•BHG presents a made-over small kitchen that’s big on organization.
The next time you’re in Atlanta you should stop by our showroom & check out the beautiful new colors we have recently added to our stock granite inventory. The movement and color variation of the exotic colors that we have added make them more like works of art than slabs of granite. Each slab is a unique expression of the natural gifts that mother nature has given us. One
of my favorites is Desert Gold. This color originates from the mountains of India. It’s a neutral mix of browns & golds that coordinates nicely with many popular cabinet finishes. Another recently added color is Tuscan Cream. This beautiful color originates from Brazil & we actually have it installed in our showroom so you can see the final product. You can view the new colors on our website: www.oldcastlesurfaces.com
The City of Ft. Worth wanted a firehouse built from concrete to withstand the extreme temperatures and unpredictable Texas weather. But it didn’t want it to look like a traditional concrete building. Plain old firehouses are a thing of the past thanks to the eye-catching ornamental precast concrete products from Concrete Designs Inc. (CDI) based in Tucson, Arizona and innovative masonry products from Jewel Concrete Products based in Waco Texas. Continue reading
K&BB Industry News has an article released August 23, 2011 that reviews 5 designers thoughts on where to save and where to splurge in a bathroom. Some items mentioned are : SPLURGE: Facuets, Towel Warmers, Toliets (smart toliets), Lighting and Spa-Like showers or SAVE: Tile (use ceramic/porcelain that looks like natural stone), a smart toliet acfcessories that works with the existing and others. For more information see the K&BB Industry news.
According to John Filippelli, kitchen designs need to go beyond beauty function by capturing the unique spirit of each person. There are many factors today that can influence the overall look of any given space. For example, the person’s age, family situation and who is sharing the home. Today’s kitchens are multi-functional spaces, where you not only can make dinner, but also can work on the computer. These kitchens also encourage family togetherness. Do you like entertaining guests and family members? Continue reading
Universal Design in the Bathroom By: Judith Neary June 2011 Issue of Qualified Remodeler Have you been thinking about redesigning your bathroom? Judith Neary, from the magazine Qualified Remodeler, has come up with three key categories that one can develop best practices for design of any bath. The first category is safety. Tile is the top product for flooring, so textured finishes on tile and grout lines create a slip-resistant surface. A way of preventing a tripping hazard in your bathroom is by having a curbless shower. The last safety precaution is installing a 3-foot wide door, just in case if your guests or someone living there uses a walker or a wheelchair. The second category is comfort. Judith states that radiant floor heat should be part of every project. This offers homeowners continuous heat. The last category is sanitation. Judith suggests instead of the typical combo heat/light/vent unit, consider at the-source-ventilation to reduce moisture and odors in the bath. If you would like to learn more tips about each category read June 2011 issue of Qualified Remodeler.
Every year the magazine, This Old House, gives five readers a $1,000 prize for clever makeovers throughout the house. Nancy and Gregg Alling, from Toledo, Ohio, won this year for best kitchen redo.
They custom built nearly every element in their updated traditional kitchen. Nancy and Gregg won because they stayed on a budget and achieved a workable layout. Gregg says that they only had a modest budget to begin with, so when they saw how expensive cabinets were he decided to make his own cabinets. He constructed all the customizations himself, from incorporating niches for the fridge and microwave, to adding special drawers for utensils. It took him about five years to completely finish the cabinets. Read more about it and look at the before and after pictures in the July 2011 Issue of This Old House.
By: Alan and Joni Horton, July Issue of This Old House
Many of us have thought that with kitchen renovations you would spend money on going out to eat or eating frozen TV dinners. Well, Alan and Joni have come up with ideas that can avoid the problems mentioned above. Idea 1: Make the most of the space you have : Joni thought creatively and turned her dining room into a kitchen. Continue reading
