Home Trends: Autumn Winter 2012/13

We recently published our Autumn / Winter 2012/13 Lifestyle Trends for the Home book, featuring four key trend directions, complete with 40 colour swatches with closest Pantone reference, actual material samples per trend and hundreds of original images styled and photographed by our team.

The books are a result of 6 months work, from our initial trend panel where we invite industry experts, forecasters and ‘unusual thinkers’ to share their ideas for the future with us, through to editing and honing the trends into workable and commercial trends for our global audience.

For A/W 2012/13, we have covered four main themes; Undone, Curiosity, Grey Gardens and Wild Spirit. Our books include a Colour Evolution component, demonstrating how colour is evolving changing and trending from season to season so that you know the key colours and how they develop over time.

To place an order for one of our limited edition trend books, please contact us at enquiries@trendbible.co.uk or see our Agents page for your nearest regional agent.

http://www.trendbible.co.uk

Design with Fibers

Wor

A natural decor, working with wood

Historically, wood is used in decoration for the beauty and comfort it offers. With other materials such as steel becoming less popular, wood has made a return to household interior design with its varying shapes and interpretations. This completely natural material is invited in all parts of the house, but is usually in bathrooms and kitchens. Used mostly for floorings and finishes, wood has a strong heritage of household use. Even trees that were uprooted by the wind or fell in a rain storm, once shaped and polished, are perfect for creating unique tables, chairs, and shelves.
Natural fibers for a sober decoration

Natural fibers are specifically selected for their beauty and practicality. Sisla comes from the leaves of the agave cactus, from Mexico. This is probably the most sophisticated fiber, as it blends sweetness and consistency. Cior, another fiber offers a more rustic appearance and generally used to create a relaxing environment. Another fiber, sea grass, is a great fiber that is mainly used because of its resilience to humidity. Last off, the banana fiber, also known as abbaca, once dried and braided offers a material with various color tones.

Concrete, a material for a sober decoration

For years, concrete has mainly been reserved for construction uses, but today this material is used frequently in home decoration. It is used on walls, floors, and even appears on some furniture. Of course, these uses are purely decorative. Some designers favor concrete for its flexibility and malleability, but also for its reminiscent nature. Recently, technology has granted the ability to create light weight concrete, streamlining designs, and removing all of its weight in terms of decoration. That aside, concrete has a great ability to blend well with other materials such as wood textile and even steel.

http://www.adesignerspot.com

2011-2012 Trends in Interior Design

2011 brings forward old ideas remodeled according to new trends, effortless elegance, vivid colors, striking and out of the ordinary combinations and contrasts. This year, we should all embrace colors that we wouldn’t normally associate, combine intense shades with balancing tones and think out of the box, giving our home a brand new personality.

Dare to celebrate neon shades, using fluorescent green, yellow or pink, delivering thus new accent elements to your freshly decorated interior. Since these powerful colors tend to draw attention, combine them with neutral shades such as white and gray that will soften the visual impact. The striking atmosphere thus achieved will definitely be one of a kind.

Make up elegant color combinations like black and gray, black and silver, light blue and gray, emerald and white, gold and white, orange and gray, lavender and white, tan and black. You can also mix styles, using a minimalist interior with accent furniture elements, like an art nouveau armchair in neutral, natural colors (black leather, cinnamon or brown velvet).

The Romantic style will never be outdated when it comes to interior remodeling. Apply pale shades of pink and gold, use various textiles – mostly white – printed with floral motifs, add flowing veil drapes and curtains, place thin pale carpets on natural wood floors, accessorize the interior space with elegant paintings depicting mystical images or natural sceneries and give your home a fresh touch with flower vases.

When it comes to creativity and high spirits, let your home speak for itself with daring colors. Use orange if you are slightly conservative, blue if you are a calm person, red if you are highly active, energetic and impulsive and pink if you are affectionate, playful and spontaneous. Whatever color you choose to apply, be sure it fully represents your personality, delivering the desired atmosphere.

Gold is still in being one of the most elegant and noble colors. Apply gold accents if you want to achieve a glamorous interior setting and use matte, antique shades to avoid opulence.

