One way to get started with gardening is to get the Culinary Herb Garden Kit, which includes seeds and growing instructions for eight useful herbs, and plant them in these practical Self-watering Flower Pots by Eva Solo. Both of these are great gifts too.

Tend to your plants like a pro wearing these Tattoo City Waterproof Gardening Boots and using a colorful Calle Gardening Tool Set.

When your plants need water you can turn to this funky Alessi Watering Can, or the sleek Blomus Watering Can in stainless steel.

Be the envy of your neighbors by acquiring a modern version of the classic gardening gnome, like these Urban Gnomes and the rebellious Flamingo-Away.

Below are some ideas for your next quick and easy redecoration.

Wall decals work best on smooth surfaces, and are very easy to use and apply. They are virtually foolproof. If you mess up, they are easily removed and reapplied.

Wall decals do not harm your walls when you take them off, so they are great for people who are renting and want to be able to remove decoration easily with no damages.

If you would like a customized wall decal in a particular shape, size, or color there are several Etsy stores that are willing to help you with making your wall decal idea come through. Check out Singlestonestudios and Shanon1972.

In a previous post I mentioned one of my favorite chandeliers, the Zettel’z 6 chandelier by Ingo Maurer. Here it is again, accompanied by some other wonderful sources of light that would add beauty and functionality to any home.

To wear

From top left: Skull Bib, Raised by Wolves onesie, iPoo onesie, cute baby shoes, My Mom is Hotter than Yours onesie, and My Daddy Rocks onesie.

To Cuddle

From top left: Ludic the Woollyhoodwink, Billy the Tuff Bunny, Drunk Underwear Man (I wonder why its no longer for sale…?), and Bop’N Beep.

To Watch

From top left: Flights of Fancy Mobile and Moo Cow Mobile.

To Read

From top left: The Baby Owner’s Manual and The Baby Owner’s Maintenance Log, great introduction books for techie parents. Baby Fix My Car and Baby Mix Me a Drink, great educational books for your baby to learn how to do something useful for their parents

These days, I live in a tropical zone with no snow or pine trees, and my beloved horse is just happy memories, which leaves me to get my holiday tree in a different fashion. Since deforestation is threatening the earth’s ecobalance, and I really can’t stand plastic plants, I have been looking for alternatives to the traditional Xmas tree. Below are some of the options I’ve found.

Wooden trees bring a piece of nature into your home. They can be reused and painted and decorated to fit any style. X’mas tree from Sandra Lindner and Green X-mas Tree from Buro North.

Live potted Xmas trees will make your home fragrant. Get a live rosemary tree or start a tradition by growing your own Xmas tree from scratch.

Shiny metal tealight holder Xmas trees will brighten your season and provide a place to hang your Xmas ornaments. The Estilo stainless steel tealight tree and Nickel plated tree tealite holder are great options.

Xmas tree wall stickers is a great modern alternative for rooms with limited space. Artsy vinyl Xmas tree by Phoebe Washburn and vinyl Xmas tree by Marilyn Minter. The Xmas tree wall graphic decal 1 and Xmas tree wall graphic decal 2 from Etsy comes in lots of different colors.

Something to consider for next Xmas?

Add a campfire to your coffee table. From left Carl Mertens’ Fireplace for the Tabletop, Table Fire Tavolo, Fire & Ice Coffee Table, and Really Hot fire furniture.

In this posting, I will present some beds that may make you wonder if you are awake or dreaming. At the very least you will fall asleep with a smile on your face

The Floating Bed

I would love to go to sleep in this bed designed by Janjaap Ruijssenaars! Actually, I would love to go to sleep in this room… The floating bed is kept off the ground by enough magnets to keep 900 kg in the air. To make sure that the bed doesn’t float away (because of wind or other things that may rock your bed…), it is anchored to the walls by four cables. With a price tag at over a million dollars (yes, that is six 0’s), I doubt this bed will be more than a dream for most of us. But what a lovely dream…

A cheaper version of the floating bed is this round floating bed, which is a little less elegant and suspended from the ceiling.

The Cocoon Bed

The Lomme bed is a little on the science fiction side. I can imagine storm troopers sleeping in these. Well, at least it would match their uniforms. Talking about matching: you can change the color of the light inside the bed, allowing you to color coordinate with either your bedroom or your Star Wars pajama. The Lomme’s color changing feature is intended for light therapy, and it features a unique light therapy alarm clock.

