is a full service Design Firm specializing in High End Residential and Yacht Interior projects. Our design services are offered on a project type basis for a room, a floor, or an entire house, high rise or yacht.
Barbara Segal is principle of Noir Blanc Interiors a top spatial and interior design firm providing a complete range of services from design services and full-scale construction management to the total selection of all interiors and has offices in Chicago, Rhode Island and Marina del Rey, CA.
Barbaranoirblanc@gmail.com
A Brizo Invite To Attend A Reunion In Memphis
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Today I am singing the blues, as I am going home to Memphis, Tennessee. The
first thing that comes to most peoples minds when they think of Memphis, is
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The Perfect Gift, If Money Were No Object
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If money were no object? Our paradise found would be, a dazzling historic
oceanfront estate, that is superbly sited on 4.3 acres of Newport's Gilded
A...
Back to communal living in 2009 is the trend Barbara Segal, President of Noir Blanc Interiors forecasts. Roche Bobois Mong Jang is a favorites furniture design for fun, layed back hippie living. With this economy comes peace, love and sex in the home. Clients will choose to hibernate and commune more. With the french, Roche Bobois selection of fabrics, one could design a beautiful comfortable shangra la for 2009.
Noir Blanc Interiors LLC. loves The Gravity Balans chair from Varier Furniture, retails for $1,200 and limited in quantity. The Gravity Balans chair places one's feet above the heart in a fully reclined position, which is as close it comes to zero gravity. There will only be 250 of these special edition black leather Gravity chairs worldwide, and each will be numbered and signed by designer Peter Opsvik. Giving the chair as a gift a signed added touch of authenticity.
Today is World Aids Day, a day where we are reminded of friends who have died from Aids and those that live with AIDS. There is now 33 million people living with HIV, including 2 million children. Over 2.7 million people became newly infected with the virus each year. Leaving children behind without parents, loved ones without partners, and animals without masters. Combating this epidemic is one that is near and dear to the heart of Noir Blanc Interiors family and friends.
The Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation has joyous Holiday Season cards where the card will state, "A generous gift has been made in your honor by(YOUR NAME)to the Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation." To Order: Please contact Tammie Meena at 310-491-3138. Pricing: $10.00 per card (plus $.12 sales tax per card for California residents only)
The Desperate Diva Calendar 2009 , award-winning calendar features 12 months of the Bay Area's premiere drag performers, including Heklina and Sister Roma. Produced by the AIDS Housing Alliance/SF, proceeds go to support the organization's mission of prevention homelessness for people with HIV/AIDS. The price is $20.00
Help unite in the fight against HIV/AIDS this holiday and always. AIDS is now a pandemic.
God bless the friends we have lost and our mission at Noir Blanc Interiors is to stay active in the support of contributing, supporting and involving our firm in Diffa.org, and Gifts for Life.
Keep informed at http://www.aids.gov/ and order your holiday cards this year spreading a global message to help pediatrics AIDS.
Every year I have flown to Paris for many years. First it was for romance, next I went for Fashion, then I became involved with Paris Manufacturers where I marketed and represented them in the US as I owned at 10,000 square foot showroom in the Chicago Merchandise Mart. Le Cordon Bleu sponsored a cooking school in my showroom and life for many years was fabulously all things French. Several year later I was buying for my French Stores Soiree. As a Designer and Stylist, I love to shop the Paris Antique Markets. And sun and in St. Tropez with my wealthy Yacht Clients who know the Joiedevivre of the South of France.
This October while being dedicated to LA. I am thankful for my colleagues and friends who have been sending me emails from Paris.
Autodesk, Inc., who is a leader of design and engineering software, is opening the Autodesk Gallery at One Market in San Francisco. The 16, 500 square foot Gallery, is located at One Market Street, is dedicated to the spirit of design innovation and has an interactive environment that highlights the impact of software and technology on the process of innovative design. LEED-certification, the space takes green interior design to the highest level with breath taking views, recycled material, certified renewable lumber, local manufacturing and recyclables.
The space features 20 exhibits including the California Academy of Sciences, Ford Shelby GT500, Cathedral of Christ the Light in Oakland, Calif., and the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge seismic retrofit. Here is a fabulous new space that is intended as a location for designers where we can discuss the latest in technology and be inspired by each others work. I have a long history with Autodesk, my father was one of their 1st Distributors and I worked as West Coast Advertising Director for CADalyst Magazine a trade dedicated soley to Autodesk software. Back then Bill Gates and many other Techies showed up at the after parties. This space represents a legend software company giving back to the design community.
