six degrees at work...

How does one get from Lori to Lauren when each are totally unaware of the other and a period of more than two years separates your own awareness of them? Well…


The short story is:

In late 2007 Ottawa decorator Lori Steeves moves to North Vancouver. Lori meets Ivana who later opens Dome Project Management in Vancouver mid-2008. Lori recommends attending American-born interior design industry guru Kimberley Seldon’s Business of Design seminar series taking place in Vancouver in early 2010. After the seminars, Kimberley recommends attending webinars put on by Calgary’s Kim Page Gluckie of MPowered Marketing called “How to Tweet” and “How to Blog”. At these webinars, Lisa from Dome meets Shannon Fitzpatrick from Toronto who writes an inspiring design blog. One morning Lisa is reading the blog and comes across the entry about Meet My Ugly Baby which turns out to be another hugely inspiring blog written by Lauren about her and her boyfriend purchasing their first apartment in Vancouver.

+ http://www.modusenterprises.ca (The company Ivana was working for, Dome’s sister company, when she went to Lori’s new North Van home to measure her kitchen for new IKEA cabinets)

+ http://www.simplyhomedecorating.com (Company owned and run by Lori Steeves)

+ http://kimberleyseldon.com/ (Kimberley Seldon, Interior Designer)

+ http://www.mpoweredmarketing.com/ (Kim Page Gluckie, Marketter specialising in small business)

+ http://www.whatsupwhimsy.com/ (Shannon Fitzpatrick, self-described “Interior Designer Wannabe” and blogger)

+ http://www.meetmyuglybaby.com (Lauren, Blogger and the proud owner of one seriously ugly baby)



The much much longer story is:

In January(ish) of 2008, home decorator extraordinaire Lori Steeves had just moved to Vancouver’s North Shore from Ottawa; very pregnant and ready to renovate. Ivana of Modus Enterprises Ltd. went to Lori’s new home to measure her kitchen for her future IKEA kitchen cabinets. The two hit it off, and Ivana saved Lori’s business card with intentions of recommending her to future clients of Dome looking for service beyond the scope of what we were offering at that point.

Many months later, Lori had a new baby girl and Ivana had a new baby company called Dome. With a view to creating the best possible future for Dome, Ivana asked Lori if she would be willing to meet with the Dome Design Team to provide any professional insights she was willing to empart. Lori agreed.

So Lisa, Ivana, and Lori met at a coffee shop on Cambie in October, 2009. Lori was very open and generous in sharing what she had learned during her years of experience working as an interior decorator. Lisa and Ivana were able to ask all sorts of questions they had been wrestling with as experienced kitchen designers looking to expand their skill sets. By the end of the conversation, Lisa and Ivana were armed with much knowledge and a name: Kimberley Seldon.

Years earlier, Lori had taken part in “Business of Design” – a seminar offered by internationally recognised interior designer Kimberley Seldon. She spoke very highly of the experience and recommended emailing the KS Design Group website to ask about the possibility of Kimberley making an appearance on the West Coast.

All three of us submitted this request to the KSDG site and it was not long before it was announced that Kimberley would do her seminar here in the Spring of 2010.

Taking Business of Design proved to be a great move for Dome.

And a couple of months later, via an annoucement on Facebook, KSDG recommended free online courses being offered by MPowered Marketting in Blogging and Twitter featuring Kimberley as a guest speaker. Lisa signed up and participated in the two webinars, as well as the “after the webinar” Twitter discussion groups.

Through the discussion group that followed one of the webinars, Lisa made an online connection with one very proficient blogger named Shannon Fitzpatrick. Shannon’s blog had been featured in the webinar by Kim of Mpowered as an example of “what to do” (because it’s awesome).

On a rainy Tuesday, Lisa was checking through her usual list of design-related blogs, and came across a posting on What’s Up Whimsy: http://www.whatsupwhimsy.com/2010/08/blogger-to-watch-meet-my-ugly-baby.html

This post lead to Lisa reading the entire blog Meet My Ugly Baby in one sitting, posting comments along the way. Lauren’s feedback to Lisa’s posts established an online connection, and Dome now follows Lauren on Twitter, and visa versa.

We have been working with Lori Steeves (on IKEA kitchen designs requiring consultation beyond what we are currently prepared to offer) for a while now. Whether any of these other connections ever result in direct working relationships remains to be seen. For now, Lori, Kimberley, Kim, Shannon, and now Lauren, too, are part of a list of people we at Dome will continue to be inspired by.

Thanks, Ladies.
Lisa (for the Dome Design Team)

pool o' drool...