Jokes aside, I do love the smooth and futuristic design of this bed, and the color therapy sounds intriguing, but what other furniture would it go with? The classic Bubble Chair by Eero Aarnio? Maybe this is a challenge for Julieann, the Tastemaker Diaries’ interior designer?

The Rocking Bed

This bed literally rocks! Getting rocked to sleep is no longer an experience reserved only for babies. This is a rocking bed for adults, and any little motion you make will make it rock (think about it…). Luckily for the easily motion sick among us, you can get stoppers that will keep the bed still. The circular lines really appeal to me, but I am not sure rocking is my thing. I wonder if you can get it to roll around the room if you only rock it hard enough? Hmmm…

The Cloud Bed

Is sleeping amongst the clouds your thing? This clean cut wooden canopy bed has cloud-shaped cut-outs, allowing light to peek in at you as the sun rises.

I think this bed is really adorable, maybe something for a young girl or boy’s room?

The Tree Bed

Would you like to rest among the trees? This wrought iron tree bed with a little birds’ nest nestled at the top is quite whimsical and charming.

If you are the decorating type, I am sure you can finds lots of fun ways to decorate the bare iron branches. The rest of us might find the odd piece of clothing hanging off a branch after a late evening…

Central fireplaces are very decorative and cozy to gather around…not to mention the easiest to install. From top left: Atrium Fireplace, Bathiscafocus Fireplace, Fireorb, and T-eye Rotating Fireplace.

Great fireplaces that need no chimney!

Traditional fireplaces are a part of the architectural structure of a home, and not very easy nor cheap to add in hindsight. But despair not, many of the absolute most amazing fireplace solutions do not require a chimney or advanced installation. These clean-burning fireplaces run on green fuels and provide great decoration, lighting, and heat to any room.

Floor-mounted, clean-burning gas fireplaces. From left a Two-way EcoSmart Fire and the Ponton fireplace.

Modern wall mounted gas fireplaces that don’t need any chimney. From left CHIMO Fireplace and Bubble Fireplace.

Do you know of any great looking, clean-burning, chimney-less fireplaces? Please share.

Here are some of my picks for this Halloween, trying to walk the fine line of wacky, tacky, and tasty. If it’s too late for this year’s party, you might be able to pick up end-of-season bargains for next year’s bash!

Trick or treat?

From top left: skull candles, Murano Alzate deep black glassware, Skull cocktail shaker and glass, bleeding candles, skeleton yard flamingos, and bone soaps.

From top left: Haunted Chocolate Castle, Bat-suckers with glow sticks, Costume Kid Cookies, Chocolate Skulls, and Chocolate Coffins.

Among the coat racks found in my stylefeed my current favorite is the Ivy modular coat rack. Besides having great lines and functionality I love the fact that its modular. This allow you to both adapt the size of the coat rack to your needs and to the space it inhabits. If you are a family of 13 you can expand the coat rack so there is room for everyone’s coat. And if your hallway is the size of Taj Mahal you can decorate an entire wall with the Ivy coat rack. No need to hold back!

I also like the curvy and girly Forget-me-not coat hooks by Charlotte Lancelot. They come in white, black, orange, and red.

I have inherited a love for trees from my dad. I do think he would approve of these Hall Tree coat hooks and the Tree coat hanger by Michael Young and Katrin Petursdottir, even though I suspect he would have preferred the prior in wood rather than stainless steel. He loves anything wooden… Maybe Aysia, the Tastemaker Diaries’ in house eco fashionista would agree with him?

Martin Kleinhans’ wardrobe is another modular system for hanging up your clothes. It allows you to organize shelves and hooks as you please on a colorful wall fixture. The smart Hook box does not only provied you with a hook for your coat, but also a box for your gloves and earmuffs, and other items that are hard to hang.

The fun and colorful Pulpo Drop coat rack by Julian Appelius would make quite a statement in a bold hallway, and a row of BASTIS hooks from IKEA would brighten any child’s room at the great price of $1.99 a piece. What kid wouldn’t like to hang their clothes on a dog’s butt?

Mr Mrs Hangup and Fifi & Fafa wall hangers are great examples of his and her hooks. My personal favorite is the latter with their clean lines and not-so-subtle gender attributes. Lets face it, us girls have twice as much clothes to hang anyways.

The HANG wall hooks from Seletti come with instructions, so there should be no excuse for not hanging up your coat. Another favorite of mine: the Footprint shoe rack by Charlotte Tangye come in both children and adult sizes and leaves no doubt what its for.

Fellow Stylefeeder member hzwicker, a favorite on my watchlist, shared this bird coat rack by Icelandic Stella Design with me.