Noir Blanc Interiors is designing a condominium residence with commanding yacht harbor, ocean, and mountain and city views at the Cove, Marina Del Rey's prestigious new high rise.
This home is surrounded by world-class amenities, impeccable service, and the newly retired client is free to indulge in private time here. Coastal living is Designer, Barbara Segal's specialty so this Sea side interior is being designed with the attention of excellent restaurants, theater, nightlife, and all the attractions of a cosmopolitan lifestyle and charms of the urban village. Entertaining friends and a private retreat for relaxing are the key elements of our clients’ interiors needs. Marina del Rey is the largest man-made pleasure boat harbor in the world and one of the great assets of Los Angeles County's 75-mile coastline.
Noir Blanc Interiors is working on the exciting new Interiors of, The Tower at Carnegie Abbey a new addition in Newport, Rhode Island, real estate. The Carnegie Tower landmark rising 220 feet above the Narragansett Bay coastline and features 80 exquisite residences on 22 stories. The building is nearing completion with private balconies provide unsurpassed vistas of the golf club, the marina and the coastline. The floors are Brazilian cherry wood and French limestone. The club offers a links-style golf course, a spa, a restaurant, tennis courts and other pools. The equestrian center is over seven miles of trails, and the marina has slips available for purchase. Just four hours from New York City and one hour from Boston this property is a relaxing and fun getaway for Noir Blanc Interior's client. The building standards are luxury all the way and the development is slated for completion spring of 2009. The Carnegie Abbey Club is known for throwing the best parties and events in Newport County!
The National Trust for Historic Preservation has included the Michigan Avenue Streetwall on this year's 11 Most Endangered list as a way of adding a national voice to the listing of the Streetwall on Landmarks Illinois' Ten Most Endangered Historic Places in Illinois, announced in April, 2008.
A lasting image of the Chicago skyline, Michigan Avenue stands as one of the world's most-recognized streets. With it’s 12-block stretch of historic buildings, dating back to the 1880s it is a virtual encyclopedia of the work of the city's best architects including Daniel Burnham and Louis Sullivan. This 12 block stretch was designated a Chicago Landmark in 2002, and now its historic character is now being threatened by the inappropriate addition of large-scale towers that retain only small portions of the original buildings or their facades. Should these development projects gain approval, they will render the local landmark ordinance ineffective as a tool for preservation of the district.
The 1893 Chicago Athletic Association, designed by Henry Ives Cobb is slated for a rooftop addition. Proposed plans are to demolish a significant portion of the vacant building's structure and several elaborate interior spaces to accommodate a multi-story, stepped, glass hotel tower. Even thought the building is protected by landmark designation and a preservation ordinance, the project has been justified on the basis that the new construction will not be visible from across the street. Nevertheless, because of the one-sided nature of the street, the mass of the tower would significantly disrupt the historic skyline as viewed from Grant Park, MillenniumPark, and the lakefront.
Growing up in Chicago with found memories of my father taking us to the Chicago Athletic Associates this issue is close to my heart and if approved, preservation advocates fear that this project will set a precedent for similar proposals within the historic district, creating a domino effect of high-rise development on a street where landmark designation was established to prevent such a situation.
"The threat to the Chicago Athletic Club particularly and the Michigan Avenue Streetwall more broadly represents the problems such intense development pressures pose on our architectural heritage," says Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. "If approved, this project, and others like it, will destroy the very National Trust for Historic Preservation is working with Landmarks Illinois and other groups to encourage strict adherence to, and enforcement of, Chicago's historic preservation ordinance.
Please help the campaign to persuade the city to issue appropriate design guidelines for this unique district, requiring all development projects to be held to the same standards.
What you can do
1.Send a letter to Mayor Daley encouraging him to support preservation of the street wall.
Every Mother's Day my father had a continuing tradition of taking us to a beautiful nursery and buying my Mother a new rose bush.
A rose garden is a much more powerful statement of enduring love, than a single rose or a bouquet. Whether it's a memory of mother doting on her bushes as if they were part of her children or the happy coincidence that roses are at the peak of their spring glory in May, there is something about Mother's Day and roses.
A rose plant is an enduring species, it can overcome adversity without much nurturing and yet produce such beauty. A rose bush lives season after season, so in May add a rose bush to your garden for Mothers' Day. Years from now you can go outside in the garden just to remember her.
