apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

More than 500 pros and non-pros, from as faraway as the Philippines, Australia and Venezuela, showed their portfolios to a panel of AD judges headed by editor-in-chief Paige Rense. Tuesday, more than 20 winning designs Living Rooms, Dining Areas, Bedrooms, Kitchens and Overall Architectural Design, are being announced on the magazines website. Winning designs will also appear in future issues of the magazine, and readers can even vote on their favorite designer entries.

Living Rooms:
Judy W. Gordon (Northfield, Ill.), for a project in Glencoe, Illinois
Norman McCrary, New York, New York
Francine Martineau, Montreal, Canada
Jack Montgomery (Southbury, CT.), for a project in Fairfield, Connecticut
Margaret Rose, Sydney, Australia

Dining Areas:
Antonio R. Mendoza (The Philippines), for a project in New York, New York
Peter Pawlak, New York, New York
Sucharitha Reddy, Staten Island, New York

Kitchens:
Ron and Ruthie Bzdewka, Somerset, New Jersey
Breanna Carlson, New York, New York
Batya Kalderon-Hadani, Cresskill, New Jersey
Sheila Camera Kotur (New York), for a project in Salisbury, Connecticut
Steven Morey, Dallas, Texas

Bedrooms:
Kasia Karska (Englewood, NJ), for a project in Lake Creek, Colorado
Tamara Magel (New York), for a project in Larchmont, New York
Michael Marienthal, Chicago, Illinois

Architecture:
Helen Grubel (White Plains, NY), for a project in East Hampton, New York
Kenneth Hobgood (Raleigh, N. Caroline), Chapel Hill, North Carolina
Valerie Schweirer, Westport, Connecticut
Brent Stocker, Sunapee, New Hampshire
Cecilia Valencia (Mexico City), Monterrey, Mexico

Additionally, AD selected Outstanding Auditioners, chosen for publication in the future but not part of the online poll. They are:

Kate Bogdanoff (Brooklyn, New York)
Anastasia Harrison (Millington, NJ)
Gary Swanson (Calgary, Alberta Canada)

But the drama doesn't stop there: starting November 13th, Outstanding Living Rooms are available for voting online. Subsequent weeks will feature other rooms and categories for reader voting.

And, on December 25, the overall website Audience Favorite for the New York Open Audition participants will be announced.

But wait, theres' more! Open Auditions take the act on the road and hit Miami, Dallas and Los Angeles in the coming months.

These Open Auditions are a bold move from the conservative publication, but one that signaled that the grand dame was perhaps willing to let her tightly coiffed hair down, in an age when titles like House & Garden are folding, blogs (like this one right here!) give the immediacy of a magazine's monthly schedule a real run for the money, and online media is diverting ad dollars.

But perhaps most exciting is the fact that AD is so psyched to be tapping into the AT community to get the word out.

And coming shortly, AT interviews Margaret Dunne, Executive Editor of AD, who talked to us about the magazine and the NY Open Auditions.