Every winter, my cat, JFK, who is usually an outdoor cat, gets a little bit crankier . . . well, a lot crankier. When he’s not sleeping directly in front of the heater or scarfing food, he’s begging me for attention. On my last trip to New York, I learned a lot of great tips from…
I know the low temperatures in northern California hardly rival those of the East Coast, but we still get our fair share of bone-chilling, gloomy winter weather, and according to the news, there’s more cold and windy rain on its way. Like Max and Grace, I am a huge fan of candles: In my urban…
There’s a wonderful trend going on right now, which I predict will last from here on out: household goods made from simple, natural, organic materials. The increasing popularity of leather, wood and metal objects is wonderful news for the DIYer because all of these materials in their raw state are relatively inexpensive, easy to manipulate,…
We have this very annoying tree right outside our apartment that blocks all light from our windows, thwarting the sun’s attempts to warm us with its golden rays of energy. Damn you, tree! Recently I begged our landlord to at least consider trimming it back, and he finally relented, which left me with both a…
When you collect as many things as I do, floor and table space can quickly become precious commodities. Having shelves full of plants is just not feasible in the studio, but I was not going to let that stop me from pursuing my dream of building a little greenhouse. If you have an interest in…
It hasn’t rained in Oakland for weeks, even months, but that hasn’t stopped me from stockpiling a list of projects for those overcast days ahead, when all I’ll want to do is to curl up on the couch with some good music, a mug of tea and a glue gun. Grace and I both gravitated…
I used to have a problem with collecting chairs, but I quickly had to shut it down. I was running out of space for them, and honestly, it was becoming a little like my stuffed animal collection when I was a kid, meaning that I anthropomorphized each one and felt guilty letting any of them…
A hanging leather shelving project has been on my to-do list for a while; to be honest, the biggest delay was just finding the right belts. Has anyone else discovered that thrift-shop leather belts are often unreasonably overpriced? Regardless, a little patience yielded some great finds: one super long thick black belt and a couple…
Balsa is one of my all-time favorite materials: It’s cheap and lightweight and easily handles bending, cutting, staining, painting, glueing and pretty much every other technique that comes to mind. It’s also a great resource for creating professional-quality results with few tools, as you can see in this awesome balsa lampshade project from Jamie Samples…
This is the fourth installment of Brittany Watson Jepsen’s summer DIY series. Check out her previous projects here, here and here. I love how simple and minimal these projects are, creating awesome results with only a few materials. Thanks for sharing, Brittany! — Kate For those of us lucky enough to have minimal living space, creative space planning is…
We’re thrilled to announce that D*S veteran and DIY genius Brittany Watson Jepsen will be sharing a short series of DIY projects with us over the summer! I’m particularly partial to this geometric side table, but they are all wonderful — so easy to re-create and perfect for the upcoming season. Trust me, you have…
It seems I have a clutter problem. Previously it was piles of mail; this time it’s piles of magazines. Riffing on the form and function of my last post, the mail basket, I thought the same construction techniques could be used for a magazine rack. I swear to you, though, I will not use this…
This project stems from a conversation I had with Grace and Amy on my last visit; they had seen an image of a rolling pin held in place with two simple straps, and thought it could adapt nicely to become a wall scroll for organizing ideas. I managed to score three long branches from a…
Math was never my strongest subject, but lately I’ve felt a strong desire to play around with geometry. Inspired by the awesome tape artwork of artist Alex Menocal, I wanted to focus my geometric experiments on my walls but actually make a piece that is three-dimensional. 3D structures can be tricky to mount on walls,…
I love projects that make use of old materials, especially when they take just a few easy steps to complete. This quick and easy reclaimed-wood knife rack from Nick Ward-Bopp is something you could probably finish in a couple hours, and as he points out below, it’s a great way to make use of empty…
Spontaneous piles seem to form around my house. Mail is probably the most often piled culprit. Why worry about opening mail and filing it when you can stack it up for a week? If you feel the same but are looking for a way to appease the neat freaks in your life, why not make…
Around this time last year, Grace, Amy and I went to check out the “McMasterpieces” show curated by Sight Unseen as part of NY Design Week. We loved these pieces by Alissia Melka-Teichroew; they not only inspired one of our projects for last year’s summer newspaper, but they’ve been haunting me ever since. I love the…
I’ve been seeing a lot of slatted wood lately, mostly in large-scale designs like Morgan Satterfield’s lovely front porch screen or this incredible house that popped up on Desire to Inspire yesterday. I’ve never come across slatted wood as wall art, but after seeing this wall map project from Natalie Gluic, I’m thoroughly convinced that…
I’ve been needing some more room for my growing record collection and all the while have been looking for the right sized vintage box. I was hoping for something somewhat military surplus, but never found the right size or condition. If I found something, it was always a one-off and typically poor shape. Here’s the…
Lately we’ve been getting more requests for furniture DIY projects. Luckily this awesome tutorial from Sarah Torrence of 508 Restoration & Design for a salvaged barnwood headboard landed in my inbox, and was just too pretty to pass up. Due to their size and the amount of use they receive, headboards can be intimidating, even…