Roses are nurturing, like all those things mothers are. Mothers are constantly overcoming adversity and not getting a lot of nurturing and always giving something wonderful.
Rose gardens I have planted along my life: -State Parkway, Chicago home -featured every year for it's beauty on the Dearborn Garden Walk, -Estate home of an Annapolis Vineyard in Maryland; -Ocean front court yard and cliffs at Bird Rock in LaJolla, California -Malibu Lakes, California.
As my mother told me, each time I moved on. "A rose garden is the display of beauty and it's the continuous weaving of life, and what we leave behind."
It is to the client's advantage and also the architect's, to have a trained and experienced decorator with both technical knowledge and an understanding of interior architectural detail so as to be able to assemble intelligently the proper textures, colors, furniture and objects to make a consistent room. If all these things are taken into consideration in the original planning...a great many difficulties can be anticipated.
Eleanor McMillen Brown, Interior Architecture and Decoration
The recent increases in homeowner wealth and the growing popularity of home improvement television programs have increased demand for residential design services. Recently a new divorced home owner who remodeled a beach house in Santa Monica needed to update the general décor of the home and requested design help in creating year-round outdoor living spaces.
However, this client watched home improvement television programs and had the budget for discount furniture stores. I like HGTV, however it has spurred a trend in do-it-yourself design, which could hamper employment growth of designers. Nevertheless, some clients will still hire designers for initial consultations. Free Design advice get it on TV.
MarjorieMeriweather Post spent months designing the ship,hand-selecting antiques and presiding over gold leaf accents. The refurbished ship's 30-plus cabins are available forcruises.
The original owners of the Sea Cloud, heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post and her then-husband financier E. F. Hutton, desired a craft like no other. In 1931, sparing no expense they created the largest private sailing ship ever built. In the 30s and 40s, the Sea Cloud was host to the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Sweden's King Gustavus V. Sea Cloud: The original Palm Beach yacht is docked at the Palm Beach Boat show this week. In Yacht Design, the luxury and ambiance of the Sea Clouds yacht interior cannot be duplicate. The special ambiance of Sea Cloud is the graciousness of a bygone era and the intimacy and comfort of a small European estate.
Sea Cloud frequently docked in Palm Beach during the 1930s. The 356-foot Sea Cloud has been extensively renovated, with great care taken by expert craftsmen to maintain the decor of an earlier time. At one point in her life, Post spent six months out of every year sailing with her daughter, actress Dina Merrill, and a crew of between 60-72. If you are a historical design buff this ship is not to be missed.
PALM BEACH BOAT SHOW Admission: $14, adults; $4, ages 6-12; free, children younger than 6. Show hours: noon to 7 p.m. Thursday; 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday; 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. March 30.
Tickets: www.show management.com; convention center box office; waterfront box offices at North Clematis and Evernia streets.
Spring arrives this week! At Noir Blanc Interiors we encourage you to make every room in the home a little greener. Doing the right thing for the environment is not only a good thing for the environment, it is also fashionable. Revive your bedroom with the natural theme by choosing sustainable materials like bamboo, seagrass, and organic cotton. Choose colors like celery, chocolate brown, and optic white to bring nature inside and help maintain natural beauty outdoors. Adding a pop of green in a neutral room gives energy in all the right places.
Look for recycled products, organic cottons, reusable anything that is gentle to our environment. Be eco-friendly and bringing your own bag when shopping it saves plastic bags. Design creative fun signs, reminding your family to turn off and not waste energy. Even after turning off a computer, power continues to flow to computer peripherals like printers and scanners. Switch to power strip and stop the energy from being wasted. Redefine your style this first sign of spring by making every room in the home a little greener.
The market might be down however in Interior Design there is always a big fish to catch. This $75 million dollar Orange County, California estate is on the market offering a RESORT LIFESTYLE: The Portabello Estate features a two-level grotto with a pool, two spas, a tunnel slide and a swim-up bar. Brion Jeanette, a Newport Beach architect, designed this expensive home in the llate seventies. The art deco home theater of the Portabello Estate features a stained-glass feature overhead. The estate also includes an automotive museum to house a collection of vintage and new cars, a boutique for the homeowner's jewelry collection and a cafe. The stunning half-mile of sandy beach at Emerald Bay sits below the property with rock, palm trees, grass borders and a walkway that winds along the sand’s edge. With expansive views of the Pacific Ocean, dolphin pods and tide pools, this estate at Twenty Two Emerald Bay offers one of the most stunning views on the California Coast. The value truly lies in the property itself, and not necessarily in the original structure, which was built in 1979. The home that sits on the property is a late seventies contemporary multi-level design. While it is a fantastic structure in its own right, the buyer will most likely build a new home, as the property can accommodate a 10,000+ square foot structure. What this estate needs is a rock star owner and with an appreciation of our love of this resort lifestyle design at Noir Blanc Design. President Barbara Segal of Noir Blanc Design, has worked on coastal estate projects on the coast in Annapolis, Md, Palm Beach, Florida, New Port, Rhode Island and LaJolla California and numerous Yacht Interiors. "This is an amazing gem of a design project to be had!" states Barbara Segal of Noir Blanc Interiors.