Go for a dramatic effect by mixing vivid shades of colors, such as red and mustard yellow, turquoise and yellow, orange and green, yellow and brown. Use softer shades and you will achieve a calm and relaxing atmosphere.

As always, it is up to you to enable these suggestions to perfectly fit your personality and your home décor. Choose whatever inspires you and let your creativity decide upon the best combinations, delivering

http://www.adesignerspot.com

What vector and raster image are?

Graphic designers use many different tools to create beautiful images, but there is a very important technical side to the profession. Designers need to not only create art, but they must also hand over the art to the client in the correct file format. After all, what good is a design if it can’t be used easily by the client?

Understanding File Formats

There are two types of drawing programs used when drawing on the computer: Vector and Raster. Clients need both types of graphics, but don’t run out and buy more software – let’s first understand the differences.

Vector

Vector images are made up of lines and curves with points. To simplify a very technical description, a vector graphic is made up of lines and points with information attached to them. For example: If you were to draw a circle, the drawing would be made up of a line with a curve (360 degrees), a beginning and end point, a specific size, an outline color for the line, and the “fill”, or the color inside the line.

What makes vector images popular among graphic designers, printing companies, and other people who work with images is the fact that vector images are scalable – they can be easily made larger or smaller without losing any image quality. When you change the size of the image, the software simply redraws the design in the new size.

Professional designers also create vector images using “layers” – a feature which allows designers to isolate each element of the design in its own space. When all of the layers are shown together, the entire graphic looks like one image. Using layers makes it easier to change vector designs at any time – any designer can take a vector image file and look at individual layers to change the colors, fonts, or layout of a design. This is useful for an image that will be used with different media – a logo printed on a brochure can be more detailed and smaller than a logo sewn on a hat.

File formats: .ai .fh .cdr

Common Programs: Adobe Illustrator, FreeHand, CorelDraw

Raster

Raster files are images made up of square dots, called pixels. Each flat dot can be a different color in your picture. When you look at the dots from far away, they blend together and produce beautiful images, but when you zoom in, you can see the pixels.

What makes Raster images different is that when you want to make a picture larger or smaller, the resolution quality goes down. When you enlarge an image, the edges of the elements in the image look boxy and bumpy because the computer has no idea what to put in between the pixels that are there, or how to smooth them out. When you shrink an image, the computer has to just throw away random pixels. The pixels themselves can’t be made smaller, so the image just needs to have fewer of them.

All of this might make using raster graphic sound inferior, but they actually have specific uses that make them better than vector images:

• Internet: Raster files are smaller, so websites download faster.
• Photographs: Digital Photos are always raster images, and they are easy to take and edit.
• Clipart: You can insert raster images into a document or presentation in seconds.
• Screen resolution: The resolution of computer monitors are all the same, so raster images always look good.

File formats: .bmp .gif .jpg .png .tiff .pict .psd

Common Programs: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Fireworks

So Which One Do You Use?

When you deliver a logo or a graphic design to a client, always deliver both formats. Customers will ask for “source files”, which mean files that can be edited and changed. A client may need vector files for printing, but raster for a posting on a website. Experienced designers have figured out an easy way to provide both types of files – design the original graphic using a vector design program, and then create a variety of vector and raster-based versions of the files from it. For example, using Adobe Illustrator it is easy to design a vector logo, select “Save As” and then choose both vector and raster-type files formats required by the client.

www.mycroburst.com

Heart Of glass

By Jenny Brewer idfx

I went along to Vessel Gallery in Notting Hill, London yesterday to see the latest creations from Italian lighting design studio Mediterraneo - five limited edition statement pendant lights crafted in hand-blown Murano glass and metal. The Intuizione collection uses layers of simple geometric shapes to create dramatic silhouettes, finished in an unusual combination of stunning Venetian glass and contemporary metal structures.

Giovanni Corrado, creative director of Mediterraneo, challenged the perceptions of traditional Murano chandeliers with pared-down detail and bold forms, spurred on by the collaboration with Vessel Gallery. 'The new designs challenge typecast ideas of Murano glass... using a thousand-year-old craft tradition to create relevant contemporary design.' Corrado aimed to create a sense of movement with each of the pieces, part of the brief from Vessel gallery to further investigate themes found in his 2009 collection.

