This is a guest post by fellow blogger Helen who is hip to all the latest and greatest in luxury bath design! Helen Davies currently works as a freelance writer for Better Bathrooms.

How many bathrooms have you seen recently that could be considered to be truly inspirational? I’ve been pondering this one, because I think a few elements need to come together in order for a room to achieve ‘inspiring’, or aspirational, status.

While other areas of the home seemingly become more colourful and vibrant, bathrooms are tending to go the other way. Contemporary bathrooms are very often neutral, soothing spaces, fitted with modern bathroom suites that are a pleasure to use, and designed to relax and revive. The use of natural materials fits well in this context and, with the trend for eco-friendly spaces also on the rise, recycled elements fit in well, too.

Imagine a space that’s light and airy with clean lines, natural materials and warm, neutral colours, strong eco credentials and some life-enhancing technology incorporated seamlessly to the design. Sound like a space you want to spend time?

By using a mix of real wood and natural stone, harnessing the beauty of flowing water and introducing soft, mood lighting and some intelligent gadgetry, this is precisely the kind of space you can achieve.

The technology which you introduce to an oasis of calm should be seamlessly integrated: sleek, green, and useful in that ‘how did I manage before this came along?’ kind of way.

And here it is: my top five technological picks for the aspirational bathroom haven of 2013…

1. Remote control shower with LED mood lighting: Start your shower from bed and get it to the perfect temperature before you even throw back the covers. Perfect for those chilly mornings… actually, perfect for any morning. And LED shower lighting is low energy but a great mood-enhancer.

2. Intelligent tap: A tap that uses facial recognition technology to adjust the flow and temperature of the water to your tastes, and it’s got a touchscreen for accessing to your schedule and checking your emails. So if you want to get a head start on your day, you can – but if you don’t, it’s still a beautiful tap that knows just how you like your water.

3. Heated toilet seat: Another one for chilly mornings. Does what it says, and makes life that little bit more luxurious as a result.

4. Shower powered radio: This little green gem is actually my favourite. Using nothing but the water pressure from your shower it pumps out music you can boogie round the bathroom to and it’s affordable, even on a tight budget.

Thanks Helen! Those are some gorgeous spaces. Readers, I don’t know about you, but most of those water temperature control features sound AMAZING (plus they are a safety feature for small children and the elderly). Sounds great to me!

Well, SOMEONE (Thisbe cat) has a case of the Mondays over here. While I’m trying to ignore her constant meowing and freakouts today, I’m thinking back fondly over birthday week. On Wednesday Ryan took me out to an indulgent dinner (we ate our weight in oysters from various dishes, among other things), followed by a rich and decadent dessert (Hot Cakes Molten Chocolate Cakery in Ballard). Thursday we ended up meeting my parents at the Alibi Room, right across from the infamous Seattle gum wall – my first visit to the tourist attraction! My intention was to read through my stack of magazines that’s been growing a few months but I didn’t read any AND two more came in the mail. Penciling in some time this week. And of course, May is not only the best month because of my birthday (wink wink), it’s also my favorite because the rhododendrons are in full swing. This one is next to a TREE a few blocks from our building. You can see how it earned the title of state flower (each one of those pink bundles is probably ten inches in diameter).

This week I have lots of outings planned, including a MUCH needed trip to the Design Center (opening some new accounts so I’m devoting an afternoon!). Plus I’m determined to get back to the gym – it’s been way too long since I’ve been and I’m in a wedding next month. Gotta tone those arms! Ryan and I are also working more on my website redesign (yay!), and I have a bunch of stuff to do for some clients.

Speaking of which, I am taking on summer projects NOW. If you’re looking at tackling some redecorating in June, July, or August (especially if there is any construction involved), it’s time to get in touch! Let’s get the process rolling. My schedule really starts to fill up in August, so it’s better to get a head start.

Have a great week!

Today is my 28th birthday! Mid-week birthdays can kind of be a drag, but I’ve got a latte and a big stack of magazines calling my name. Then it’s off to the salon for a trim, maybe a little shopping, then meeting up with Ryan for dinner out followed by decadent dessert. Sounds like a pretty good day to me!

P.S. I’m still slowly chipping away at my 30 before 30 list! I’ve only got 2 years to finish my short story, guess I should start on that today too, huh?

Photo by me last Valentine’s Day.

