Modern, Minimalist New York Apartment by Decor Aid

all photos courtesy of Decor Aid

Having launched in Boston (and several other cities) earlier this year, interior design firm Decor Aid is spreading like wildfire by passing trade-only discounts on to clients, and I'm liking what I see! This family apartment on Manhattan's Upper East Side combines easy mid-century style with just a touch of glam, plus a cool, neutral palette that lets the view take center stage.

The original interior featured outdated, mismatched furnishings and an overall gloomy aesthetic that didn't take advantage of the apartment's abundant natural light. Like many mothers, the client wanted a kid-friendly, yet sophisticated, family home that would be uncluttered and serene. She asked Decor Aid to create distinct spaces that would coexist, allowing her to relax or work while keeping an eye on the kids.

Architect Achille Salvagni’s Rome Apartment

all photos by Eric Laignel [via Interior Design magazine]

Guess what? I'm in Italy! You may not be hearing from me much in the next couple of weeks as I eat my way through Venice, Florence, Tuscany and Rome, but take a look at this to-die-for Roman apartment in the meantime. Renovated and decorated by architect Achille Salvagni for his most exacting client—himself—the apartment combines modern art and furnishings with antique family heirlooms.

COS x HAY Spring 2016 Collection

[photos via Dezeen]

Scandinavian superstars Hay (the Danish home furnishings brand) and COS (the Swedish fashion label) have expanded their collaborative line for spring with homewares in tone-on-tone sorbet shades that look sweet enough to eat. The hues of blue, pink and green pair with cork and blond wood accents in the COS X HAY collection comprising furniture, lighting, desk accessories, rugs and more.

A Postmodern Makeover at Masquespacio

all interior design photos by Bruno Almela

Working from home certainly has its perks (sweatpants, puppy snuggles), but no matter how I try, my home office style will never match the likes of this.

Masquespacio is a multidisciplinary design studio based out of Valencia, Spain, that relied heavily on postmodern and Memphis styles in the recent redesign of its brand image and studio. The new brand identity comprises seven on-trend colors, allowing Masquespacio to change its color palette annually and to customize branded stationary for its clients.

South American Pastoral: Art Rugs by Alexandra Kehayoglou

Using discarded wool scraps from her family's Buenos Aires carpet factory, artist Alexandra Kehayoglou hand tufts carpets worthy of a gallery wall. Yet her textured grasslands, glaciers, forests and desert isles—all inspired by her native Argentina—function just fine on the living room floor.

Saturated Scandinavian Design at the Home of Note Design Studio's Daniel Heckscher

all photos by Tekla Evelina Severin [via Sight Unseen]

Ahh, Scandinavian design: so crisp, so clean, so neutral! So, what in all that's good and holy is going on here?

Well, this technicolor Stockholm apartment belongs to Daniel Heckscher, an interior architect at the colorfully inclined Note Design Studio, and it turns staid Scandinavian design on its head to the most wonderful effect. A home tour by Sight Unseen shows how this apartment throws many of the familiar constructs of Scandinavian design out the window (all white everything, for one), while staying true to a certain simplicity.

Heckscher started the vivid renovation of his white-box apartment in 2014, a post-divorce home for himself, his six-year old son, Otis, and his four-year-old daughter, India. Yes: as if the apartment weren't perfect enough, there's an ostensibly single, handsomely bearded and hella talented father living there with his ostensibly beautiful, blond children who happen to have the most adorable names you've ever heard.

The Well-Appointed Catwalk's Top 5 Posts of 2015

Another year down! Thanks to all of you who have read, commented and otherwise shown some love to The Well-Appointed Catwalk throughout 2015. The posts that have been most popular this year have proven that your tastes are just as varied as mine when it comes to design. From couture to kitchen islands, here are the top 5 most-read from 2015 (excluding giveaways, of course). Catch up in case you missed a few, and let me know what you'd like to see more of in the new year. I do this all for you, after all!

1. Every Final Look from Spring 2015 Couture Week

Spring 2015 Couture Week has come to an end, and what a week it was. Shaking of the confines of commercial viability, designers save their most imaginative (and often outlandish) creations for these biannual couture shows. And the most dramatic look, of course, is usually saved for last.
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Valspar's 2016 Color Trends Come with a Coloring Book!

Valspar's 2016 Simply Perfect color palette [all images courtesy of Valspar]

You've heard of the whole coloring books for grownups thing by now, yes? It's basically bigger than craft cocktails and tiny homes, and for good reason, since the repetitive motion of coloring is the perfect way to de-stress at the end of a long day. Jumping on the bandwagon is paint authority Valspar, who has created a beautifully detailed, downloadable coloring book to go with its 2016 Colors of the Year report.

Illustrated by Danish artists Olivia Linn, sections of the coloring book correspond to Valspar's four color trends for 2016, named as Comfort Zone, Simply Perfect, You Do You and Good Company.

Arthur Arbesser Throw Blankets for Hem

Just in time for blustery temps and holiday gifting, Hem (the Berlin home furnishings brand I simply adore) has enlisted womenswear ingenue Arthur Arbesser to design some awfully dreamy-looking throw blankets. Made of 100% New Zealand lambswool in two geometric patterns and four colorways, a contrasting pair of these cozy beauties is taking the top spot on my Hanukkah wish list at the moment.

