• Tour a Craftsman Minneapolis Home That’s All About Mix and Match Style | Architectural Digest
    Home Improvement

    Tour a Craftsman Minneapolis Home That’s All About Mix and Match Style | Architectural Digest

    In Minneapolis’s historical East Isles neighborhood, there’s one item getting passed around more often than a casserole dish: a burly and solid wood upright piano incapable of holding a fine tune. After being decommissioned from a restaurant in nearby Kenwood years ago, the antique piece—decorated with hand-carved motifs, no less—has been carefully transferred from household to household. “It’s a terrible piano, but I loved the fact that it’s a neighborhood fixture,” says its current owner, interior designer Victoria Sass, who proudly displays the instrument in her home studio. “Someday maybe I’ll move and pass it on to another neighbor.” Until then the piece remains in a house that—much like the…

    Comments Off on Tour a Craftsman Minneapolis Home That’s All About Mix and Match Style | Architectural Digest
  • 40 Retaining Wall Ideas That Will Elevate Your Landscaping | Architectural Digest
    Garden

    40 Retaining Wall Ideas That Will Elevate Your Landscaping | Architectural Digest

    Putting up walls can be a good thing. That is, if you’re talking about retaining wall ideas in your landscape design. “At the basic level, a retaining wall is a structure that holds or retains soil behind it,” explains Joe Raboine, director of Belgard Residential Hardscapes, an outdoor hardscapes company. “Though retaining walls are most commonly used to create a functional area out of a sloped terrain, they do serve other functions.” You might think that retaining wall ideas are all about function—after all, retaining walls prevent soil erosion and reduce the risk of flooding—but they are not all utility; these structures can enhance an outdoor space by creating levels,…

    Comments Off on 40 Retaining Wall Ideas That Will Elevate Your Landscaping | Architectural Digest
  • Inside Vanessa Carlton’s Magically Cozy Rhode Island Home | Architectural Digest
    Home Improvement

    Inside Vanessa Carlton’s Magically Cozy Rhode Island Home | Architectural Digest

    “We found it on Zillow, just like everyone did during the pandemic,” musician Vanessa Carlton says of her charming Federal post-and-beam house. She and her husband, fellow musician John McCauley, even purchased the Rhode Island home—which was built during the first few years of the 1800s—without ever seeing it in person. “We did a FaceTime walk-through,” Carlton says. “I know, it’s crazy.” And yet the house, which the couple share with their seven-year-old daughter, Sidney, has led to their “next life” in the Ocean State. The blind commitment to a centuries-old abode is a bit more understandable considering that Carlton and McCauley, whose renovation projects have grown larger over the…

    Comments Off on Inside Vanessa Carlton’s Magically Cozy Rhode Island Home | Architectural Digest
  • Tour an Upper West Side Home That’s Been Injected With Downtown Cool | Architectural Digest
    Home Improvement

    Tour an Upper West Side Home That’s Been Injected With Downtown Cool | Architectural Digest

    It’s a classic New York story: A young family is moving some 80 blocks north but doesn’t want to sacrifice downtown cool for the change of address. That was the brief for Manhattan-based interior designer Neal Beckstedt, when a pair of clients called on him to decorate their new place: A 1928, three-bedroom apartment on the Upper West Side with high ceilings and leafy views of Central Park. It needed to be, in Beckstedt’s words, “Young and fun and cool while still respecting uptown. Bringing the downtown element to them—that was the challenge.” Luckily, he and his clients—a real estate developer and a learning specialist—had instant chemistry: “Neal understood that…

    Comments Off on Tour an Upper West Side Home That’s Been Injected With Downtown Cool | Architectural Digest
  • 16 Backyard Vegetable Garden Ideas for Beginners | Architectural Digest
    Garden

    16 Backyard Vegetable Garden Ideas for Beginners | Architectural Digest

    Follow the old adage of “what goes together well in the kitchen, grows together well in the garden,” Vallin Kostovick says. For example, plants like lettuce and tomato grow well next to each other because as the tomatoes grow taller, they provide necessary shade for the lettuce. 3. A slender garden Get the most out of every square foot and use more vertical or horizontal space to create a slender garden along a fence, wall, or other tighter area of your backyard. These types of gardens are suited for climbing plants like cucumbers, zucchini, and squash. Easy to grow garden ideas “Most veggies need full sun to grow happy,” Angelov…

    Comments Off on 16 Backyard Vegetable Garden Ideas for Beginners | Architectural Digest
  • Step Inside One Brooklyn Designer’s Dream Family Home | Architectural Digest
    Home Improvement

    Step Inside One Brooklyn Designer’s Dream Family Home | Architectural Digest

    “I’m a collector,” asserts Jenna Chused, the interior designer behind Chused & Co. and a forager of vintage treasures. “I’ve been antiquing and going to yard sales since I was eleven.” Unsurprisingly, that skillset came in handy when decorating her own home—a charming Italianate town house nestled in Brooklyn’s leafy Fort Greene neighborhood. Chused, whose roster of clients includes actor Michelle Gomez, had selected the abode for its “expansive layout, 12-foot ceilings, clean lines, and gracious style.” Serendipitously, she finished the renovation six months before the start of the pandemic. During the remodeling period, Chused relished making her own selections without having to wait on client approvals. Opening rooms up,…

    Comments Off on Step Inside One Brooklyn Designer’s Dream Family Home | Architectural Digest