We love our new lamp from Lamps Plus, but there were a LOT of options to look through. Before we settled on one, I showed Ryan a ton of choices (he always gets veto power) and they were kind of all over the place! Based on size restrictions, we narrowed it down pretty quickly, but I thought it would be fun to share some of the other options I considered!

1. Color Plus: Lamps Plus has a really cool line of lighting where you can pick an EXACT color and then choose which shade you want to top it off! I considered this shade of red (and would had added some trim to the shade just for fun) before my ginger jar stole my heart.

2. Rose Canton: This is actually really close in design to the one we got, but with a multi-color pattern. Isn’t it the cutest?

3. Ventana: This mid-century inspired Jonathan Adler lamp was a little too tall, but I knew Ryan would love it. Kind of want to snap it up and save it for his office one day.

4. Gazebo: I loved this pattern but ultimately decided I didn’t need a drum shade. The cane motif is gorgeous!

5. Lotus Leaf: I am still in love with this one! It was just too tall for this spot. But I’m filing this away for our next apartment because I love it!

6. Floral Blue and White: This was one of the final picks, but ultimately Ryan vetoed it in favor of the one we got – I love the vase shape on it though.

So many options, so little table top! Can’t wait until we’re in a bigger space – I’ll go lamp crazy!

P.S. Looks like Lamps Plus has tons of stuff on sale right now! Head over if you’re in need of lighting!

Well our wedding is now just five months and a few days away! Which means we’ve been hard at work the last three and a half months since Ryan proposed. We have all the big decisions basically done, and find ourselves now with about a million and a half small decisions. Wedding planning is NOT everything I thought it would be. I’m thrilled, of course, to be engaged to my love, but I’d always told him I’d want a year to plan and really “enjoy” being engaged. Man, I’m glad we missed that mark because five months out I’m ready for the whole thing to be done and just be married already! I don’t like being that person who only thinks/talks about her wedding!

Psst! Sneak peek at our venue, above!

Here are some of the things that have been going on in Morgan/Stephens wedding land…

1. EVERYTHING is more expensive than we thought it would be. Like, a thousand dollars more EACH. We’d originally thought we could pinch and do the wedding for $15k (before I’d looked up any vendors). Maybe that would have been possible if circumstances were different (we didn’t want to get married in the city, we weren’t having an October wedding in a rainy city, we had a childhood home that would accommodate us, if we were a super DIY graphic design team who’s cousin is a DJ and best friend bakes wedding cakes). But generally the non-negotiables for us meant that the budget instantly rose by another $10k. The sad part is, in many ways we’re still thinking in terms of a “budget” wedding – we just chose some spurge items that were absolutely essential to us. We’re lucky to have help from our parents as well as forking up a chunk ourselves (hence the not buying much for the apartment lately), and we don’t want to take on any wedding debt.

2. We don’t like WEDDING STUFF that much. Matching bridesmaids. Ballrooms. Chair slipcovers. The concept of “wedding colors”. Upholstered card boxes. Cheesy bridal party poses. Garters (whose idea was THAT?). And at (nearly) 28 years old and having attended MANY weddings, I’ve realized… we don’t HAVE to do anything other than say vows and sign the marriage license. Approaching everything from point of “do we want to do this” and incorporating only the traditions/elements that appeal to us has been AWESOME. What are my wedding colors? Well, I don’t have “purple and orange” where everything is color matched – we’re using a palette of hues ranging from ivory to nude to blush to dove gray, with hits of charcoal and evergreen… not what the caterer wants to hear when picking out linens!

3. We’re also on a “take it or leave it” attitude with wedding trends. I’m not styling a magazine spread – it doesn’t matter to me if the ideas have “been done” and I also don’t care if it’s “the hot new thing” if I don’t like it. When is a trend “over” and who decides? Guess what – if you love it, it’s always in style. You don’t have to cater to anyone else’s taste but you and your spouse-to-be (and it helps to throw the moms a bone once in a while). Falling under this category is keeping DIY projects to the bare minimum! I am not a DIY bride, I am NOT a crafter. I MIGHT paint our names on a mailbox for a card box and I MIGHT make my own veil. Otherwise if it’s too complicated to do ourselves or too expensive to hire out, we’re skipping it. Also, I didn’t want to decorate a whole bunch, so our wedding is in an art gallery. It comes decorated. We’re adding flowers and candles (and table linens) and that’s about it. Keeping it simple!

