Comments (0)

By nini, February 19, 2012 18:23

Alby subway wall decoration

The subway in Stockholm (Sweden) is a really long art exhibition.

Every station has its’ own look and feel. Its’ own kind of art.

Now and then I pass the subway station at Alby (on the red line of the Stockholm subway).
The station is like a huge green cave. With cave-paintings on the walls.
Last time I passed I managed to take a picture of one of the decorations with my iPhone.
I plan to take more pictures on other parts of these walls the next time.
I love these decorations at the Alby station.

Comments (1)

By nini, February 12, 2012 17:56

I yesterday visited the Stockholm Furniture & Light fair on the only day it was open for the public (it was open only for professionals Mon-Fri). Thought there would be lots of visitors, but the fair was rather big, so it wasn’t all that bad. In Hall A, the large hall, were all the new and beautiful things. In Hall B, the small hall, were all the ordinary and not (in my eyes) so interesting things. Looked more like ordinary furniture stores there. In the passage in between you found the commerce and the cheap stuff. Not all that much though as this fair didn’t sell anything ”physically” (even though you could order from the various representatives).

I love fairs as inspiring as this one.
And I love what they had done to the exhibition areas.
I enjoyed every minute of the beautiful lines, the colors, the materials.

It felt like my eyes and my soul needed this.

Comments (0)

By nini, January 24, 2012 17:39

My kitchen is bright with its two corner windows. Love the light in it. And it is fairly big – at least compared to my previous kitchen (some very small pictures here – will update those pages one of these days, it is on the agenda). I love my table and my chairs. And my ceiling-lamp. I’ve added the windowsill to the left, there wasn’t any originally. And the floor is very nice.

But.

The kitchen is not that well organized. Our flats at the ground-floor of this building were built in 2003 where there used to be a daycare centre. They used the existing areas and puzzled in four flats. Three inside the house, one outside. Mine is one of the inside flats. (See plan of flat here).

There are a couple of things I lack in my kitchen:

• a pantry. Presently solved by a low BILLY cupboard (above right). No, I don’t have space in any of the existing cupboards for the dry stuff, unless I throw out a lot of things. (I had a pantry in my previous kitchen).
• a bigger fridge and freezer. I’d love to have them fullsize. Question is where it would be possible to put them. Haven’t solved that yet.

The corner between the low BILLY and the cupboards is also somewhat problematic. I cannot put BILLY closer than it is as I would then not be able to open the door to the cupboard furthest away.

One solution might be to remove BILLY, put in drawers instead of shelves in the bottom cup-board closest to the wall, move what’s in that cup-board into another cup-board (make space first by getting rid of anything I never use). Could work… The bottom cup-board next to it is ready to swallow a tiny dish-washer. Has all the electricity fixtures and such. But I don’t really need a dish-washer.

There is very little space to work on. Very little. I use the space on top of the stove and to the left of the sink. And sometimes the kitchen table. And to a certain extent the small cutting-board that is under the worktop with the coffe-brewer.

There is one tiny worktop to the left of the stove, and another equally small, to the right of the stove. And one in the corner by the BILLY-cupboard, where the microwave lives (and takes up all the space). Then there is another one to the right above. Occupied by all kinds of things that are frequently used.

The worktops are fake oak. I’d love to have white ones. (Just outside the kitchen is my tiny office-space).

Above is the tiny fridge/freezer. And that size is not enough for me. Even a one-person household, needs more space than that. At least if you want to cook and freeze – I don’t cook one-person meals, that’s not efficient – and want to take advantage of the better prices for larger quantities. I’d at least want a bigger freezer. To be able to squeeze in a full heights freezer and fridge here, I would have to remove the cupboards to the left. That’s a lot of work.

Have seen solutions with built-in freezer or fridge in drawers. That maybe might be a solution for the bottom cup-board here if I keep the present fridge/freezer and add a freezer with drawers. Which would mean yet one less cupboard…

The number of cupboards is OK. I could probably get rid of some of the stuff I keep in them too… to get more space.

I changed the door handles in August 2010. The old ones were those brownish pinewood ones below. Couldn’t stand those. The new ones are in brushed metal. Made quite a difference. But I would love to also exchange the doors to shiny white ones that Ikea has. Cannot afford it presently though. It’s a lot of doors. At least they are standard sizes, which was not the case in my previous kitchen.

Conclusion: new fridge and freezer full size (or new freezer in drawers), new worktops, new cup-board doors (same handles)… Well. One can always dream, right? A new, modern, flattop stove would also be nice to have…

Suggestions? Opinions? Note: I don’t have the money for a total rebuild.