From the collection, Leopoldo (above) puts a contemporary twist on the familiar shapes of conventional chandeliers, while Elio (below) mixes luxurious materials and soft silhouettes with industrial aesthetics. My favourite though was Osiris (top), for its shots of vibrant coloured glass.

http://blog.worldinteriordesignnetwork.com

7 steps to make worst logo design

Who would want to create the worst logo design ever? It is something that all logo designers avoid. However if they are not careful, they can end up doing just that. Today’s post will be a continuation of my previous post “How to Lose a Logo Design Contest in 10 Ways” and will highlight a few mistakes. These are fairly common errors found today among logo designers and lead to a poor logo design that the client does NOT want. Follow these steps, and you too can create the worst logo design ever.

1. Use Stock Images and Clip Art – Stock images are downloaded by hundreds of people every day for free. Using them can severely devalue a company and then there is the ever rising risk of copyright infringement.

2. Use Logo Makers – Even though it is your job to come up with your own new designs as a logo designer, take the shortcut and use a free logo maker. So what if the logo is of poor quality? You’ve managed to create a logo that will most likely never win. Now move on to the next contest.

3. Use Multiple Colors – Colors make a logo look more appealing. Using too many of them however will give any viewer a headache. This will also increase aspirin sales.

4. Add Unattractive Fonts – Unattractive fonts can turn heads – away from the logo, that is. Use fonts that are completely out of sync with the theme of the design. The more unattractive it looks the more likely it is to get looked over.

5. Use Unappealing Symbols and Objects – Draw up some random symbols and overused images, or get them from the internet or use the free graphic symbols given with the designing software, and put them all together hoping for them to somehow sync together. Now that’s what I call online abstract painting!

6. Lack of Imagination, Depth and Creativity – These are very time consuming. Avoid them. Just spend about 10 – 15 minutes thinking about the logo design you will create and then start putting your ideas to work.

7. Be Experienced in Having No Experience– If you can’t make heads or tails out of your design draft, it is ready for submission!

Well there you have it, 7 ways to create a bad logo design. Follow the above mentioned tips and designers can rest assured that their drafts will get nominated for the Logo Design Razzie Awards. If only there was such a thing!

www.mycroburst.com

kitchen design ideas

If you're in the mood for a little kitchen decorating, there are tons of great kitchen interior design ideas and schemes from which you can choose. The kitchen is the heart of many homes, and so it is a room that typically gets a lot of design attention. If your kitchen needs a minor facelift, or if you're in an "everything must go" kind of mood and want to give your room a complete overhaul, these kitchen interior design ideas will help get you on your way.
Getting Started - What You Need to Consider

Style is always important in design, and of course, when you're decorating and designing your dream kitchen, you want the finished product to be in a style you love and that fits in seamlessly with the rest of your home. But kitchens require a different approach to interior design than you would take with your living room or your dining room, because kitchens, like bathrooms, need to be functional as well as beautiful. Kitchens are the center of a lot of activity in your home. In addition to the obvious - cooking - kitchens offer a gathering place for casual family meals and catch-up cups of coffee with friends and neighbors. They need to be designed in such a way that facilitates the activities that happen in the room.

With this factor in mind, consider what kind of changes you want to make to your kitchen. If your kitchen has a particular problem that makes the room less comfortable to work in - for instance, if your kitchen is very small or has outdated appliances - then fixing these factors should be at the top of your list. Now is also the time to decide the scope of your design project and settle on an adequate budget.
http://interiordesign.lovetoknow.com/Kitchen_Interior_Design_Ideas

how to buy sofa

When you're thinking about a new sofa, you'll want to check our sofa buying tips. While it is important to get a sofa in just the right color, it is just as important to get one that will last. Inexpensive furniture can break, pop springs, and look out of shape within a year of constant use. Quality construction will offer years of enjoyment and has enough good "bones" to allow you to recover it periodically.

Choose the Style of Cushions for Your New Sofa

First decide if you prefer the look of loose back cushions or attached. Loose cushions give you the option of turning the pillows as needed, while attached backs won't need fluffing or rearranging. Be sure to sit in the sofa you are considering. Is it comfortable? Are the arms the right height for taking a nap or reading a book?

