apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

Admiring this was better than a fourth cup of espresso, as it also restored my sense of humor.

Not my personal style, but it'd be immensely fun to visit.

I love the sleeping loft and I'm a Coloradan so I also love antlers and rusty metal stuff. The farm implements do remind me of that scene in Twister when a tornado is bearing down and the protagonists look up to see really sharp pointy things swaying in the wind, about to fall on their heads.

Wow.... beautiful and amazing and terrifying all at once. Interesting contrast to the "loft-living" renderings with poured-concrete floors and barcelona chairs developers love to sell to bring yuppies into w'burg...

I'm from Colorado and I am more than a little creeped out by this. I think I can understand the rustic/ironic statements at work here, especially in Williamsburg, but, it creeps me out a bit. I'm a bit too freaked out by dirt to even imagine this people possible. Think of all the places dirt could hide.

However, maybe if there were less DETAIL type shots, and more room set shots, I'd be able to have a better feel for the space? It could actually be open and funky and whimsical...but right now, I just feel nervous.

But still - I applaud your refusal to stick to things that can be acquired with a line of credit or from a chain.

Collection of.... what exactly?

This is the Anti-Cure apartment

While I love the kitchy personal style and of course.. her first name ;).. I dont think the "thirty second rule" for dropped food would be applicable.

so cool to see this on AT
Brooklyn style, represent!

how do you keep that massive Staghorn fern alive?

I have to agree with Rachel on this one. I feel a little creeped out. I'm not sure what it is exactly. It wasn't the clutter so much as the fact that a lot of it just looks, well, dirty.
I admire somebody doing their own thing, dancing to the beat of their own drummer, etc. But I'm afraid a trip to this home would require a series of tetanus shots.

Anne Bancroft wants her crazy house from great expectations back. Seriously, its fascinating, but if I had 2000 sf, I think I would have more open spaces. Maybe Paige is using part of the space for a non-living purpose. I would also uncover those windows and let the light in, but maybe it was raining. It felt small.

Also, I could smell the must in the pictures. Do the plants kill that smell, or add to it? Maybe the lighting made it seem dirty. Or maybe the shellac. I liked the photo of the wall with all the stuff attached -- and I think the old hip joint device is wonderful. Conceptually reminds of swingle Michael or Martin Mann (whatever i'm tired) used to make. Also reminds me of wendy small photograms.

As my husband would say, Hells yeah

Uhm, what sort of drugs are involved here exactly?

There's no pleasing some of you people! First, the apartments were too IKEA, or had stratospheric decorating budgets.

Now, we've got the anti-chain, scavenged-with-hard -work-and-ingenuity look, and you're still not happy!

(just kidding. I think this is an apartment designed to elicit strong reactions.)

Half the people I know in bklyn and queens have a less developed version of this look. (Give them 17 more years.) And I suppose that's been a huge influence on all the mainstream modern baroque that we've been seeing recently.

myself, I was absolutely obsessed with antlers for several years. I've been nagging my northern wisconsin inlaws for years to send me some antlers.

I don't do the full-on baroque, but I was really grooving on the idea of an organic-shaped vase filled with antlers on a very plain table.

But my in-laws just think I'm a bit weird, and so far haven't indulged me. They sent some nice maple syrup tapped from their trees last year, though.

Thanks so much for sharing this place.

Now this is real personal style!

OMG... thanks for a good laugh, in a way I love it...

Call me if you ever decide to move and need help packing it ALL up! LOL

This apartment should have its own movie. It certainly has enough character! I actually had a soundtrack working in my head as I moved through the photos. I kept waiting for a earth shattering moment, like someone I thought was dead to be hiding out here curing cancer from the plant life.

Props for showing it to such an opinionated crowd!

and yes, I have an active imagination.

Doug, I couldn't have said it any better.

Fred: You were so drunk last night, you hung your clothes up in the closet!
Lamont: I always hang my clothes up in the closet.
Fred: Yeah, but usually you take 'em off!

Before Williamsburg became ultra-chic, artists lived rather reasonably in industrial or formerly industrial spaces. Some of them still do or are fighting to keep such spaces.

This place freaky.

The one thing I like though is the loft bed.

Jill's already said it, but I need to chime in. 17 years ago = 1989. Williamsburg was popular with artists, but this was long before it became Billburg.

No trust funds here, ladies and gentlemen.