Comments (0)

By nini, January 8, 2012 10:26

When I bought my present flat, I got one room less than I previously had. Went from 78 to 66 square-meters and one room less. I lost a workspace. Which I really need (why I need it is another story). Solution? I moved one cleaning cupboard from the lefthand corner above into the storagespace and squeezed in a workspace in the small hallway, on the way to the kitchen. Above is the result.

So this is what I have to make do with. Tiny, cramped, on the way to the kitchen, but it works acceptably. Being in the doorway to the kitchen makes it feel less cramped than it really is. And I get the daylight from there as well.

I only miss a space to put my scanner. So when I need to scan something I use my second iMac (an older one which normally lives in the bedroom, meant to watch movies on) on the coffee-table in the living room with the scanner.

I could put the scanner on top of the printer though. That is where I put the other printer (a fast, black and white HP printer that belongs to the housing cooperative, used to print those 144 copies info-letters I do for the housing cooperative regularly, plus other info-material to distribute – it lives under the black chair just inside the kitchen when not used). But that is not very good. Anything put on top of my color laser CAN fall to the floor… (Unfortunately happened to my camera once when downloading pictures from it – cost me SEK 1800 in repairs).

Storage to the left and the right behind my back. The opening to the left goes to the first tiny hallway and the entrance. Which means I hear every movement in the entrance to the house (despite having a piece of drapery covering the entrance door). A plus there is I hear when mail is delivered when I sit here. We have the mailboxes in the entrance to the house.

The cupboard above is also used as a linen cupboard in the spaces behind the doors. The narrow set of shelves to the right (the beech tree one) has since been moved elsewhere.

I spend far too much time in this corner…

Comments (0)

By nini, December 31, 2011 11:31

Image above found on FaceBook.

Or as Steve Jobs has said:

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” [Steve Jobs, former CEO of Apple Computer]

Things to think about at this time of the year. Happy 2012 everyone!

Comments (0)

By nini, December 27, 2011 07:45

Nowadays you can get various colorful hangers to put over the door or on the wall. Very practical and useful. Also save space and gives you new places to hang things.

They come in all priceclasses. You can either get a very expensive one, designed by Eames. Like the one above. Costs several thousand Swedish Crowns. Looks nice though.

Or you can get a cheap one from Lagerhaus.

I got the one from Lagerhaus, and I am happy about it. It costs SEK 99. I wouldn’t dream of paying several thousand SEK for a hanger. Not even when Mr Eames has designed it.

Comments (0)

By nini, December 26, 2011 15:19

This is a map of my friends on FaceBook as per this moment.

I am still wondering who is in Africa?

And why is the one in South America not showing up?

And one in Australia is not shown in her correct side of Australia.

Not very exact this …

Comments (0)

By nini, December 26, 2011 09:00

When I moved to my present apartment two years ago my ceiling lamp for the living room got damaged and the inside, thin, plastic lining got crushed at several places. It also got generally crocked.

You can clearly see the crockedness on the bottom of the lamp. Yes, I have tried to straighten it without success.

This is from another direction. No way I could get it straight.

This has annoyed me ever since because I liked that lamp and it was rather expensive. The damage was visible mostly when the lamp was lit and from certain directions. Which was bad enough.

So I took it down. Just touching the inside plastic lining made it fall into lots of little pieces. Really damaged. I’ve saved the stem with the electric fittings and the top and bottom metal ring and glass bottom. Might do something with them one day. Provided I can straighten the stem.

I’ve been looking for a new lamp for the last two years without finding anything which I both liked and could afford. I have a tendency to like designer lamps at high prices… Unfortunately I don’t have a budget for that.

I’ve replaced the damaged lamp with a simple, white ceiling lamp from IKEA. I’m really pleased with the result. It is 5 cms smaller in width than the old lamp-shade and about as much higher. Gives better light too.

The old lamp had three (3) 7W energy saving light bulbs. The new one has one (1) 11W energy saving light bulb. I tried a lot of different bulbs before chosing this one. It is also a question of how many lumen and such for the light temperature. It is pretty hard to choose a light bulb these days and get the kind of light you want.

Comments (0)

By nini, December 25, 2011 15:02

In the Swedish interior design magazine Sköna Hem 01•2012 I found this image on page  38.

The crocheted throw feels extremely familiar. Bought at a second hand market it says.

I crocheted a throw like this long ago. A gigantic square from left-over yarns. Realized some time ago (last year?) that I would never use it. So donated it to the Salvation Army shop Myrorna in Skärholmen.

Little did I know that his kind of crocheted thing this year would become THE thing to own. (No, I would personally NOT have used it had I still had it).

I am almost certain that the crocheted thrown in the picture is the one I once did.