Do you know of a decorative, interesting or fun coat rack/hook/hanger design? Please post a comment and share with the rest of us

Transparent Concrete Walls Anyone?

The last thing I think of when hearing the word transparent is concrete, but despite this, the Hungarian architect Áron Losonczi has invented something as incredible as light-transmitting concrete. He calls this new material LiTraCon, and I can’t wait to see what people will do with it!

Transparent concrete walls requires some planning ahead, and most of us are stuck with already existing walls. But don’t despair! There a lots of ways to make your walls stand out without rebuilding them from scratch.

Light Emitting Wallpaper

The Dutch designer Jonas Samson has designed light-emitting wallpaper. It looks pretty interesting, but his website doesn’t explain the details of the concept. In particular, it doesn’t explain how you make your walls light up. It looks to me like his wallpaper requires entire light walls, in which case, it will involve a considerable amount of work. Let’s find an easier way to decorate our walls shall we?

Wall Stickers, Wall Tattoos, Wall Decals

The wall sticker trend has been around for a while. They offer a fast and fun way to decorate your walls without leaving permanent marks. Great if you are renting a place, or for children’s spaces that need to change as they grow older. Below are some of the wall stickers from my StyleFeed.

I love the seven panel Moroso wall graphic by designer Tord Bontje. It’s typical for his style, but maybe a little too busy for my taste. This fingerprint wall sticker is more my cup of tea: simple, symbolic, and way more affordable. Speaking of affordable, IKEA offers wall stickers as well. The SLATTHULT poppy wall sticker is one of their creations. Why not create your own little piece of Paris by adding this Eiffel Tower wall sticker to your wall?

Paint-by-numbers Wallpaper and Wall Strips

Finally, you’re allowed to draw on the walls! Bring out your inner kid with these paint-by-number wallpapers and wall strips from 2Jane . You are recommended to use crayons or paint pens to fill in the designs, but any paints, markers, or colored pencils will do!

Lights & Shadows

Probably the fastest and easiest way to add decoration to a wall and make it stand out is playing with lights and shadows.

Not as advanced as the light-transmitting concrete wall, but Reveal lighting by Adam Frank creates the illusion of natural sunlight streaming in through a double window and onto your interior wall. The Lumen Oil Lamp comes in several different versions and also brings a little outdoors inside.

Seen any interesting walls lately? Post a comment, I’d like to know

Write it on the Chandelier

Ingo Maurer’s Zettel’z 6 chandelier has been on my wish list for a long time. Why anyone haven’t bought it for me yet is a true mystery (hint, hint..). This wonderful chandelier includes 40 printed and 40 blank sheets of rice paper. In other words: you can dress this light fixture with your favorite poems, love letters, pencil drawings, etc. What a wonderful way to leave a message to your honey!

Write it on the Wall

A $1200 chandelier is of course not the only way to leave a message in your home. Chalkboard stickers are somewhat cheaper and can look great in your home office, your kitchen, a playroom, or in the hallway. They come in lots of different shapes and colors, and can definitely be decorative as well as useful.

Write it in the Shower

We have all written messages with our fingers on the bathroom mirror after a hot shower. Chances are, not all of these messages were ever read by others. Did you know that you can use your bathroom mirror as a white board and leave more permanent and visible messages using dry erase markers or Crayolas? If you don’t want to mess up the pretty reflection of yourself in the mirror you can put up one of these frosted glass white boards next to it.

What if you need to take notes while you’re in the shower? (Just admit it, you can get some pretty amazing ideas while showering.) The erasable shower note tablet is the solution to that problem. I’m pretty sure you didn’t know you needed one… but think about it.

Say it with a Bean

Here is a perfect solution for those of you who don’t mind it taking 1-2 weeks for your message to be read: the message bean!

“…each magical Message Bean grows with an actual word lasered onto one side and an image on the other. Simply remove the foil top and bottom of the can (for drainage), and add a 1/2 cup of water to the enclosed soil — in just 1-2 weeks, the bean will poke through the surface, revealing the special message! The bean then sprouts into a small plant that can be kept in the container or replanted. A simple and original way to send a greeting.”

The message beans are available in Happy Holidays (with two stars), Love (with a heart), Happy Birthday (with a musical note) and Thank You (with “Thanks” in Japanese).

Say it the Geeky Way

Us uber-geeks are all wishing we could leave holographic messages like princess Leah in the original Star Wars movies, but until these are commercially available (which they will be, like all good science fiction ideas), we will have to resort to less impressive means of communication like the WavyWand and InfoGlobe.