What I find fascinating is what I mentioned above - the influence of this kind of look (popular with several of my own freaky artist friends) - on the modern baroque that we're seeing everywhere now. Those cunning purveyors of citified hipness at Urban Outfitters have been pushing a hygienic and watered-down version of this for a while. Now we're seeing it everywhere. I just found a popular (and cheap) riff on Tord Boontje yesterday - $8 dishtowels and placemats, complete with birds and deer.

I give this woman huge credit for her pioneering (though my own cup of tea is considerably more bourgeois).

sorry - just to clarify:

I didn't mean to imply that Tord Boontje is some kind of corporate shill, there - just that he is one of the designers attached to an increasingly popular aesthetic.

I get that Paige is certainly not following trends and that her place has "developed organically". Original Blues, I agree with what you've said about how interesting it is that this kind of look has shown up in a hygienic and watered-down version in trendy spots - both high and low-end.

Personally, I've decided I'm officially over it. Make that sick of it. I know I'm just one person and obviously if the masses and design junkies love this "look" it will be around for a while. Probably long enough to trickle down into Target, IKEA and the like.

Is anybody else tired of it? The whole Tord Boontje lights and curtains/Ross Menuez Fauna Pillows/faux taxidermy/real taxidermy/deerhead/antler coatrack/antler lamp/hunting lodge/sylvan inspired/ faux bois/bear/deer/rabbit/owl/woodsy/kitschy/over/it

I never really got into the whole taxidermy-and-antlers thing, but that's because an ex-husband in the mid-1990s had 10 taxidermed owls and a stuffed loon.

I don't think I'm tired of it just yet, melanie, but I'm a little disappointed to see it emerge as such a clearly identifiable trend. A lot of the lovely things get lost that way, and although I wish I were strong enough in my beliefs to just acquire what I like, regardless of trendiness, I think I'm cursed with "first off the bandwagon" syndrome.

wende - 10 owls and a stuffed loon? wow, how did you ever negotiate shared space? Did he start with, say, 15 owls, a moose head, and a loon, and you bargained him down?

If ever there was a call for an apartment big enough to house a manly den, 10 stuffed owls and a loon seems to be it.

Negotiate shared space? Pshaw!

That particular ex-husband fancied that his home (note that I don't say "our home") was a Victorian house museum. I wangled the smallest bedroom as my office when we moved to Minnesota, but I still had no control over my environment at all -- not even the pictures and furniture in "my" space. Didn't have the dollhouses then for self-expression, either.

Given my rabid territoriality over MY HOME-MY STYLE (may not be good taste, but by golly, it's MY taste), what was I thinking??? Happily, the current husband is almost opinion-free, as long as he has somewhere to sit with his computer.

Original Blues, I think I understand what you are saying. I think it's the everything-woodsy-all-at-once and the fact that it is such an identifiable trend that takes away from what could be a few really cool pieces (if used sparingly).

I don't hate trends just because they are trends. If I like something, I like it, and if I don't, I don't. My own place tends to be pared down and have simple clean-lined furnishings because that is my own preference, although I appreciate a lot of different styles. It's also a lot easier on the wallet if you just acquire the things you like over time and don't become overly concerned with having the hottest hippest thing (esp. since it won't be the hottest or hippest thing for long).

The 3rd place winner in the Smallest Coolest exemplifies what I'm talking about - milking that Sylvanian trend for all it's worth. It might look very "in" right now, but three years from now it is just going to read "Fall 05/Spring 06".

I truly believe in only positive feedback. I try not to post if I can't find a nice something or other in someone's place. This should be a forum for people to share design ideas........I've looked at this for nearly 20 minutes and I'm going to be truthful and say that this is reminding me of Silence of The Lambs and I have to go home now and hug my cat and promise her that I'll never stuff her and that I promise to dust always.

But I do think its nice of Paige to share her ideas, although I couldn't take a shower there.

There's at least two distinctly different categories of
antler-inclusive home decor.

+ the winking trendy pomo
(white porcelain antler lamps, black wire coatracks)

+gritty real deal artist-eyed taxidermy
(see above, and that gorgeous Tribeca pad from months ago that had the collection of antique wrenches that made some people nuts)

And also, perhaps, type 3: wende's ex-husband
which made me gaffaw in an embarrassing way
(thanks much)

Although, I gotta say..... I am jealous of the hugeness of the apartment (what I can see of it)... and the big windows....

Maybe I'll invite myself over with a mop and a bucket!

