When I went off to pursue my college degree, I was sure I wanted to go into advertising. I chose a school in New York City, the hub of all things marketing, and started right in with Advertising 101. It wasn't a history of advertising class or even the art of advertising, which would've certainly appealed to me, it was the economics and the business. I switched majors pretty soon thereafter, not thinking I had the temperament for advertising - art history seemed a better fit.
Read MoreTEDx Portland
This past weekend I attended the 4th annual TEDx Portland. Over 2,500 people converged on Keller Auditorium to hear some ideas worth spreading. My take is that fans of TED talks, we are a bunch open to inspiration & generally hungry for a different perspective - so the vibe was that of positive optimism as the speakers engaged the audience with their thoughts on the idea of "Perfect" - the 2014 TEDx Portland theme.
Read MoreInspired web sites - all in one place!
Via my daily feed from Grain Edit, which is an amazing site focusing on modern graphic design, I stumbled upon siteInspire. This is a site that curates all the best web sites and catalogues them based on their attributes. These are organized by style, type and subject and you can filter your search using these attributes. For instance under style you can choose from feminine, busy, retro, light, Japanese, etc. Under subject you can choose from any number of things, including architecture, art, travel, music, etc. This is an incredibly useful and entertaining site for those of us, like me, that has spent many hours looking for a certain type of site design that I had seen but hadn't thought to bookmark.
Caitlin Wilson Design
I initially stumbled upon Caitlin Wilson via Design*Sponge, which offered a sneak peak of her home. She is an interior designer and textile designer out of Philly who is obviously inspired by her global travels but retains a bright, modern aesthetic. Based on the sneak peak photos, her home features prominently in her textile web site, Caitlin Wilson Textiles, where many of her patterns can be seen on pillows, chairs, headboards, etc..
What I found most intriguing and beneficial, though, was the way she organized her interior design web site: Caitlin Wilson Design. Here styles have been quantified via general terms: traditional, contemporary, vintage, eclectic, transitional, modern, minimalistic, etc.. It's not easy to visualize what a certain style is comprised of, especially when there are alot of similarities between them. What does one mean when describing transitional versus eclectic? Caitlin's web site is definitely a good resource, plus her interior spaces are beautiful and well documented. The photos of the overall room intersperced with small details really evoke the feeling their theme describes and illustrates how layering is really what makes an interior space truly successful.