apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

I see an amoeba shaped coffee table. Something irregular that breaks up all the straight lines that I see in your photo.

Someone should make a quarter-oval-shaped coffee table.

That would look interesting there, where you had the rounded part on the outside corner facing what might ought to be a slightly more round chair, or whether you had the rounded part facing the sofas and squaring off the outside corner of the area.

A Noguchi table would look nice. It is amoeba shaped.

nice space, i'm in edmonton too, cambridge lofts building.

Laccio table? It's white, but far less overwhelming than the Saarinen tulip and also, the metal legs will add light (but then again, I like white on white). http://dwr.com/productdetail.cfm?id=7204
or a pair of stainless steel cubes?http://www.gusmodern.com/products1/tables-accents/ss-cube/ss-cube.shtml#ss-cube
or something small, round, glass

i say keep looking. good luck.

saarinen with the walnut table top?

kdkaboom-

Yesss. That's exactly what I was thinking. I second the tulip table with a walnut top. It would stand out from the rug, but wouldn't be just another piece of dark furniture.

@realgone - we're downtown neighbours. I'm in the Executive lofts.

The beau was also looking at a Noguchi, but it's a little out of our price range right now.

Edmontonians coming out of the woodwork -

We're in Terwillegar. Moving soon;recommendations for decent shops to hit? We're going to need to furnish a living room.

what is with all the coffee table questions recently?

anyhoo, the idea of curvy shapes is right on target. BoConcept has a couple of tables with irregular shapes that are designed to be combined. If you use one white one and one walnut one (as they are often paired in the BoConcept photos) it will be very flexible in your space and avoid being either too much white or too much wood.

Or a large, low, square glass table would also look good in this space. Bontempi makes some nice ones in bright reds, oranges, etc. or if you can't commit, start with an Ikea table and a can of spraypaint. . .

What about the Eva Zeisel coffee table rather than the Noguchi? Plenty of curves but a little less common.

http://dwr.com/productdetail.cfm?id=12076

Or maybe the Saarinen table with a marble top, rather than white or walnut, for variety.

Sorry I have no idea. I have a similar configuration with my couches and I am clueless! I personally would love the noguchi but I envision my kid cracking his head on it! I was thinking of a simple slender table in front of the largest sofa (room and board parsons with glass or walnut top) rather than a big table sqaure in front...what do people prefer?

How about a cluster of something round, along the lines of three Chinese porcelain garden stools? I'm not sure that would give you as much useful surface as you need, but the items could be arranged to follow a sort of amoeba-L with the sofa, and it's a look that doesn't say "office."

This month's Oprah Home (whatever the real name of that magazine is) showed tiger-print things in that shape.

Very cool building!

There are a lot of lines in your place and they're all very neat and tidy. Perhaps a blue or green splash of colour to mix things up a little in the center of the room. The Geo Table by Arik Levy might be nice. Check it out here

There are three pictures, just click the buttons on the lower right hand side.

There is a round Kelly Hoppen table on pg 182 of Sep Elle Decor that would look cool.

eeeck, you beat me to it.

Iverrson, you sure seem to be a big fan of Global Art Interiors...

Rafaella--coming out of the woodwork to ask, as I must know--WHERE did you see a second hand Saarinen table?
I must go see this store. I must.
Thanks.

Former Edmontonian here, weighing in:

How about a marble-topped Saarinen?

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.highbrowfurniture.com/tables/products/saarinen_coffee/%3Fpic2.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.highbrowfurniture.com/tables/products/saarinen_coffee/&h=227&

Or the surfboard table? (comes in white or black)

http://www.unicahome.com/catalog/item.asp?id=10791&PartnerID=FR

OOOH - your space is just like mine. I want to hang a curtain to divide my space, and I see that you have one - how did you do it????

I also vote Noguchi, in the wood tone. Reasonably priced repro available here, in Canada:

http://mmdh.ca/

(Okay, I admit it, I was also an Edmontonian, now happily in Montreal.)

Whatever shape you decide to go with, the table should probably be a bit larger than the one you have now.

That's a lovely space: you've done well with the way you've arranged the furniture. I'd love to see more.

So many excellent suggestions, thank you. We'll have to do some more searching around.

To answer some of the questions about furniture shops here in Edmonton. We found the Saarinen table at a store called Populuxe Retro just off of 124th Street. I discovered it with a friend when we went to Colonel Mustard's Sandwich shop (which is right across the street). Populuxe features a lot of mid-centry modern finds scooped up from the basements of old grannies or from estate sales. The owner's name is Tony and he is very good at telling you the history of all of items and their level of authenticity (or the story behind the knock-off). It's worth checking out for sure, I'm never sure what I might come across there.

As far as other stores are concerned, we're kind of limited. We bought our couches at Urban Barn (several locations around the city). They have a lot of selection as far as sizes and fabric selection. Our couch was manufactured by a company called VanGogh based out of Vancouver. Honestly, I didn't find too many stores that I liked in Edmonton. If you don't have anything against Calgary (I'm from BC and haven't bought into the whole city rivalry) it might be worth making a trip there and checking out the stores that are on 117th.

The list continues... there are a couple really modern stores (or stores that think they are modern), one called F2 Furnishings in South Edmonton Common and another that is in the same complex as Lee Valley Hardware. If you have a lot of money to spend you can go to Inspired Home Interiors (11807-105Ave). It has absolutely gorgeous furniture that I could only lust after. It's worth going just to look at. While you are there pick up a copy of Avenue magazine, they also list some sources in there.

As far as our curtains are concerned. Simple solution, Ikea. We have four separate panels hanging from Ikea's tension wire that we attached to the wall using some material we had leftover from our kitchen reno (don't mount directly on the drywall over an expanse of this size... the weight of the curtains will pull the anchor out from the wall). We usually only close the curtains at night (they're closed in this shot because I didn't want to showcase the boxes I haven't unpacked yet).

For those of you that are interested, I'll be posting more photos of the whole space on my photostream. More to come here.

Oh, Iverrson, I thought it was because you worked for that company. Since it seems all your comments refer to it. And your profile links back to it.

Do you absolutely need a coffee table? Could you put drinks on end-tables instead? To me, coffee tables just collect clutter and dust and break up the room's flow.

Just a thought.

I vote noguchi. nothing is timeless. but buy original.

see it here:

http://blueantstudio.blogspot.com/2006/09/for-apartment-therapy-house-tour-part_18.html#links

thanks

-joel