Guido, I remember that Tribeca apartment. It's weird, because while I usually don't go for that look, I think that couple did a fantastic job in their place. I think the key was that their place was (if I recall correctly) immaculately clean and provided a nice backdrop for their rustic treasures. They also had a mix of some modern pieces and antiques which kept it from feeling monotonous.
As for your classifications, I think the "winking trendy" will soon wane, but those who truly love taxidermy, rustic tools, etc. will continue to treasure these items and have them as part of their decor.
I also got a good chuckle from Wende's ex. What exactly does one do with a stuffed loon?

I guess you divorce him.

You mean Yoktan's Tenemant, Guido?

Collection spaces are really intersting to me because it's such a fine line for design. Yoktan had it right. Dixie's Carnival had it.

The Grid Violation from SCA didn't have it, because he didn't have enough collection and it looked like clutter. This, for me, doesn't do the collection look well because there is just a whole lot going on and I feel like there are too many things competing for my attention. But, then again, I'm not sure that this space was developed to be designerly.

About Taxidermy - I sort of love it. But, I only love it when it is either an authentic craft piece (like what you see in the Adirondack lodge) or something hysterically funny that plays off it's authentic heritage (like a stuffed chipmunk).

Once taxidermy gets too witty, or too hipster -- I don't like it. Or, if the taxidermy includes the animal digging in a box of Ritz, or holding a Coors can, then I'm not intersted.

"I never really got into the whole taxidermy-and-antlers thing, but that's because an ex-husband in the mid-1990s had 10 taxidermed owls and a stuffed loon."

Oh my lord it's a red-letter day on AT.

I have to agree with the summation beautiful, amazing, and terrifying. Quite a fascinating place! It totally makes me think of a downscale John Derian setting. (And if anyone subscribes to House and Garden, they featured his much cleaner, but still artfully-falling-apart-at-the-seams apartment, and apparently, some subscribers got so irate they cancelled and wrote vitrolic letters. The editor has the only editor's letter I ever enjoy (I find most to be totally narcisstic) and was like, "Why would anyone get so angry about someone's space?"

I agree with Original Blues. This is being emulated, in a cleaned-up fashion, by many retailers right now.

"Is anybody else tired of it? The whole Tord Boontje lights and curtains/Ross Menuez Fauna Pillows/faux taxidermy/real taxidermy/deerhead/antler coatrack/antler lamp/hunting lodge/sylvan inspired/ faux bois/bear/deer/rabbit/owl/woodsy/kitschy/over/it"

Melanie brilliantly summarizes how I've felt for a looong time. I actually laughed out loud. Man, I was tired of it from the moment I encountered my first taxidermied-chipmunk-liquor-flask thing.

But I do agree w/ what some others have said--I think Paige is very much doing her own thing, & I gotta admire that even though it's not my style at all.

I think it's neat.

of course, if I had that space...it would be worlds different.

Most of this was screaming "serial killer" and "goth teenager's dream". Also "home as nightclub". To me this seems more of an edgy entertaining/party space than a living space.

Good for Paige for deciding she doesn't want to live in a conventional space and for sticking with her idea for the long haul. When I was 16 and listening to Christian Death I'd probably have thought her apartment was the coolest place on earth. Now I just want to give it a good clean-out. But on the other hand, the kind of other-reality of her space is appealing.

Wow! There is help available for people who are hoarders. Seriously.

I agree with Kat above. I love lots of plants, I love old stuff, I love some amount of interesting clutter, and I love bringing in the birch trees... But this place is filthy. Everything needs to be dusted and vaccuumed. I would still love to tour it, though.

(Has there ever been a "tour of AT-featured apartments" done? I'd definitely love to see these places in person...)

Lots of good ideas in there, if you look. Rustic wall art could be created on an artist's canvas, using the found letters shown in pictures 28, 29. It would work in a modern setting, with the blocky letter shapes. Could be done with postcards that have interesting penmanship.

Graceful shimmering rope in picture 22, could that be somehow draped like a valance at a window?

Too many plants? Don't need a birch loft? Adapt the ideas for your own style:
http://tinyurl.com/zj76w

There's another picture I can't find right now, but it used the birch (I think), running a trio of narrow trunks from the floor to the ceiling, AGAINST the wall, flat. May have had part of the trunk removed to lie flat against the wall. It was near a window that had birch trees outside, so the separation of indoors and outdoors became somewhat blurred.

All those neat widgets and gears, they could make a great mobile. Windchime. Framed objects. They have a pleasing shape. They get lost in a jumble, but a few framed ones could make a stunning display.

