apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I'm looking for a craigslist-like website that was blogged about here a while back. The main difference was that you could browse through pictures... I can't find it anymore.

meenasyaz -- Not sure if this is what you're looking for, but you can download a tool that works with firefox that previews all the pictures on CL...I LOVE it!!!

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/chicago/books-guides-resources/craigslist-image-previewer-from-craigs-toolbox-051736

Anyone else unable to access the fall colors page this morning? When I went to bed there was a measly 17 vote difference in my matchup, so I'm very eager to see the results!

Our developer is working on the problem with the contest page now....should be up and running soon!

What happened to the colors contest? I heard it was shut down due to rigged voting. That's too bad. It was such a great idea and there was so much great talent exhibited there.

ACK - A tiebreaker! The suspense is killing me :)

Sorry to be such a downer but the Colors Contest is a joke. The first rounds were plagued with voting difficulties, people unable to login and horrible mismatched faceoffs. Strong vs. strong and lame vs. lame. Then, the site malfunctions again, and now as I look at some of the remaining entries I'm astonished at the amount of "bright and bold" white, beige and grey! Apparently the colors contest doesn't require color. Maybe I'll enter my 1000 sq. ft. apartment in the Small Cool Contest.

Small Cool was limited to 850 sq ft (at least it was last year).

Maybe people misunderstood and thought the winners NEEDED the CB2 gift cards to help with color--that's all I can figure out. I was amazed to see the "Finalists" this morning, and I'm so sad for the awesome places that lost.

Um... I think that was classical22's point.

I kind of agree - I loved last year's Colors Contest, but this year there was just too much at the beginning, and too much of it was pedestrian to be worth wading through. I think it's partly because this site has grown in popularity by leaps and bounds over the last couple of years... I guess I'm a snob who misses the smaller site from the early days.

I think there are some tremendous entries in the contest and I do think there are certainly worthy contenders. As an entrant, I'm just happy I wasn't too shy to do it! Participating in the contest was fun and it took a lot for me to clean my house, learn how to photograph it, and try to present its best side.

I'm delighted that people I don't even know had some very kind and supportive things to say about my apartment. My friends, of course, we ready to chime in, too, but honestly, it's the site readers I don't know who left comment that made me smile inside.

Having written that (and hoping not to sound like sour grapes because my place didn't make it to the voting stages)--this voting system pretty much bites.

I believe (but don't know) that I somehow managed to vote for one entry two times in the same round. I also think that since judges are choosing 16 finalists, we need to see how those decisions are made. Maybe you needed to present a run down of what the editors saw and reasons they chose one entry over another.

Clearly, I'm not the only person who wonders how landlord white walls and green pillows became the criteria for a finalist. I almost wondered if the editors/judges looked around to see if there was something from CB2 in the place before considering it.

I have to agree--last year, the voting was really fun! I felt like I was rooting for specific entries, and moreover, there was a way to assess those that had merit, but maybe didn't stretch far enough to become a contender for a color contest. If I recall correctly, there were three or four "levels" that the voter could choose to describe his or her thoughts on the place. The contest felt more alive and interactive that way.

What annoyed and troubled me most this year is how vastly different my idea of a colorful apartment is from the editors here and the voters, too, I suppose. And it's hard not to conclude that the voting is somehow about choosing the better of two that aren't that good in the first place. It seemed more about pitting favorites together or pitting less than stellar work against each other to arrive at what might be the *least* indicative of what reader's actually think. I have a sense from just the few comments I've read that this is an overriding sentiment of this year's contest. I could be wrong.

Thanks for letting me "sound-off" here. I hope I don't sound like I'm ranting or crabby because I'm actually feeling really great about my entry and some of the ones that have advanced. This has been on my mind for over a week now so I thought you should know.

I don't think there's anything bad about a place full of landlord's white walls and green pillows. This is a contest to see how people use colour in an inspiring way. To me, a renter, it is inspiring to see what people can do with the limitations of a rental.
And guys, beige and white ARE colours. It is a colour contest, not a poll to see who has the brightest, boldest colours.

(oh, and just in case you're wondering, I have a big bold red rug in my living room)

It is a color contest and a design contest! That means how you've used color to DESIGN your house, rental or not. Besides, Jesse's is a rental. A well designed rental that started with white walls. Some entries were not just lacking color, but were lacking inspiring design as well.

Oh, and lucitebox - I'm glad to see an entrant speak their mind. It doesn't sound like sour grapes at all. I've been frustrated as well when trying to vote, and I didn't even have a stake in it. And congratulations for doing as well as you did, and for having the nerve to showcase your home to the world!

I agree that you can certainly do a lot with colorful accessories, beige and white. Would that I could, I'd live in an all white majorly windowed box with perfectly appointed (colorful things) around me. I have dogs and they like to make things complicated. (I've washed my flokati rug 4 times in the last 3 months.)

I think it's great to see how people work within the confines of their limitations as renters. Having said that, in my mind color should be the underpinning for the entrant's desire to even enter in the first place.

When you look at the winners last year, you see a fair amount of accessorizing with color, but I think the best entries this year (and last) were clearly using color -- integrating it into the space. Jesse's a renter and I love how committed he is to being enveloped in color. I'm not just talking about kooky kitschy colors like my own. I mean that I feel best about the entries that actually somehow "own" it. (*It* being color.)

I couldn't help but wonder if we stripped a few colorful accessories from a few of the places this year, what would we end up with in the house that shows off color? I honestly don't think that the contest (whether you're renting or you own) should come down to voting for people who make easy commitments to vases with beautiful flowers. But, if you noticed that it's easy to achieve a colorful, lively vibe that way, then I think the exercise succeeds entirely.

I might be wrong, but I thought there were a lot of entries that relied on detail shots that were banal, but surely colorful. My dishware and my pillows extant--in my mind, these things don't really add-up to designing with color.