European design has always been ahead of its time and I for one believe that its the French Designers that do it best! Well… Italian too but that can be it’s own blog post.

Three French interior designers stand out to me. We often turn to their work for inspiration. All three are well known for their attention to light, volumes and details, transforming the spaces they work on to be contemporary and elegant.

The Darwin D. Martin sits in a beautiful neighborhood called Parkside. As you make your way through Parkside, you pass hundreds of beautiful old homes. The Darwin D. Martin house is a radical deviation from the rest of the neighborhood, a neighborhood filled with Victorian and shingle style homes. The home is a perfect example of Frank Lloyd Wright’s prairie style; it’s characterized by low, horizontal lines that intend to blend the building in with its flat landscape.

Today, clients look for a very diverse range of amenities in their homes; fitness centers, wine cellars, home theaters, spas and even golf simulators. Of all the things that clients tend to look for, a conservatory is rarely on the top of the list, let alone on the list at all. Perhaps the idea of a home conservatory, or greenhouse, is an antiquated concept. 

Built by the Franciscan monks in 1867, the "Paterskirk" in Mechelen, Belgium looks like an ordinary church- which is what I thought it was prior to entering. As I walked in I was greeted by a doorman ready to take my suitcase.

In 2009 the Paterskirk church opened as a 4-star hotel known as Martin’s Patershof. Nowhere else in the world is there a five-story hotel with 56 rooms inscribed within a church.

The Dansaekhwa movement emphasized going back to nature. The return to nature denied the artist as a subject. Working on canvas, artists paid attention to the properties of soft objects and renounced figuration. Use of hanji Korean paper and earthy tones became popular.

In 1981 Memphis Milano or The Modern Memphis Movement began in Milan. A group of designers led by Ettore Sottsass gathered to start a revolution against serious and functional modernist design. The group was named after Bob Dylan’s song “Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues” as it was believed that they listened to this song on repeat throughout their entire first meeting.