Architectural Digest annual dinner held at the grand ballroom at The Lotus Club
The Seventh Regiment Armory
Opening night Preview of the 54th Annual Winter Antiques Show in New York benefiting East Side House Settlement. There was lots to see and the crowd was big , with more than 75 dealers on display. This is a great show that runs for ten days through January 27th.
A few blocks down on 66th Street, at the famous Lotos Club was the AD100 dinner that Architectural Digest’s Paige Rense editor in chief of Architectural Digest, gives each year for the top 100 interior designers. Archetictural Digest is the most successful shelter magazine today and an invitation to this dinner is an honor in the design community.
The guest list was made up of decorators, designers, architects, writers who do the Architectural Digest stories, photographers, and AD editorial staff.
The Lotos Club is one of the oldest literary clubs in the country, founded in 170 by a group of young writers, journalists and critics. The lotus house was built in 1900 as a wedding gift by Mrs. Elliot F. Shepard for her daughter Mrs. William Jay Schieffelin. Mrs. Shepard was a daughter of William H. Vanderbilt, who was one of the original occupants of the double Vanderbilt mansion that took up the west side of the block on Fifth Avenue between 51st and 52nd Street. The clubhouse went directly from private residence to club and it retains much of the original family’s interiors. The stately oak paneled library and the grand ballroom on the second floor is where the AD 100 dinner was held. The Lotos were filled with men and women who were very happy to be among the invited. Of course the night was not complete without the song:
New York, New York
(Ebb-Kander) Start spreading the news
I'm leaving today
I want to be a part of it, New York, New York
These vagabond shoes
Are longing to stray
And make a brand new start of it New York, New York
As the President of Noir Blanc Interiors, I am looking forward to a busy 2008. Odd as it seems, the nation's mortgage crisis may deserve credit for the fact that our business is booming. The design market is thriving, and I think that has to do with the shift in the economy, "People are staying in homes longer, rather than flipping houses. So I feel my clients are now investing in their houses and buying bigger-ticket items."
A few trends that might be making their way to the interior design graveyard.
Goodbye
The all-granite kitchen and the all-stainless-steel kitchen.
The Marie Antoinette influence of damask and decadent, Baroque furniture is becoming last year's style.
Dark finishes on furniture, ebonized wood. However dark finishes just won't die in the world of retail furniture!
Hollywood Regency
The chrome black leather, Design Within Reach phase is winding down and out
Asian modern is really tired and we're all sick of seeing it
Poured-concrete kitchen and bathroom countertop
HELLO 2008
There's a push toward green. Our clients are asking us to, give them more green. Antiques are considered green, and I use them as often as possible in my interiors.
Large, overscaled patterns on fabrics and wallpaper are getting smaller and more elegant.
Multiple looks for a single room - casual/formal.
Waterworks custom metal finishes on faucets.
Golden harvest yellows, rococo pinky red and snorkel blue
Textural finishes on furniture.
Energy-efficient washers and dryers from Miele.
The Kravet Green collection of eco-friendly textiles
Benjamin Moore's low-toxicity Affinity paints.
Fireplaces in the city
Requests from clients to mix contemporary and traditional design elements.
Venetian chandeliers and Lucite furniture-like tables, headboards, vanities. They have a bit of shine and a bit of sparkle to them.
Digital wall-scape imagery. With this medium, the sky is actually not the limit and the possibilities are endless. You can take any image and translate it into a permanent wall or floor covering.
Lavastone
Upholstery is organic hopsack, fabrics will be a green
Designers doing more home for sale staging, in light of the downward housing market
At Noir Blanc Interiors we see clients are customizing rooms, "Home theaters and TV rooms are very lounge-oriented, wine cellars are adjacent to the dining room, home offices are not using traditional built-ins or office furniture but look more like libraries or sitting rooms."
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The Lotus Club stately oak paneled library.
