This story category covers design and home decor, home maintenance and easy organizing tips.

Fall Leaves In A Cut Glass Vase

Great Decorating Ideas With Fall Leaves

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What’s more beautiful than fall foliage? Here are a few understated ways to use it to decorate your home.

 

Fall Leaves In A Cut Glass Vase

 

FREE & EASY | Whether it’s branches in vases or individual leaves strewn along a dining table or on top of a napkin or plate, nothing looks more striking than nature brought indoors and left in its beautiful, natural state. Around here, we subscribe to a natural, casual approach when it comes to arranging botanical materials, and a less is more strategy for tabletop décor. Read more

Metal Gift Wrap-Martin Tessler

Make Bedazzling Window Screen Wrap

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Knock your present out of the park with pedestrian materials from ye olde hardware store.

Metal Gift Wrap-Martin Tessler

 

CREATIVE SOLUTION | If you’re looking for an easy, dramatic and glamorous way to wrap a very special gift, nothing has the power to bedazzle like ordinary window screen and wire. Read more

Karlstad Warranty- IKEA

Questions To Ask When Buying IKEA As-Is

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As-is items from IKEA carry the possibility of problems. Here are some questions to ask before you buy.

Karlstad Sectional-Apartmet Therapy

 

BUYER BEWARE | For years, although I popped into IKEA’s as-is section every time I visited the store, all I’d ever bought was a $10 lamp. Then recently I came across a Karlstad corner sofa in Isunda grey (like the one pictured above), usually $1,199, for $899. I had been thinking about buying a sectional for some time but never did anything about it. Now here was the very one I’d been eyeing for $300 off.

I asked why it was as-is and was told it was a return. Nothing seemed amiss: no snags, tears, stains, dents or sags. The Richmond IKEA has furnished its returns waiting area with Karlstad sofas in the same slipcover and they seem to be holding up well, plus a friend of mine has bought two as-is sofas from IKEA with no problems. And there it was, assembled and ready to go. I bought it.

Here are the questions I wish I had asked. Read more

GOOP turkish-t-for-goop

Hamam Or Huckaback: The Linen Towel Option

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Fed up with soaring energy bills? These stylish well-priced alternatives to triple-thick bath sheets could lead to savings.

GOOP turkish-t-for-goop

 

SHOPPING AROUND | Leave it to sophisticated Europeans to promote a stylish/ecofriendly way to dry your body after bathing. Flip through any of their high-style décor magazines and you’ll run into references to both linen and flat cotton towels, which are a true and viable alternative to those triple-thick terrycloth bath sheets we North Americans appear to prize—a choice that has our dryers set on overtime and our energy bills on the rise. Read more

Votive Candle Holders - John Sinal

Make These Window Screen Candleholders

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Sure it’s great for keeping out bugs, but metal window screen also shines as a candleholder.

Votive Candle Holders - John SinalRegular hardware store metal window screening, with its nostalgic cottage connotations, has obvious uses—and some that are less apparent. Here I’ve folded it into holders for votive candles that are straightforward to make. Read more

Italian Hotel Satin Stitch Bedding White Collection- Restoration Hardware

Sheet Music: How To Buy Well Made Bedding

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Nothing makes me sing out loud like well-made, well-priced bedding.

Italian Hotel Satin Stitch Bedding White Collection- Restoration Hardware

 

BUY RIGHT | I’ve got a bee in my bonnet about bedding. It’s one of those product areas where well-known designers license their name in an effort to reach a broader market. When you purchase sheets by Ralph Lauren, Barbara Barry, et al., you are paying foremost for name recognition, not necessarily for quality. This is particularly true of designer middle-market lines destined for department stores such as Macy’s or The Bay, or discount emporiums like TJ Maxx and Winners. These sheets are always more expensive than the house brands, which may be equal or even superior in quality to designer-logo-label ones.

After snagging a particularly poor quality set of 500-thread-count sateen Barbara Barry sheets on sale at Winners, I decided to educate myself about sheeting so I wouldn’t get stung again.

WTF may be considered a profane acronym in certain circles, but in sheet world it stands for the three things that matter most: weave, thread count and fibre. Read more

The Ideal Way To Store Your Magazines

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Finally, a systematic way to keep magazines together yet separate in an attractive {and unobtrusive} arrangement.

 

THE CREATIVE SOLUTION | When you have large numbers of magazines, quick reference is not always easy. The standard way to keep periodicals organized is to store them in magazine file boxes, but these containers, which are often made of flimsy cardboard, hold only a minimal number of copies. As your magazine collection grows, so does your need for file boxes, which can end up looking like an unattractive, mashed-up mess when you can’t find more to match the style you started out with.

Faced with this very problem awhile back, I came up with a flexible yet consistent-looking way to sort and store my favourite mags. Read more

Soap Dish by Brendan Power- Heather Ross

How To Make A More Effective Soap Dish

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Here’s an attractive and easy way to address a perpetually slippery problem.

Soap Dish by Brendan Power- Heather Ross

 

CREATIVE SOLUTION | It may not be the biggest problem of our time, but how do you keep a bar of soap from turning into sludge—or sliding all over the place? Read more

Leaf Bookmarks- Martin Tessler

How To Preserve Leaves And Branches

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Who knew the garden could be an endless, free source of gorgeous bookmarks and gift tags.

Leaf Bookmarks- Martin Tessler

 

CREATIVE SOLUTION | We’ve all seen dried or preserved foliage—tired, dusty, brittle arrangements begging to thrown out. Preserving leaves in glycerin not only keeps them supple but makes them as tough as leather. Keep a bunch on hand for ready bookmarks or, if you now read all your novels on an electronic device, label them with metallic ink to use as place cards or gift tags. Read more

Flower arrangement by Brendan Power-Martin Tessler

Decorate The Table For Summer Dinner Parties

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Fresh ideas from the garden set the table—and the scene for summer entertaining.

Flower arrangement by Brendan Power-Martin Tessler

 

If you are planning a summer dinner party and want to decorate the table in a way that’s fresh and easy, here’s a spin on the current penchant for using formal table arrangements made of single flower variety in a single colour packed tightly into a vase. Read more