Complete Setting

This is a picture the left hand built-in. You can see a house with an egg and a raven on it, behind that is a raven siting on an eight-ball. These are pieces that I picked up last year to commemorate our new home and family. They are very simplistic shapes that speak volumes about the silhouette and lines of real ravens. The work is done by Mark Orr at his Michigan studio, Scavenger Art.

I had the great fortune of meeting Mark at the American Craft Council’s Baltimore show. Mark is very friendly and has a great sense of humor. This sense of humor really reflects in the pieces that he creates. Like the birds on most of his pieces, much of his larger pieces are made with unique and interesting finds.

There is one murder of ravens very near our house and we get the occasional visitor to our house. The ravens and crows are actually all over SF and so I thought Mark’s work was perfect for our new house.

Next to these pieces is an earthenware plate, that I made myself, filled with a collection of pine-cones. The real ones are from walks with my son. Exploring our new neighborhood, he would always find a pine cone and want to carry it. They started to pile up and the more they did, the more I liked the look of them. I added silvered glass pine-cones that I found at Target. The silver is a duller antiqued look and I love the way it picks up soft light amongst the wood. There are also a few metal pine-cones that I found at a great design shop in the Castro. Given is not only a cute shop but it also happens to be the site of Harvey Milk’s camera shop. The photo in the back was taken by my partner. He has a great eye for shadow and form. I thought that a picture of a pine tree was a perfect back drop for this display.

I wanted to show you some of the other projects we are working on, while not working on the bathroom. The majority of our projects this year are not really glamorous. We will be replacing the roof and sky light sometime during the summer. We haven’t had any leaks anywhere yet but we do know that they are more than a decade old.

The other big project we have is to replace all of the stucco on the front of the house. If you have ever been to San Francisco, you know that we have a sea of stucco. There isn’t a wall that we haven’t improved with the monotony of stucco finishes. We texture it, color it and pile it high. Can you see where I’m going with this. Stucco is not the same as adobe. Adobe is a specific finish that is appropriate to a specific style.

San Francisco’s love affair has been around for years and in all fairness there is a valid reason to use. When a house shakes down on you wood and plaster are much better than brick or stone. I know, the things we sacrifice for safety. Unfortunately decades ago when our house was built nobody realized that stucco absorbed moisture but didn’t always dry out completely. Moisture + plaster = rot. We’re going to add some features to the house when we do the replastering: new light fixtures, handrail for the stairs, and resealing the steps, outlet for decorations. Yes we have priorities. Halloween is coming and we have big plans!

Here is a picture of the living room when we moved in. The color was drab and unfortunately there were holes in the walls from screws and bolts. I couldn’t live with this room so it got a coat of paint. I’m not married to this shade, it may have to change to match something other feature, but it is really a comfortable color for me. I love being in this room now. We’re going to use this room to entertain in and to show off our slowly growing art collection. I like things that are in contrast so why not create a gallery space that is very inviting and relaxing. LOL

Here is the chair that I was looking at but once we saw it we realized that the scale was all wrong. We are looking for chairs that are about 25″ - 28″ wide to keep a good flow around the room.