4. We’re getting creative in cutting costs. Yes, some things were a lot more expensive than we expected. But we’re willing to trim other places to make it happen. I love our wedding invitations (getting samples next week!) but they could have been wayyyy more expensive had I opted to do letterpress or foil instead of printing, and we skipped the extras like ribbons or a million inserts and inner envelope. I want them to be pretty, but simple is fine. We also wanted REALLY good food (we’re both kinda foodies) but we couldn’t afford the kind of sit-down dinner where everything is amazing… so we’re having really amazing heavy hors d’ouevres. Not only is the food price-per-head less (even $5 less per person counts when you have 100 guests), but we’re renting fewer tables and linens, plates, and flatware. Not to mention fewer tables = fewer centerpieces. I’ve always loved wedding cake designs, but we got major sticker shock looking at wedding cakes ($900?!) and realizing that we’ve eaten our fair share of dry cake with plasticky fondant. Taste and cost over-ruled and we’re doing an assortment of yummy two-layer bakery cakes for closer to $300. Easy.

5. Working together has been a saving grace. Lots of people have assumed that I, as a bride and as a designer, am dictating the whole wedding. Or even pre-planned the whole thing before Ryan even proposed. Couldn’t be farther from the truth (and this attitude kind of hurts my feelings). Sure, I had ideas I’d gathered with Ryan’s taste in mind, but the actual vendors we’ve hired are ALL different from what I’d initially thought  - most of them I hadn’t heard of before we started actually calling around. And as someone who might have the tendency to over-think the planning process, it has helped SO much to talk over everything with Ryan and to make decisions together as quickly as possible. No drawn-out mulling over napkin color. I find a source, we look at options, we pick. Boom. Ryan was in charge of the catering (found a bunch of options, called for quotes, went over the estimates and menus). As soon as we found ourselves hemming and hawing over two, we just picked one. Perfect is the enemy of done. We’ve found it really helps to schedule wedding planning sessions (with wine, naturally). We go through our checklist, tackle the most urgent items, assign “homework” to be completed for next time (like gathering estimates), and we’re done. Whenever we get too stressed out or have been doing a lot of planning stuff, we schedule a non-wedding day where we spend time together doing something fun and don’t talk about wedding planning. Keeps us sane.

This is getting crazy long so I’ll leave my other topics for another day. Is there anything you want to hear about specifically? Still keeping wedding posts to a minimum, but thought this was a good check-in point to share our process!

I happened to win a ticket rather last minute, so I hadn’t planned on getting to partake, but I am SO glad that I did! I’ve been feeling a little lost in the direction to take my business next. After two years, I feel like it’s time to ramp up and get more of the jobs that I love working on, and some bigger projects. But I wasn’t really sure what steps to take to do so, and not sure how to manage the additional tasks that come with bigger projects. Now I have tons of ideas and a lot of powerpoints to review and take more notes from!

Plus I got to meet some amazing people!

Lori Dennis and Kelli Ellis (both of HGTV fame, plus successful interior designers) are the Design Camp founders! It’s truly because of them that Design Camp has such a great spirit of support and education (no snottiness or closed-doors allowed).

Why yes, this IS me and Million Dollar Decorator Nathan Turner.

Love that we had some Seattle flavor – my friend and famed blogger Cassandra LaValle of Coco+Kelley talked all about blogging.

I also met big-wig blogger (and now author) Ronda Rice Carmen of All The Best blog, who stuck around for both days and signed books – her new book is from Rizzoli and called Designers at Home.

Seattle ladies Cassie Daughtrey and Keri Petersen were my table buddies on day one (Keri’s daughter is also a Maggie Rose!). They were speakers on day two and taught us all a ton about staging for real estate sales.

Me and Keri (on a fabulous Kravet sofa).

All the wonderful folks at Design Camp Seattle!

Some of the big changes you’ll see  (and won’t see, but will be happening behind the scenes!):

1. My rates will be going up.

2. E-decorating will likely be folded into my regular design services, at least for now.

3. A major overhaul of my accounting and project management tools, including new systems for ordering client goods.

4. Working toward more streamlined installs and finding the best teams to bring in to help with this.

5. Outsourcing some of the more tedious work so I can focus my time on design.

6. More in-depth blog posts with design tips (I’ve been feeling very stuck on these, but lots of ideas brewing now).

7. Opening more accounts at more showrooms and with new vendors to offer the absolute BEST products to my clients.

…and more.

I’m so glad I had the chance to meet these inspiring ladies (and a few gents) to get my butt in gear and get fired up about putting changes in motion that I’ve been hesitating to take action on. An awesome experience all around.

