Long story short…when I first moved to NYC, I was roommates with an awesome guy, Josh, living in an awesome loft in Brooklyn. Soon after, Josh took off on a world-wide adventure growing a company called InTheMo with his long time friend and colleague. Fast forward 5 years, and InTheMo now has offices in several cities, and the New York team has moved out of Josh’s living room into a beautiful 3500 sq ft loft near Union Square. What does every interactive digital media company need? A 30 foot bar. That’s where I come in.

I definitely couldn’t do it alone, so my boyfriend Aaron came on board to tackle this beast with me. We started by collecting inspiration images.  Even though we were building a bar in a very tech-savvy office, we wanted to give it a rustic look to contrast that. Most of our favorite inspiration rooms incorporated reclaimed materials and industrial or vintage fixtures, which was a great direction to go in for a big bar on a budget.

As a company fueled by young creatives, it was important to have a place for colleagues, friends, and clients to come together over a beer or an espresso to discuss exciting projects and potential collaborations. The goal was for this office to eventually become a great place to screen films, host music performances, and of course party. This is a pic of the back corner of the loft, future home of the bar.

Pondering proportions. Mapping out the footprint with masking tape.

We bought the reclaimed wood from a guy we found on Craigslist.  We had barely enough to wrap around the bar, so we cut it into smaller pieces to minimize waste and stacked the planks in a contemporary pattern.

We stained some slightly moldy wood lathe 15 different colors which gave it the perfect rustic patina. We staggered the pieces and nailed them to the wall surrounding the custom liquor shelf and all along the window wall.

Cutting sheets of steel for the foot rest, one of my favorite details. I have to give Aaron props for doing most of the hard core building all by himself. He’s super talented. A bar of this size is a beast of a job for 2 people in a time crunch. It was literally just the two of us working on this project every night after the office folk went home, like DIY vampires. At least now I can cross “build a bar” off my design bucket list!

That’s Mo the moose.

InTheMo provides production/video/web services all over the world. Learn more about them here!

Since the new year, I’ve spent fewer than 10 days in my Brooklyn apartment. I stayed in NYC for the holidays, so in January I went back to the Bay Area to see the fam, then got caught up in a whirlwind of activity that included a long stint in LA and shorter stints in Taiwan and Miami. I won’t linger on the details, but in a nutshell, I worked on a few shows with some awesome people, went to the beach a bunch of times (Jen + sun? Weird, I know), and spent too much time and money at Yogurtland. Yum, passion fruit probiotics!!!

I’m back in NYC now. The city is gloriously bright and brisk and as usual, I am crippled by the blooms wreaking havoc on my sinuses. Time for serious spring cleaning which includes tediously editing and archiving photos taken in the last few months. As you can see, I’ve wholeheartedly hopped onto the instagr.am bandwagon. Here are some of my favorites.

I love meeting Project Runway fans because they are always super enthusiastic and loyal. Most people who watch it LOVE it and say something to the extent of “I’m a Project Runway junkie,” or “I’m obsessed, I’ve never missed an episode.”  The show pioneered artistic/creative reality competitions, and after 9 seasons, it’s no surprise that they decided to do an all stars season. The All Stars finale aired last week, and if you missed it, you can check out some full episodes on the website.  This season’s set featured a new shiny runway, new interview set, and pearly rainbow work room.

New shiny white runway! I took those pictures in the back. They’re abstract pics of NYC architecture.

New interview set with squares! I love geometry.

Wonder how we pulled off this look? LOTS of paint colors, and LOTS of tape, applied by the steady hands of our friends Vin & Janell of Blue Swan Painters.

The glorious return of tape baby!

Big shout out to Katherine D., Luis, Keith, Andrea, Katherine, and Erin. And big thanks to the awesome production team for supporting us and making a great show!

Most of you know by now that I’m kind of schitzo when it comes to my work. I do TV shows, I design websites, I take pictures, I make beanies etc. People often ask me what I like to do the most, and interiors for reality TV are definitely my favorite projects to work on. I’ve noticed a pattern; the more outrageous the show the show, the funner the set. (When I was a kid “funner” was not a word. But now it is.)

Last summer I got to work on Love Games 3 with many of my favorite designer friends. It’s a rowdy dating show about 3 Bad Girls in a mansion and the 13 guys trying to win their affections. The season has already aired, but you can watch many of the episodes here.

For this show, the idea was to transform the house into an exotic beach retreat. It was a grand group effort and we managed to design and build tons of ambitious projects in a short amount of time. Big high five to Rick G., Katherine D., Katherine L.,  Laura, Jake + awesome builder guys, Chris, Niles, Aaron, and Heather. GO ART DEPARTMENT! May our unicorn flag fly high with pride!

Everything is more awesome when covered in sequins. Thanks Tony for building this beast, and Katherine and Heather for melting all the skin off your little fingers to make it sparkle. :)

All beach houses should be near water. No water in sight? Build a moat. BAM.

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I’m blogging from Taiwan!  I’m so grateful and amazed that technology allows me to do this. I just found out I can imessage people back at home if I’m on a wifi network. So awesome. It’s a ghost town around here because of Chinese New Year, so I’m huddled in the house wearing 6 layers catching up on emails and computer work. It’s only 58 degrees but for some reason I’m freezing. Last night I bought new fuzzy socks and wound up wearing a pair on my hands. My grandmother laughed at me. I’ll probably venture out with my cameras later today. I took tons of pics last time I was here in 2010.

Here are some pics from the Project Runway 9 finale, which aired a couple months ago. I’m finally getting around to posting pictures from shows that have already ended. Sorry! This was definitely my favorite finale set to date. Watermarked pics are from the Lifetime website. More to come!!

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