I think there's something in just about every picture that can inspire a person. While I'd not care for dead animals around the house, I did frame some raven feathers. I've been feeding a pair of ravens for a couple years now (and their babies when the come along) and there are always feathers around. I also make the feathers into cat toys. Binding them with dental floss and attaching to a stick.

Reuse, repurpose, recreate. Take what's available and make it your own.

Hmmm.. I know the same type of eccentric in Jamaica Plain (Boston) who has the same type of taste and weird collections in his triple decker and enormous Bamboo-covered yard (with tents, mini houses to play in, etc.) Maybe they know each other? Attend Burning Man every year with an art car?

My husband said when looking at the rope-as-bathroom-floor-rug, "Flesh-eating bacteria would thrive there." I thought that summed it up.

It looks like a fun place to check out, like exploring a flea market/barn, but I think I would feel like I need to take a bath after I get home.

We did love the birth loft - I wish I could have seen it from a differnt perspective. But what a great expression in the collection, however. Very immense collection.

Best place I've seen in years! Would've been nice to get to get a panoramic/overview shot, though.

I like it! and I'd like to spend some time here just looking around at all the treasures... the one thing I would do different is that if I had 2000 sq. ft. I'd go for large bedroom area with a huge, cushy bed covered in old lace and vintage textiles rather than a loft sleeping area ... fascinating place (and Paige looks so familiar, has this been featured in any magazines?)

I also think that Keith LoBue would love this place too! http://www.lobue-art.com/home.html

I went to a party at Paige's once a few years ago. The pictures here did not do justice to the place. It is amazing. Some of the shots needed to be longer and the camera, well, better.

What's lost is how romantic the apartment is, in a very non-cheesey and almost masculine way, with the tools of fishing, hunting, invention and apothocary. It's a fully realized artistic vision, beautifully executed.

I think it's funny, too, that even in an apartment this anti-bourgeois, this devoted to the pre-industrial, to what's made and found, Ikea will still find its way in. Ikea is a virus!

Looks like a stage set for Jan Svenkmeyer - interesting, but looks like it would be smelly. Nice to see somthing totally different though.

"What's lost is how romantic the apartment is, in a very non-cheesey and almost masculine way, with the tools of fishing, hunting, invention and apothocary. It's a fully realized artistic vision, beautifully executed."

I can absolutely see what Jenny is saying here. This place has so many layers--I'm sure there are tons of wonderful things tucked away that you might not notice the first, second or twentieth time you visited. I feel the same way about Paige's place as I do about my grandmother's. It's cluttered with things that I wouldn't necessarily choose to surround myself with, but it's REAL. There are REAL objects with a history that goes farther back than a trip to Target or IKEA. I wish that I had the guts to have a space more like that, but I always opt out for a "cleaner" look.

And as far as clean goes, Paige has probably been sick less in the last 17 years than all of the rest of us combined. I'm kind of a clean freak (although, not a harsh chemical user), but I think that I'd be better off if I wasn't so anal. And, really, do you think this space would feel right if everything was sparkly and clean? It kind of defeats the purpose.

Does anyone else find this pretentious?

All I can think about is all of the spiders that must be hiding in all of the little corners. :( :( :(

Seriously freaking out here.

My post of 4/26/06 stands with this addition:

If it were just cleaner......

Hmm. Not feeling it. Remind's me of a Brazilian psychic's home I visited once. During my reading a bunch of mice decided to stroll around the plants. Freaky.

No to the tree house motif.

I don't get it - why are we revisiting this?

paige-
ok, just telling ya i'm a minimalist so while this isn't my style, something about your place is sorta alluring. i think it's all of the personality. have you seen amelie? remember how she had all those weird little lamps & things? it sorta reminds me of that.

i do think the whole thing would be nicer if it was taken down a notch. you know that concept of before you leave a house, take something off? kinda like that. but if you're happy, go for it.

ANYWAY, i'm very impressed by your gardening skills. i also like the found letters. it's really charming.

also, please don't store your medicine bottles in the bathroom like that. the humidity is really bad for it.

i hope you enter the green contest. :)

Wow. I am glad that Paige is healthy, but the place looks filthy although I feel the harsh photography reveals more (to the eye, not the nose) than an in-person tour would.

I can't get over the idea of "found roadkill" as home decor. This is the set of a Nine Inch Nails video for a song about Miss Haversham.

Suddenly every other space I've seen on this site seems orderly and clean. I think this is one space that isn't about design at all. It's much more about the life that takes place in it. Even the collections fade into the background.

I do admit that looking at this place makes my nose itch.

Are all those medicine bottles antique as well?