A new lamp for our living room has been on my agenda for a long time. I love the Delta lamp we have, but it was just a bit too big for the spot, and having a white desk and white shelf AND a white lamp with a white shade was starting to blend together into a big blur. So I got in touch with one of my favorite affordable lighting sources, Lamps Plus, and not only did they have a ton of options in the style I was considering, they offered to send it to me for free (so sweet of them, but I definitely still chose exactly which one I wanted).

This shelf is kinda chunky, so it makes the lamp look a little on the petite size, but it’s a pretty normal sized lamp – but I love that it’s narrow so it makes my view from the desk into the hallway look a million times more spacious. Plus I love the flirty little shape of the shade – we had way too many drum shades happening around here, and I like to mix it up. You can find it here.

Reminder of old lamp (now in the bedroom):

And back to present! How cute is that finial?

Ryan helped me pick which blue and white ceramic was the best (we were annoyingly picky). And with the new gallery wall, we felt a little limited by height constraints, but we still had options. There were a few lamps that I loved (both in blue and white and some other totally different options) that just didn’t fit in this spot, and I’ll share some of those with you later this week!

(Sidenote: I’m obsessed with these little basket sets from Ikea. I’ve got to stop using them everywhere, but they are so handy and cheap! This one has quarters for our laundry).

I love it! It’s the perfect piece for this room and I think we’ll be able to incorporate it in future apartments too (especially because of my growing blue and white jar collection. It’s an obsession.).

And because I just couldn’t help myself, a new pillow too, also from Lamps Plus (only $50 and came with a pillow form!). We needed something a little less “sweet” to pair with the floral.

A huge thanks to Lamps Plus – their selection is awesome (no joke, I looked through EVERY table lamp to make sure I didn’t miss a winner). There is really something at every price point. I’ll have a little round-up of some of my favorites in a couple days!

What do you think? I was a little worried it would look too small – but it’s basically the same height but with a slimmer profile. And I love the blue and white!

Happy Monday, my friends! As you can see, a few things in the apartment moved around this weekend, meaning I’ll have new pictures from the living room for you later this week! Just have to tweak a few things and take photos.

I apologize for the radio silence last week! I won tickets to Design Camp – a two day (plus third evening meet and greet) last week here in Seattle and was spending every waking minute  absorbing TONS of information about the business of design and also upcoming trends and new materials from industry insiders (still dreaming about the yard of silk velvet I got to pet). And of course, meeting a lot of fabulous ladies – many were local and some had flown in from all over the country. Getting to meet other Seattle designers is a real treat though because there aren’t a lot of mingling opportunities. We may have to change that!

Now of course is my first day back in the office and luckily I have no appointments on the calendar  I’ve got all day to go back and review the info from Design Camp and start making lists. Because it wouldn’t do to get all fired up and recharged and then to go back to what I’ve always done – oh no. BIG changes will be happening, some almost immediately.

I have more info to share from Design Camp (and a few photos!) but I’ll save that for another day.

I also know I haven’t shared a single peep about wedding planning for a few weeks! We’ve been terribly lazy, actually. Since all the big things are taken care of, we’ve sort of been dropping the ball on the bitsy things, but we’re determined to get back on track this week. In many ways it has been very overwhelming and I think we’re just ready to be married and on our honeymoon (we’re booking that soon – Palm Springs!). Counting down to October! I’ll have more wedding details (and some resources for other brides) coming up this week!

And then a friendly email from Jayson Home landed in my inbox and their catalog arrived almost the same day, and in both instances I found myself practically drooling over a bed with an entirely different shape.

The George.

Whereas I’ve been loving tall headboards, this one is much lower. And while my stint as a hotel maid in college put me off footboards (takes longer to tuck in the duvet), something about this one is calling my name. Love the double nailhead trim around the bottom and the tiny brass feet.

Of course, with a price point of $3,195 for a queen it’s out of MY budget for the time being, but I’d love to use this for a client! And maybe file away for inspiration for my dream house.

Soft pink walls, a collection of art, a vintage dresser, and a Pottery Barn Kids glider.

A blurry shot of the crib and Target bedding. Clara hasn’t slept in here yet but I’m sure she’ll love it!

Love the pop of gold.

This fabric (just from Joann’s) was put to use on a pillow and this lampshade. Pottery Barn Kids curtains.

A sweet changing spot (I can’t get enough of those tiny socks!). Changing pad cover is Layla Grace.

Welcome, baby Clara!