Say it with M&M’s

I love M&Ms, and my better half, the wonderful Mr A, cannot get enough of them. On top of this my good friend, the lovely Miss T, has inside connections in the Mars company, and keeps feeding our addiction with new and exiting beta flavors of the drug of our choice. Could it possibly get any better?

Yes, it can! You can get m&ms in the color of your choice with your own personal messages on both sides. It’s the perfect valentines day gift, birthday gift, xmas treat, wedding treat, etc. So if you don’t want to spend the money buying me the Ingo Maurer chandelier, then at least get me some candy!

Say it with a Toast

I suspect the following devices were invented right about the time when the first virgin Mary grilled cheese sandwich was sold for their weight in gold on ebay. These are toaster/printers which allows you to print messages and images on slices of bread while toasting them. Maybe not the greatest way of leaving a message since the receiver of the message would have to be around to enjoy the toast while it is warm (I’m not sure how excited I would be if someone left me a cold toast), but I can see it being a fun way to teach your kids how to read or to just liven up the Sunday breakfast with a dirty joke.

Leave me a comment if you know of a decorative or fun way to leave a message!

Egg Chair by Arne Jacobsen (1958), LC4 Chaise Longue by Le Corbusier (1928)

Noguchi Coffee Table by Isamu Noguchi (1944), Monte Carlo Bench – Eileen Gray (1925)

If you are lucky enough to find an original, and have the money to buy it, I truly envy you. But for those of us who are not so lucky, there are companies offering replicas of these modern classics for a cheaper price, so we can still enjoy owning one.

If you have a favorite modern classic, please let me know about it in the comments

First let me make one thing clear: I am not talking about a regular personalized photo-mug or mouse pad that you can order from any online photo printing service. Think bigger and bolder! I am talking about making your photos the focal point of a room, proudly displaying your best snaps and giving them the attention they really deserve!

Your Photo Blinds

Don’t have a room with a view? Do something about it! Get your favorite photo printed on window treatments like blinds or shades. Balcony Vacations is one of the companies who offer this service, and some of them do customized sizes as well. With the daylight spilling through your blinds and illuminating your photo of a French meadow you can bring a little piece of nature into the city and pretend it’s summer all year long…

Your photo Table

Desktop Design is an Austrian firm that produces tables with photo and graphic surfaces. They provide a collection of high quality photos to chose from, but are also open for you sending them your photo or pattern to include in a table top. Their tables come in different sizes and you can choose between aluminum and wood materials. FYI: their website is only in German…

Your photo Tiles

Tired of those pale pink tiles in your bathroom, or the decorative village motif tiles in the kitchen? Why not replace them with one, or several, of your own wonderful photos? Fotokakel is a Swedish company who transfer high resolution photos onto glass tiles. They offer a library of photos to chose from, but are also open for you supplying your own photos. You can have your photos converted into one tile, or blown up on a set of many tiles. So now you can have your own photo of reef fish, shot while diving in Fiji, covering your shower walls. FYI: their website is only in Swedish…

Your photo Wallpaper

Wallpapers have been in for a while. Why not truly own your walls by marking them with your own photos? There are several companies that offer to turn your photos into wallpapers. Of the ones I have looked at ID-Wall is the only one publishing their prices, while the others say they will send you a quote based on your online inquiry. I personally have mixed feelings about photo wallpapers, but like anything else it can be pulled off with good taste and an eye for composition. It will certainly add character to your home!

Your photo Lighting

According to the Swiss company Anathome these ultra-flat LED panels, covered with prints, veneer, wallpapers or fabrics, will be in production soon. I expect they will let you customize the panels with you own photos. Anathome’s concept is modular panels (Yay, I love modular systems. Its like LEGO for adults!), and besides the announced LED panels they do regular wall panels and other surfaces customized with photos or other types of finish.

Prefer graphic designs over photos? I bet all these products can be personalized with your own high resolution design as well as photos. Go crazy with creativity

My style can safely be called eclectic. The kinds of things that catch my attention are interesting and pleasing to the eye, make me smile, and have that unexpected extra dimension that gives them character. This includes modern furniture, ethnic antiques, artsy wall decor, silly gadgets, stylish recycling, and ingenious designs. I blame traveling and having lived in a handful of different countries, picking up aspects of various cultures and making them part of who I am.

Almost everything you’ll find in my Stylefeed are things I would love to own if I only had enough money to buy them and enough space to put them in. But who needs 27 beds, 54 lamps, and 32 couches! In future posts, I will share some of my favorites with you, and I hope you will enjoy them as much as I do!