This is a health department nightmare waiting to happen. Food splatters on the wall, garbage on the kitchen floor, plants on the stove, a non-cleanable bathroom floor, and the roadkill. THE ROADKILL. When that was picked up off the highway, how many diseases and bacteria did that carcass carry? Jeepers. I'm sure Paige is nice and all, but I'm sorry, I don't think I'd want to set foot in there.

Fascinating but filthy - I would have a hard time sitting down in this place let alone eating or washing there - it looks like a hobo lives there and I can smell it even through the computer screen - individuality is great - genuine dirt is not

This place is awful! I can't believe it's on this site! Yesterday when I logged onto the site, I saw the clip about Maxwell being featured in House Beautiful and there were big letters that said, "TOSS IT." Also there was a quote about AT and its philosophy of less is more. I cannot believe this place is featured. The owner definately needs Maxwell's help STAT!

This place is an example of hoarding and pack rat syndrome, it is not an interesting example of display. In fact, she has done a disservice to any interesting pieces that might be there because you can't see them under all the layers of rust and filth.

I am shocked at this lack of restraint.

Oh and I forgot to mention, it looks like a horror picture should be filmed there.

This place is disgusting - I wouldn't want to be her neighbor - God only knows WHAT would run away from her place and into mine - if she likes living with all that junk she should have moved into a cabin in the woods of Vermont. All this 'new found' creative living in 'trendy' Williamsburg irritates the hell out of me - having lived in Williamsburg for decades before it became 'trendy' enough where you can now hale a 'yellow cab' from either side of the Bridge instead of begging a cab to take you as far as the bridge and then having to jump on the subway INTO Williamsburg. To think 2nd & 3rd generation Williamsburg residents are being pushed out of their communities to provide 'living' space like this.

I concur with Jackie.. Silence of the Lambs comes to mind. But most disturbingly, it reminds me of the house I grew up in. My folks' home is about 140 years old (in the Berkshires). Dirty. Cluttered. Disrepair at every turn. Discovering our cats' dead mice behind a chair or two is a memory this apt. brings up. Yikes!

This home? Bad mojo! Dark energy! No way would I want to sit down or walk barefoot here. Argh!

I am from alaska and this apartment reminds me of home. It has soul. It is strange how offended people are getting about the level of cleanliness in this apartment. Most buildings have mold in the walls anyway, and once you leave your house you are inundated by a battery of flesh eating bacteria...... and that is before you enter the subway.

Reminded me of a witches den and then I spotted the cross with shroud picture hanging from a door - just below a goats head? and there was a porcelain Madonna standing somewhere else in another picture. Definitely not comfortable visiting your place - glad I live far away in another country. Of course I would not be so impolite as to say this to you face to face and would probably make little gasps of 'ooh's' and 'aah's' as I ducked under the road kill and tried not to get stabbed by the deer antler. I am reminded of the plant that Morticia Adam used to feed. Very interesting and different nevertheless.

hmmm... plastic milk crates and carcasses? Not a good look...

OMG, is this where the new Silence of the Lambs movie will be shot, this is so frightening...I couldn't figure out what half the photos were, oh well to each his/her own...

Paige, I'm sorry for my previous post - I've had an attack of the guilts ever since and had no right to post smart mouthed comments particularly as I hardly live in a palace myself! Hope you forgive me and keep on enjoying your own space.

It REALLY needs to be dusted and vacuumed. I wish people would clean their homes before posting them. It makes it more enjoyable to look at. Just like if you go to your friends house and they haven't cleaned the bathroom in 6 months and you go to use the toilet and the seat is up and there is feces splattered on the bottom of the seat and you are scared but you have to pee so bad so you hover and pee instead of touching it even with toilet paper.

So, yeah, I would really like to SEE your style but I can't see through all the dust.

I like your plants.

Kind of a rawness to this. i have to say I am not sure if I could live there...but definitely void of contemporary capitalism.

There is a spirit in this space.

Hi Gehry, it was good to read your post - I agree with your spirit comment!

I can agree with everything already written. I was ESPECIALLY uncomfortable touring her pad, and kind of like looking at a car wreck (which I NEVER do), I have the feeling I need to see the show again. You know....to get more creeped out.

My first reaction was "WTF" OMG its like my fathers ideal place - fugly -like someone else said "amazing and terrifying all at once" I have to agree...the picture of the owner of this space though pretty much says it all...It looks like she would be very comfortable there...

sometimes I just want to take a shower after reading people's very conventional and stupid reactions.