My husband, Kevin, went out shortly before Christmas to buy my gift (a really good idea).  He had an idea what he was looking for.  But when it came down to decision time, it was far harder than he imagined.  We’ve all been there: This looks comfy, but I don’t like the color.  Will she love or hate that pattern?  Why am I stressed out over a gift?

Then sales lady asked a few questions about me.  Then she smiled and said, “This one is beautiful.  And, it has this feature that makes it so comfortable.  She’ll love it.”

Wow.  The relief.  Buying presents was fun again.

We so want to help make creating your room fun again.  Sure, a room is more complicated than other decisions.  That’s why we sketch, do floor plans, try hundreds of fabrics and look through catalogs.  We’ll try to understand those crucial questions.  But we’ll also try our hardest to remove the stress and worry… and add back the laughter and fun.

Bonita

I love the Christmas season but am always ready to get everything put away and get new things out for the winter season.

Marlene Warren, our merchandise manager here at by Design, has been working her miracles here at the store.  New merchandise has been arriving all month and she is making everything look so great.

In our black and white room, she painted horizontal black and white stripes.  They look terrific!!!  We are going to update the room and put green in to liven it up!  Black and white is ALWAYS great.  It is somehow both timeless and trendy (sounds impossible, but it’s true).  But wait till you see it with a splash of green.  It will be so much fun!  Just a thought for any of you looking for some freshness — add a new accent color to change the entire feel of a room.  New pillows, artwork, ottoman, a new chair!  This is where we shine at by Design.

We would love to help you!

Bonita

This is what we love to do!!

A client came back into by Design.  She had bought a really (really, really) cool table from us — but it just wasn’t complete.  So we played.  We found a wonderful mirror.  We thought it needed some sparkle, so we added a lamp and some other accessories!  It was so fun!  Fun for her and definitely, fun for me!  We love what we do here at by Design!!!

Thanks, Melissa and Rachel!

Bonita

Click on the graph to better read our pithy & insightful comments!

No, really, we know this stuff is boring, but whoa… these cotton prices are really going crazy.

So our wonderful customers are in for some shell-shock in the very near future.  And that concerns us.

Just saying.

By the way, the numbers are from Woldfram Alpha search engine.  Just enter cotton price trends.

I was in the East Village for a Holiday Open House.  I went in to Ephemera.  I love to go there.  It is a cute shop that is run by 2 young ladies who are so nice.  I don’t even know their names but I do know that it is amazing that these young people are running a business at their age.  Well, as I think about it, I guess that my husband and I were too—at that age.  We started our business when we were 25.  Gosh—that was a long time ago!

I do hope that people do try to shop at cool, independent businesses because if we don’t shop at them, they go out of business.  We have to shop at family businesses.  It is so important to our economic culture.  Some times I feel like the internet wants to take over the world—please shop local first.  It is always better to see and feel things, isn’t it?

One other side note that I loved:  When we were at Ephemera,  one of the girls mothers had made all home made goodies for the event.  Over 1000 of them!  They were so good!  Is that sweet or what?!

Bonita

Our Christmas Music at by Design is now officially ended and I would consider it a success! We had 4 different groups in on Saturdays between Thanksgiving and Christmas. They were very diverse–from a Jazz Trio to a Chamber Orchestra to a Women’s Church Choir to a Youth Choir. It was a lot of fun for us at the store and we had a nice group of people for each one. We wondered if it would be successful because people are so busy during the holidays. Our thought was that sometimes people need to just relax and enjoy the music of the holidays.

I loved it and I can now officially say that I think we will do it again! I love traditions, don’t you?

Duty above and beyond the call—

I’ve been so fortunate over the years to be surrounded by great designers here at by Design.  But, what truly makes them special is the fact that they’re wonderful people.   They care so much about their clients.  They will go to incredible lengths to help their clients.

We have a terrific wedge sectional up in our After Hours Room.  It is soooo comfortable, and people love it.  We recently had a customer who was having a very hard time visualizing it in her room.  So Laura got some brown butcher paper and with the help of fellow designers, made a template of it.  Now—that was not an easy job.  It took almost 3 hours for them to do it.

Needless to say, the client was thrilled and ordered it.  And guess what—I sent it home with one of my clients, and they ordered it also!

I would venture to say that there are not many furniture stores that would go to this kind of effort.  But really, the effort came from Laura and the design team.  My girls didn’t think anything of it.  They are used to going out of their way to give “Knock you socks off” service.  They are great designers and wonderful human beings.

Bonita