One Fifth Avenue by Tamara Magel

Sleek, modernist and glam aren't the words that usually come to mind when I picture "Parisian farmhouse" style, but call it what you will, Tamara Magel, because your latest project is giving me all the feelings! 

Designed for a Manhattan power couple as their first home together with their baby, the elegant but previously outdated unit at One Fifth Avenue was filled with dark artwork, furniture and floral tapestry. Magel renovated the place from the ground up with chic herringbone floors (my favorite!), classic black trim, clean white walls and artwork commissioned by her long-time friend, Peter Brockman.

Giveaway: Win a $150 Minted Fabric or Art Print

Minted has released its latest trend report, showcasing its original art prints and home fabrics against fall's runway trends. Swoon! I just love a good design crossover. Patterns swing from bold and abstract to nature-inspired, and like all Minted designs, each is created by an independent artist from one of 40 countries around the world. With designs unique to the online marketplace, and loads of printing and framing options, these are prints (and fabrics) that are a serious cut above.

But here's the best part: I'm teaming up with Minted to give one reader $150 toward any Minted art print or fabric!

Parisian Floors by Sebastian Erras

all photos by Sebastian Erras [via Instragram]

I'm as tired of Instagram shoe shots as the next girl, but when the floors beneath look as good as these, I'll concede. Sebastian Erras' series, Parisian Floors, reminds us to watch where we tread. Though, chances are most of us aren't walking on surfaces as lovely as these. Take a look...

WTF?! Moment: A Tiny Heirloom Home

Because sometimes design is so absurd, so out there, that there's nothing to say but WTF?!

Don't worry about fitting our chairs on the tiny porch, babe! We can drink our pour overs on this pile of dead leaves. 
[all photos via Tiny House Swoon]

I love the blog Tiny House Swoon. I really do, because there is indeed beauty in less. But, sometimes, there are also moments of complete ridiculousness. Moments like this one, when the builders of a tiny "Heirloom Home" in Oregon seemingly hire hipster models to pose for a photo shoot because no one could actually live like this!

So, keeping in mind that it's all in good fun, let's take a look at this itty-bitty house and the madly-in-love wood nymphs who supposedly inhabit it.

Back to School Week: 10 Whimsical School Buildings Around the World

photos © David Romero-Uzeda [via ArchDaily]

Whether heading back to back to pre-K or grad school this week, there's no classroom that couldn't be improved by bubble gum pink Pantone chairs and cave-like sculpted walls... not to mention splash pools, indoor slides and hanging gardens. Fortunately, some whimsically minded architects and interior designers have done just that.

Back to School Week: Moving Day with Sactional

[all photos courtesy of Lovesac]

Brace yourselves, Boston: Moving Day is coming! In case the hapless drivers with out-of-state plates weren't forewarning enough, September 1st is nigh and, with it, a hoard of students, their U-Hauls and the endless traffic they create throughout the city. There will be laughter; there will be tears; there will be at least one moving truck wedged under a bridge somewhere along Storrow Drive.

I can't say I'll miss it, but at least Lovesac is taking some of the pain out of moving with its latest product, the Sactional. Read on, because it's a game changer.

Santorini's Perivolas Hotel by Costis Psychas

[all photos via archilovers]

Living halfway around the world leaves me feeling nostalgic for quintessential New England summers: lobster rolls, lighthouses, Nantucket red. Hummus and high-rises don't quite measure up, but I am discovering the upsides to a Mediterranean summer. For one, my toes no longer go numb when I step into the ocean, and destinations like Santorini are almost as easy to reach as Martha's Vineyard.

Greece has always been high on my list of dream vacations, and now that the economic hullabaloo seems to have quieted down, I'm hoping to spend a few days in Santorini with the hubs come September. Not that I'm lacking for fabulous sea views in Tel Aviv, but there's a serenity that only a vacation can provide, and Santorini's Perivolas Hotel by architect Costis Psychas has it in spades.

L.A.'s Blue Room Recreated by Timothy Oulton

all photos by Antonio Diaz

Groucho Marx refused to take part in any club that would have him as a member, or so he famously said, but I'm not sure that even he could resist the allure of exclusivity surrounding the new Blue Room. The entryway to the club within a club says it all: Step through a secret bookcase on the fourth floor of the Los Angeles Athletic Club, and enter a speakeasy that once played host to Charlie Chaplin, Clark Gable and Spencer Tracey.

To call the Blue Room "new" is really an anachronism, as the space existed when the athletic club first opened in 1912. As the home of LAAC's Uplifters Club, the influential men's social club moved out of the Blue Room in the 1920s to avoid the scrutiny of prohibition. It was only during the athletic club's recent renovations that the long-forgotten clandestine passageway to the Blue Room was rediscovered. Of course, the booze flows freely now, and the private club's air of mystery is a wise style choice by designer Timothy Oulton rather than a bootlegging-era necessity.

Rainbow Architecture & Interiors ... Because #LoveWins

from top: Shanghai's Rainbow Chapel by Coordination Asia [via Design Milk] / Miami International Airport's "Harmonic Convergence" by Christopher Janney [via Top Design Magazine] / Moo Headquarters, London [via Mashable]

With the 4th of July approaching—my first as a dual Israeli/American citizen—I have never felt more proud of the USA. The Supreme Court accomplished something beautiful last week, and the Americans that I know have been showing their support regardless of political affiliation. So how to celebrate? With lots and lots of rainbows! Because #lovewins.