How Many Cushions Do You Like on a Sofa?

How many seat cushions would you like? One cushion offers a clean modern look while two or three are traditional. When you sit on the cushions, do they stay in place or do the corners flare up? Are they attached to the frame with a clip to hold them down?

What Style of Sofa Arm Do You Like?

Choose an arm style for your new sofa. You can choose from armless, traditional rolled arm, curved English arm, or a straight Parsons style. The rolled arm has a flat front panel and is often outlined in cording. English style is rounded at the front, with fabric formed into sunburst-type pleats. Straight arm sofas are most often seen in contemporary settings.

A Skirted Sofa or One With Bare Legs?

Do you want a skirted sofa or one with the visible legs? Choose from leg styles that vary from heavy square chunks and wide bun feet to more delicate tapered legs or carved and curved formal versions. Legs are usually available in a number of finishes as well.

Understand Frame Construction for Upholstered Furniture

Ask about the construction of a sofa under consideration. The best are made from kiln-dried hardwoods (oak, maple, poplar, etc.), while inexpensive furniture is made from softer pine lumber. Interior construction is important as well. Cheap furniture is stapled together and has haphazardly constructed corner bracing. Better frames are securely screwed together.

Understand Sofa Seat Construction

Find out how the seat support system is made. Often a furniture store will have a cutaway model of the interior of upholstered pieces. Does it have quality 8-way tied springs or cheaper wire coils?

Choosing the Cushion and Pillow Filling for Your Sofa

The cushion and pillow filling are important to the feel of a sofa. Upholstery foam is inexpensive and comes in several thicknesses and weights, however the best cushions have down fillings. All-down cushions must be fluffed daily, though another option uses down pads wrapped around a core of foam. Understand these options for the sofa you want and which might be best for you. Are the cushions standard or special order, foam or down?

Choose the Fabric for You New Sofa's Final Cover

Choose a fabric for your sofa. Chenille is soft and durable while Leather is long-lasting and attractive. Velvets and other fabrics look lovely but may wear out with heavy use over the years. Finally consider options for trimmings. Dress up a sofa with fringed pillows or double welted seams. While these options add to the cost, they also give your piece a one-of-a-kind look. Many furniture manufacturers also offer the option of custom-made slipcovers to give you a seasonal change.

source:interiordec

china shopping mall

James Kanter over at the New York Timespoint out a very important statistical update: According to an assessment of per capita carbon emissions by the Netherlands Environmental Agency, China now emits on a per person basis more than France. While emissions in France in 2009 were 6 tons, those in China were 6.1 tons--up from 2.2 tons in 1990. Which really means that China can no longer claim to be a developing nation.

I realize that glosses over things a bit, but not too thickly.

China Has Radically Reduced Poverty, Manufacturing For The World
Since it's essentially the world's factory, about one-third of China's emissions are the direct result of making goods for consumption overseas. If France manufactured more of its consumer goods domestically, its emissions would likely by higher--though since most of its electricity comes from nuclear energy, it's not a direct comparison, since China is largely coal-powered.

Also because of all that manufacturing, those higher emissions in China don't directly represent the lifestyle choices of the average Chinese resident, much in the same way that statistically per capita emissions in US states with high levels of oil refining and chemical production are skewed higher than just personal lifestyle choices would create.

That said though, a quick glance at World Bank stats shows that the poverty rate in China has dropped from 65% in 1981, to 16% in 2001, to just 4% today. Statistically that's actually lower than in France by about 2%.

Keep in mind that what counts as poverty in France probably counts as luxury to many of China's poor--an important point in terms of human development--but it's all still quite telling.

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/07/china-no-longer-developing-nation-per-capita-emissions-higher-than-france.php

kitchen design

Need to blend your home appliances well with the kitchen interior design? Well, stickers can bring different elements of your kitchen in to harmony. As example,you can use wall decals stickers to make your different pieces of furniture from different set look them similar. You can also covering furniture with it to make them have expensive finishing touches. Below is some creations from Kodu Design.