211 Elizabeth Condos

Roman and Williams (previously featured in the post on the Practical Magic House) are so incredible I may have to do a series of posts of them. Here's some shots from a project called 211 Elizabeth -- a built from the ground up set of brownstone condos in Nolita.


A dramatic wall of 9 foot high glass doors—with true divided lights and transoms—intersects the living room and dining room. Every living room has a large wood-burning fireplace. The floors are walnut herringbone parquet, and the baseboards, casings, windows and doors are trimmed in Roman & Williams’ favorite high gloss black oil paint by Fine Paints of Europe.

Although transom lights and herringbone parquet may be more than you can swing for your house, high gloss black paint on the trim is an easy update. (I'm using this approach in my addition -- we'll see how it looks....)


...vanities are painted a high gloss cream and feature double mirrors, double sinks and patinated brass fixtures. Walls, floors, and vanity tops are fashioned from slabs of Calacatta Gold marble detailed by acorn topped brass headbolts.

This is a lot of marble, but white vanities topped with marble are easily found. Antiqued brass fixtures aren't common yet, but I found a couple of options through the big box retailer's special order programs for my bathrooms.


...all shelves with glass fronts are framed in walnut and painted by hand with high gloss black oil paint. Counters are rendered in Danish oiled wood.

I don't actually like these cabinets, but check out the floors. Walnut herringbone! Gorgeous. And the squared off lighting adds another geometric touch.

These are just renderings, but I'd love to see some real life pictures of these homes.

What do you think?

Art Donovan's New Wall Lamp

Art Donovan has a new wall sconce:


It's hard to see here, but the interior of medallion on the left rotates, with some fancy blue light phasing in and out.

What I want to know is what material Art used for the gold mesh caging -- remember, this is the man who has used slinkies in his designs before.

Nice work!

Tonight: Steampunk Gadgets in Warehouse 13


This just in...

SyFy (formerly SciFi) Network's new show Warehouse 13 -- X-Files crossed with a warehouse full of antique supernatural gadgets -- premieres tonight (and Datamancer has a keyboard featured!).

Read about it here. See more gadgetry pictures here. There seems to be a nice Victorian house involved, too.

If you watch it, let me know what you think. And if you figure out how to watch it without cable, please let me know!

9 The Movie

Automata (or golems -- it's hard to tell if it's magic or science that created them), mad scientist creator, the obligatory airship, post apocalyptic. It's nicely dark and grungy. It's 9 The Movie.



There's some good mad scientist bits here:
http://www.filminfocus.com/focusfeatures/film/9

I'm looking forward to more of the sets.

Kozo Lamps

David sent me this find -- some wonderful, industrial, lamps by kozo lamp. (And we love lighting, don't we? Sometimes I worry that I post *too* many lighting options, but then decide, "nah, stylish electricity is the easiest way to steampunk a house.")


The Kozo 3.

Here's what the makers have to say about the lamps: “With a bit of humor and a certain audacity, KOZO lamps stand as alien lighting figures, telling a new story”


The Kozo 2.

KOZO lamps are made out of galvanized iron plumbing tubes, hand picked and collected from different manufacturers. each bares the trademarks of its origin.
Kozo 1

The materials are left as authentic as possible with a little rust at the joints and some marks from hand tools that were used in the assembly process.




Kozina