Okay this just created that painful feeling you get in your jaws when it's been, like, ten hours since you've eaten and you see something you simply must devour instantly presented in front of you:


http://mini.glark.org/post/845969148/wine-barrel-floors


Thanks to Meet My Ugly Baby for this find.
+ http://www.meetmyuglybaby.com/
+ http://www.meetmyuglybaby.com/shopping/laminate-pros-cons/


And to What's Up Whimsy for leading us to that blog.
+ http://www.whatsupwhimsy.com/


Huzzah!

"design your life"...

We are planning on attending the Vancouver Home and Interior Design Show:

http://www.vancouverhomeandinteriordesignshow.com

Lots of local and national companies to see. I'm particularily looking forward to viewing exhibits from California Closets, Color My Kitchen, Cookworks, Home Makeover Magazine, Midland Appliance, Nood, Paragon Surfacing, Recycled Patio, Renocon Design Centre, Tiles for Less, and Yaletown Interiors to name a few.

Hope to see you there,
Lisa (for the Dome Design Team)

the devil is in the details...

Well, I think the beauty is in the details: in planning ahead. Planning ahead means you can execute those touches that truly "make the space". How delicious is this kitchen's ceiling detail as it pours down the wall and runs into chunky-but-sleek open shelving? If you could clearly read the text the article you'd also see that this inset conceals a vent for the cook-top on the island.

westernliving march 2008 "secret heart"

I'm glad to have seen this. Sometimes fun things happen when the co-worker you need to speak with gets stuck on the phone with a client and there is a magazine to leaf through near by...

Have a terrific weekend,
Lisa (for the DOME Design Team)

we all deserve to be pampered once and a while...

Doesn't this look just fabulous? Like a place you'd love to get spa treatments done?

This is one of the treatment suites at Breathe Spa in Downtown Vancouver. Just over a year ago they moved into a space that was - although new to them - filled with antique original features everywhere you looked. The owner's added a careful combination of new and vintage-looking touches to create an incredible space to relax in.

Check them out: http://www.breathespa.net/about.html

And, when you do, be sure to take note of the cabinets Dome recommended to seamlessly integrate with the sumptuous and clean feel of the rooms.

baby's first publication...

We design cabinet plans for people all the time. Some clients are afraid of their computer. Some want to cut down on the time they are at IKEA working on their cabinet order. Some clients have no idea where to start. Sometimes it's just that the client doesn't have the time to do measure for and space-plan their cabinets.

The clients who are strapped for time are often flush with style and decor ideas. That was definitely the case with Michael Richardson and Brian Sevy, our clients from the Southern Lower Mainland in January of 2009. They were just in the beginning stages of a major renovation project then. Lovely people who we hadn't heard from in a while, until...

Picture this... It's Saturday night and my family is in town and we're doing a barbecue dinner. Hubby's hard at work prepping the food when we realise we are out of charcoal. No problem! We live a minute away from the grocery store. So my brother in law and I head over to pick up a bag of charcoal from the store. Standing in the check-out line, I see this:

I thought to myself "I never buy magazines from the grocery store. And Kimberley Seldon is the Decorating Editor for this one. I should buy it." So I did.

Cut to 45ish minutes later, me eating my dinner, and flipping through my new magazine while casually listening to the conversation my sister and mum are having. Thank goodness I was between bites, because there would have been a serious spit-take. My thoughts: "Oh this is a great sofa. Love that table. Huh - the set-up of those kitchen windows looks familiar..." That's when I almost lost my dinner. Here's what caught my eye:

I think to myself "I know those windows." How do I know those windows? Because we were there. We measured and planned this kitchen a year and a half ago.

So congratulations to Michael and Brian for having the vision to restore this retro gem. Congrats to us for having a client featured in a major design publication. And thank you to Kimberley Seldon for being so generous and inspiring because, without that, I probably wouldn't have thought to pick up this issue of Style at Home.

To learn more...

Style at Home: http://www.styleathome.com/ and http://www.styleathome.com/the-summer-retreat-issue/i/146

Kimberley Seldon: http://www.kimberleyseldon.com/ or http://www.kimberleyseldon.blogspot.com/

To see more...

We planned out the cabinets for the main kitchen area, and also designed and sub-contracted the fabrication of the custom piece that you'll see to the far right of the image directly below (wood-framed pass-thru between kitchen and dining area). All cabinet parts were supplied by IKEA, the finishes were selected by the client, the cabinets were installed by our company, and all other finishes were fabricated and installed by other companies.

 

And pick up the issue - on stands now!

Thanks so much for reading.

Cheers,

Lisa (for the Dome Design Team)

in case you're not on facebook...

We have a number of photos posted on our Facebook page, but - as not everyone who reads blogs is on Facebook - we thought it was a good idea to post photos of our Past Projects here, as well. So here goes... Click these images to see them full-size. (Oh, and hopefully you can guess which is the "before" and which is "after"!)

. project one

. cabinet plan and installation by Dome
. finishes selection and photographs by client